Jato's Bumpy Road to Fordyce

[JatoTheRipper]

I meant the stubby puller pro to replace the Slate motor.

Ah ok. Well if I get rid of the Slate then it will be replaced with a Fusion Pro or a Stubby kit and a 540M outrunner.

Solid upgrades man

If I’m not mistaken the only real downside to the GTS shocks is a slightly longer compressed length than the incision shocks. In this application it will hardly be a limiting factor

Thank you. That's interesting. I did not check the compressed lengths, but this is good to know for the future. Like you said, probably a nonissue in this case.

 

[JatoTheRipper]

I tried getting the VRD Carbon body painted, but with fall quickly approaching and the days ever getting shorter, I ran out of time. fall! I hate this season with a passion.

The motor end plate finally came in so I moved onto the Fordcye.




Out with the defective.





In with the new and here is the motor in the transmission. I decided to use the 15T pinion from my Ultra rather than the 13T stock pinion from the RTR Fordcyce. Hopefully this is enough wheelspeed on 2S and 3S. If not, I'll switch out the gearing. Not a huge deal.




I put all the wires from the motor on the right side to keep them away from the front driveshaft. Hopefully this works out well.




I also replaced the front two S8E shocks with Traxxas GTS. I then realized the preload collars do hit the stock shock towers. This will have to be fixed. It was at this point that I installed an S8E preload collar on a GTS body and it fit perfectly. Sweet! Good design choice, Vanquish. So I will have to swap out all of the preload collars. I am also torn about switching out the stock GTS shocks for the stock Fordyce springs. I think I will do that because the GTS springs seem a bit stiff.


I have a question for the resident experts on this forum. I took something apart without really paying attention to orientation. Shame on me. The photo shows the right rear shocks. The offset lower ball has the shock sitting inboard which makes it mostly vertical. Did your Fordyce come like this or did yours come with the rear lower shocks offset to the outside? The photo I took beforehand seems to show the shock offset to the outside, but then that would not match the front and it would also angle the shocks outward at the bottom. How was yours assembled - front and rear?

 

[Col_Sanders]

I put my shocks to have the spacer on the inside. Looks like thats how they do it from the factory in the pics I see.

On 3s, it should get it. 2s? 2s is for kids

 

[JatoTheRipper]

I put my shocks to have the spacer on the inside. Looks like thats how they do it from the factory in the pics I see.

On 3s, it should get it. 2s? 2s is for kids

Which pics are you referring to? In the photos on the Vanquish product page, it appears the rear shocks are angled, but I haven't seen any photos verifying this.

 

[bgredjeep]

I do the same. Spacer side in so the bottom of the shocks are further out. I don't know if it would be noticeable, but it should be more stable that way.

 

[Col_Sanders]

Search Fordyce on AMain. It is visible in one of their pics.

 

[JatoTheRipper]

Search Fordyce on AMain. It is visible in one of their pics.

I guess you are talking about this photo. Definitely appears to show the spacer on the inside especially on the left rear. Thanks for the info. Flipping this ball may allow the shock to move away from the shock tower just enough for the preload collar to clear. I will have to check.

You know it would be nice if Vanquish had decent manuals for their RTRs. The exploded diagrams are fine in some areas and complete, useless garbage in others. And most of their kit manuals have been "coming soon" for a long time now. It's really not that hard to upload a file and create a link.




That rant just gave me the thought to check the Vanquish website. From the VS4-10 Builders Kit - Straight Axle photos, I found this picture that also confirms the shocks are spaced out towards the end of the axle.

 

[twade984]

I’m not sure which kit, but one of the manuals clearly shows the shocks get mounted that way

 

[JatoTheRipper]

The electronics I removed from my VS4-10 Ultra are some spaghetti wire for sure. And there aren't that many places on the Fordcye to put a big ESC like the Mamba X especially with the BEC stuck to the side. The real estate is small in RTR form. Nothing turns girls away like bumpy (Fordyce) and small!

This may be the first time I ever moved a truck to the side because I didn't want to deal with the electronics! Time to get back to it as I want to get this truck back out on the trails.

Who's hungry for some wires?


First up, I removed the unused servo mount. I think this is for the DIG option. I didn't take many photos unfortunately. When the servo mount is removed, the side trays are left with standoffs. No idea why the parts were designed this way. Would have been cleaner to include the entire standoff with the servo mount and upon removal, you would have been left with a clean side tray. That wasn't the case, so I removed the side tray and cut off the standoffs.



Look how much frickin' room you gain by removing the servo mount and the gargantuan battery tray. The stock battery tray sits way high. I think this is mostly because it mounts to the panel above the rear axle.



Does anybody know the intended use for the grooves in the battery tray as indicated by the red question mark (?) in the image below? My guess is wire management, but I don't think I ever used this in any of my Vanquish builds.

My current plan is to trim off the yellow parts of the battery tray. I don't see why it needs to be tied to the rear chassis plate crossmember. I can then shorten the standoffs on the battery of the stock tray and lower it way down. I'll also remove the two wire management clips with the yellow box around them.

The better and more final solution is to design and print a better battery tray. That includes one for the side slider top plate. If you guys know of any existing designs that will work, please let me know. I want to run at least 2200 mAh batteries in this rig so I don't want the center tray that I used on my VRD Carbon.

