valheru
Quarry Creeper
Owning, bashing and happily upgrading a Traxxas E-Revo VXL 1/16 since 2009, my best friend had to go out and buy himself in January 2016 a 1/10 Ruckus AND then a 1/8 Kraton 6S within a month of the first one (bastard ).
Not that I have an inferiority complex with my old reliable 1/16 Revo, especially when compared to the Kraton 6S, but high speed bashing alone gets kinda old after a while.
After countless hours of web surfing, Youtubing till my eyes bleed in the wee hours of the morning I was decided to try out or progress to a crawler/rock racer type of rig.
Therefore, mid-March 2016, I walked in my LHS here in Ottawa and left with a hole in my wallet of nearly $900 CDN, a box containing a Wraith RTR, aluminium parts, BIG LiPo batteries (compared to the 1/16 Revo that is) and a feeling of what the f... did I just get myself into again!!! :ror:
Having studied in mechanical engineering and worked in the industry of design, prototyping, fabrication, and mass production. Including as a hobby 7 years of autocross and track racing a daily driven 2005 Subaru 2.5RS, building 3 versions of normally aspirated race engines top to bottom, designing and fabricating on and off-road and race components.
And because I am a bit OCD, I tend to try my hand at building my own stuff and testing most concepts/theories myself. Which in the RC world is a good thing since the liability and risk factors are almost nil compared to 1:1 vehicles. "thumbsup"
Without further ado, here is my project Northern Progression, from the world of high speed bashing and into the realm of low speed crawling.
After reading Harley's multiple guides that are stickied (big props to Harley for the time and effort he spent on those "thumbsup"), I proceeded over the last few months to read a couple hours almost every day on crawlers in general, setups and the Wraith.
Project Northern Progression now had an objective, something to aspire to!
But first things first, and just like my 2.5RS, the following required some immediate attention on the RTR:
- Lights baby!!! :twisted:
- Lower the COG; and
- A power plant upgrade.
After playing on my CAD for an hour or two, I was satisfied with my version of a lowering kit that did not require any holes in the hood.
Then into the garage to replicate using the crudest of tools I have left since I am now a government employee and no longer have access to machine tools : a press drill with a cross-vise, a horizontal/vertical metal band saw, a combination belt/disc sander, a good assortment of drill, end-mills, files, chamfering tools, etc, and every machinist measuring tool imaginable.
In the lights department, my LHS had in stock a nice roof rack that included a 4 LED light bar that is an almost exact match to the Axial ones found on the RTR, and to increase the light output of all the LED pods on the Northern Progression I painted the reflector bowls with gloss silver paint.
Next up was a Traxxas Titan 550 21T motor with a change of pinion/spur, from the stock 20/80 to 15/87 as a starting point.
By early April 2016, my STRC C-hubs that were backorder finally arrived and I was ready to install all those nice aluminium bits I had picked up when I bought the RTR back in March:
- RC4WD inner fenders;
- STRC knuckles, C-hubs and lock-outs;
- Axial universals;
- STRC steering links;
8)
Mid-April and I quickly realized that my roof mounted light bar tends to be one of the first thing to make contact with the ground when project Northern Progression rolls over...
Back to the garage to design and fabricate my own roll over protection system (ROPS) as known in the ATV/UTV industry.
A length of a 1/8" cold drawn steel rod, a quick and dirty 2 dowel bender, my MIG, some rod ends from the plastic tree supplied with the RTR, a bit a silver paint and voila!
Also added to the build, a bit of scale and recycling ingenuity: an exhaust stack to fill the hole in the stock hood where the antenna would normally go; I used some steel fuel lines that I found on an old 2001 Subaru 2.5RS intake manifold I had lying around in my scrap pile. Once sanded to remove the rust and clear coated, it has just enough patina to look legit! :lmao:
Finally I had my first real run with project Northern Progression other than inside the house or in my backyard covered in 5 feet of snow.
