More updates, this rig just keeps evolving. I'm determined to make a killer performer out of it...I know it's in there somewhere!
I picked up these Integy front shock towers for all of $16 each on clearance, so I had no qualms about hacking one up. Which is why I bought it! I was looking for a flat plate design to open up some shock mounting options and these were perfect. Cut off the outer shock mounts and used the holes already there for the body mounts as upper shock mounts. Laid down the shocks a bit and gave me a narrower upper mount which meant...
I could cut a hole in the body to drop it down lower since it was sitting on the front tower. Hacked off about 3/4" from the bottom and now it just looks mean!
My soul brother Al Bundy is not impressed...
He refuses to get his hair cut until he finds just the right barber - I also haven't cut mine in 8+ months. Not sure of that's a badge of honor or not. Still the funniest show ever made imo.
Anyway, so I snuck out after softball again to do some testing... 1.9's with good foams, lower CG, lots of OD, should be a pretty good performer, right? Nope. It was worse than when running the damn center diff.
Looked badass out there, but couldn't climb worth a damn. That's about as far as it would go and it would just sit there and spin. Tires flat sucked, I don't know if they needed some break-in or what, but I had better grip with the SC tires.
I brought along the swaybars and did some testing - in the end, I removed them both front and rear. I ran some lines with and without and seemed to do better without. I do have progressive rate springs in back and seems like they do the job the swaybars should do. It just seems to "stick" to the rock better overall without.
Surprisingly, still sidehilled pretty decent, but that was pretty much the only bright spot. Odd with so much OD
The OD made it far worse overall. There's just not enough weight on the front end to take advantage of it, and the front and rear are doing 2 totally different things, so it broke traction constantly. Plus the CVD's were not happy at all - lots of chatter and some cracking sounds to boot. Lots of OD definitely put some stress on them, and frankly they are the only spot I'm worried out in the drivetrain.
Ok, so back to the drawing board....
Kept the slipper and went back to the stock gears all around losing the OD. I smushed the earplugs in the center diff and they feel great, but I stripped the screw holes in the housing and the thin plastic cover is not seating correctly. POS. So it's sitting for now, and I'm not about to pony up $70 for the HD metal unit. Ridiculous. HR makes an aluminum casing, I might spring for that though. I can always use it in another truck if it doesn't work here. (I bought a 4x4 rustler slider to sop up the spare parts from these two builds)
Then I got a wild hair... I was thinking about weight distribution and kinda wishing I had a lighter motor since it's all the way in back. What am I thinking, of course I have a lighter motor! I've got a bucket of motors sitting here....I was thinking about a Holmes outrunner initially, but the output shaft had to be cut to work with the GRU. Nope. Not doing that. I already had cut the shaft on the Tamiya X-acto mini motor, so in it went. It's not a crawler motor, and it's not exactly torquey so it needs to be geared down quite a bit. But it is much lighter! Works good in my Tamiya builds, should be ok here since it's somewhat light.
I put a heatsink on that bad boy which just pokes out the existing hole in the body. The motor is not 3S rated, so I dropped back to 2S which isn't the worst thing in the world since I can use some lighter packs I had laying around from the Capra. I'm geared as low as I can go with the Slash diff gears and it's in the ballpark, but I ordered another set of 'pede gears to open up a few more gearing options.
Between the motor and battery, I dropped 110g from the chassis. Not bad!
I hacked up the tires a bit... the build I bought them for a while ago never happened, so I didn't feel too bad breaking out the scissors. Removed every other center lug and siped every other outer lug. Not sure how they'll work and they aren't pretty but they definitely feel more grippy. I did break the cardinal rule and added some weight the the front wheels - not too much, 66g per wheel. Really, it's only the last place I can add it.
Moving the weight from the chassis to the front really made a difference. It was very balanced before, but I can feel just handling it that it is now much more front heavy. According to my scales, I'm at 2445g (or 5.3lbs for those in Rio Linda) with 54% of that on the front wheels. Not bad. Fingers crossed for the next test!
So I did the walk of shame, drove home, unloaded, tore it down and found the pinion was just loose. I feel like a idiot, lol. First thing I should have checked, I should know better. Oh well. I got 1.5 batteries through it, enough to know what to change. 