 

[Col_Sanders]

The servo mount that you removed on the driver side slider was for the selectable OD on the VFD Twin. The spot right in front of the big yellow square there was for the dig servo on the VFD Twin. I think those grooves were just for wire management.

I THINK the battery tray you printed for your VRD Carbon might also fit on this chassis. There are extra mounting holes for the rear upper links on the chassis. Only problem is getting the screws in since the stock sliders are in the way. I spent about 20 seconds on that project myself, then I saw something shiny and

 

[89Industries]

As far as I know the grooves in the servo mount are just to fit some servos that have a support rib on the output side of the mounting flanges. Mostly cheaper servos with plastic case in my short experience

The servo mount you removed is for the 2 speed od on the vfd twin. Servo mount on the rear battery tray is for dig. I think they put the standoffs on the lower tray to give enough material to thread into from the top to mount the servo.

On my Phoenix, I run a 3700mAh 3s Helios shorty battery on the right side tray where you have your Rx. I put a piece of 3/16" thick closed cell foam on the tray and another small one at the base of the fender well (foam came with a lithium motorcycle battery years ago so I figured it's ok). Then route the Velcro strap under the top part of the side tray and Bob's your uncle. No printing or difficult fab needed and battery stays put even when rolling end over end down a hill.

I was able to put the Rx up front next to the steering servo, but I don't have a separate esc since I'm running a hw fusion pro in the Phoenix.

 

[bgredjeep]

Do you really need the bec in that setup. The mamba x has an 8amp (peak] internal bec. Should be plenty for pretty much any servo. I haven't needed an external bec in my mamba rigs.

 

[Col_Sanders]

Do you really need the bec in that setup. The mamba x has an 8amp (peak] internal bec. Should be plenty for pretty much any servo. I haven't needed an external bec in my mamba rigs.

I was thinking the same thing. That was one of the big selling points of the X when it came out. I'm running an old Savox 2290SG on one and dont recall of having any issues. To clean up wiring a bit more, Castle has their own sensor cables to get rid of that stupid little adapter cable and you could cut off the failure prone power switch and solder the wires together.

 

[JatoTheRipper]

Test...WTF is going on with this forum?!

 

[89Industries]

How so Jato? I haven't been having problems as far as I can tell.

 

[JatoTheRipper]

How so Jato? I haven't been having problems as far as I can tell.

Nothing, but problems since this morning.

 

[JatoTheRipper]

Gotta type some of these responses again because this site must be on the shittiest server ever created and it went down again. Of course that was while I was posting.

And again!

And yet again!

The servo mount that you removed on the driver side slider was for the selectable OD on the VFD Twin. The spot right in front of the big yellow square there was for the dig servo on the VFD Twin. I think those grooves were just for wire management.

I THINK the battery tray you printed for your VRD Carbon might also fit on this chassis. There are extra mounting holes for the rear upper links on the chassis. Only problem is getting the screws in since the stock sliders are in the way. I spent about 20 seconds on that project myself, then I saw something shiny and

Ah yeah now that you say it, I think I did use that servo mount on the Ultra build. Thank you.

I don't really want to use that tray on this build, but maybe the 2200 mAh batteries will fit. I guess I either run the 2200 on the right side slider tray and get the weight more forward or run it on the 3D printed tray that I have on my VRD Carbon and get the weight lower at the cost of being more rearward.

 

[JatoTheRipper]

As far as I know the grooves in the servo mount are just to fit some servos that have a support rib on the output side of the mounting flanges. Mostly cheaper servos with plastic case in my short experience

The servo mount you removed is for the 2 speed od on the vfd twin. Servo mount on the rear battery tray is for dig. I think they put the standoffs on the lower tray to give enough material to thread into from the top to mount the servo.

On my Phoenix, I run a 3700mAh 3s Helios shorty battery on the right side tray where you have your Rx. I put a piece of 3/16" thick closed cell foam on the tray and another small one at the base of the fender well (foam came with a lithium motorcycle battery years ago so I figured it's ok). Then route the Velcro strap under the top part of the side tray and Bob's your uncle. No printing or difficult fab needed and battery stays put even when rolling end over end down a hill.

I was able to put the Rx up front next to the steering servo, but I don't have a separate esc since I'm running a hw fusion pro in the Phoenix.

Thanks for the info.

Do you have a photo showing the foam and the Helios shorty mounted up? I'm not getting a clear picture in my head.

 

[JatoTheRipper]

Do you really need the bec in that setup. The mamba x has an 8amp (peak] internal bec. Should be plenty for pretty much any servo. I haven't needed an external bec in my mamba rigs.

I was thinking the same thing. That was one of the big selling points of the X when it came out. I'm running an old Savox 2290SG on one and dont recall of having any issues. To clean up wiring a bit more, Castle has their own sensor cables to get rid of that stupid little adapter cable and you could cut off the failure prone power switch and solder the wires together.

On my Ultra thread, I said, "It's a Sfeers servo meaning it's from China. It's not branded Reefs, but I'd be shocked if they aren't the exact same servo. I am running it at 7.4V from the BEC. My FlySky receivers can't take more than 6.0V and that's the only reason I'm using an external BEC." If the Vanquish receiver is rated at more than 6V, I probably can get rid of the BEC.

I have to say shame on Castle for not updating the Mamba X firmware since 2018!

 

[89Industries]

Here's some pics. Way simpler than you might be thinking. Not super pretty but effective.