Spring is in the air, its about 5 degrees Celcius, there is a bit of mud where the sun has full exposure and about a foot of snow left every where else. Me and my 8 y.o. daughter went out for some bashing and mudding with both my RCs. Good times followed by a 2 hour clean up!
8)
Not that I have an inferiority complex with my old reliable 1/16 Revo, especially when compared to the Kraton 6S, but high speed bashing alone gets kinda old after a while.
After countless hours of web surfing, Youtubing till my eyes bleed in the wee hours of the morning I was decided to try out or progress to a crawler/rock racer type of rig.
Therefore, mid-March 2016, I walked in my LHS here in Ottawa and left with a hole in my wallet of nearly $900 CDN, a box containing a Wraith RTR, aluminium parts, BIG LiPo batteries (compared to the 1/16 Revo that is) and a feeling of what the f... did I just get myself into again!!! :ror:
Having studied in mechanical engineering and worked in the industry of design, prototyping, fabrication, and mass production. Including as a hobby 7 years of autocross and track racing a daily driven 2005 Subaru 2.5RS, building 3 versions of normally aspirated race engines top to bottom, designing and fabricating on and off-road and race components.
And because I am a bit OCD, I tend to try my hand at building my own stuff and testing most concepts/theories myself. Which in the RC world is a good thing since the liability and risk factors are almost nil compared to 1:1 vehicles. "thumbsup"
Without further ado, here is my project Northern Progression, from the world of high speed bashing and into the realm of low speed crawling.
After reading Harley's multiple guides that are stickied (big props to Harley for the time and effort he spent on those "thumbsup"), I proceeded over the last few months to read a couple hours almost every day on crawlers in general, setups and the Wraith.
Project Northern Progression now had an objective, something to aspire to!
But first things first, and just like my 2.5RS, the following required some immediate attention on the RTR:
- Lights baby!!! :twisted:
- Lower the COG; and
- A power plant upgrade.
After playing on my CAD for an hour or two, I was satisfied with my version of a lowering kit that did not require any holes in the hood.
Then into the garage to replicate using the crudest of tools I have left since I am now a government employee and no longer have access to machine tools : a press drill with a cross-vise, a horizontal/vertical metal band saw, a combination belt/disc sander, a good assortment of drill, end-mills, files, chamfering tools, etc, and every machinist measuring tool imaginable.
In the lights department, my LHS had in stock a nice roof rack that included a 4 LED light bar that is an almost exact match to the Axial ones found on the RTR, and to increase the light output of all the LED pods on the Northern Progression I painted the reflector bowls with gloss silver paint.
Next up was a Traxxas Titan 550 21T motor with a change of pinion/spur, from the stock 20/80 to 15/87 as a starting point.
By early April 2016, my STRC C-hubs that were backorder finally arrived and I was ready to install all those nice aluminium bits I had picked up when I bought the RTR back in March:
- RC4WD inner fenders;
- STRC knuckles, C-hubs and lock-outs;
- Axial universals;
- STRC steering links;
8)
Mid-April and I quickly realized that my roof mounted light bar tends to be one of the first thing to make contact with the ground when project Northern Progression rolls over...
Back to the garage to design and fabricate my own roll over protection system (ROPS) as known in the ATV/UTV industry.
A length of a 1/8" cold drawn steel rod, a quick and dirty 2 dowel bender, my MIG, some rod ends from the plastic tree supplied with the RTR, a bit a silver paint and voila!
Also added to the build, a bit of scale and recycling ingenuity: an exhaust stack to fill the hole in the stock hood where the antenna would normally go; I used some steel fuel lines that I found on an old 2001 Subaru 2.5RS intake manifold I had lying around in my scrap pile. Once sanded to remove the rust and clear coated, it has just enough patina to look legit! :lmao:
Finally I had my first real run with project Northern Progression other than inside the house or in my backyard covered in 5 feet of snow.
Spring is in the air, its about 5 degrees Celcius, there is a bit of mud where the sun has full exposure and about a foot of snow left every where else. Me and my 8 y.o. daughter went out for some bashing and mudding with both my RCs. Good times followed by a 2 hour clean up!
8)
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