I have cut all three material with a hand held jig saw but a band saw would probably work best. lexan is pretty flimsy if you use that make sure you use at least 1/4". 3MM Carbon fiber would be best though IMO.

Can't you find some sort machine shop or garage that will have 'scraps' laying around, you won't need much for this mod. 1/8 - 5/16 thickness will work just fine.
Where cutting is concerned, I'm currently using a few simple tools to make shapes out of aluminum.

- A nice clamp/vice to hold the material
- A hack saw... great for general shapes and lines (cuts through aluminum with no effort)
- A Dremel with cutoff wheels, a tungsten carbide cutting bits is always nice and some sanding drums.

I draw all my designs in Adobe Illustrator (you can do it by hand if you wish) and print them out... I'll lay a couple strips of masking tape on the aluminum sheet...
Then glue the drawings to the taped side (this to allow for easy removal of the paper when I am done cutting the shape). After making my cuts with the hack saw,
I'll use the cutoff wheels and sanding drums to fine tune the shape.

Carbon fiber is easy enough when you use cutoff wheels.... Just be careful with this material, the dust is not the kind of stuff you want in your longs nor eyes...
make sure you wear eye protection and a dust mask (damp)... Also make your cuts in a well ventilated area... Wetting the carbon before your cuts will reduce
the amount dust flying around too. Use a sanding drum or sandpaper to clean up edges and lines.


Countersinking both materials can be done with a countersink tool you can pick up at your local hardware. With carbon fiber I prefer you an abrasive cone shaped tool...
In stead of cutting in the material, it grinds the surface away smoothly and reduces the chances of delamination... it's also a good idea to apply some thin CA (zap) on the area
when you are done making the countersink (again reducing the chance of delamination)


http://www.dynenco.net/countersink_f...ountersink.jpg


A scroll saw would be so sweet for this too.

Like you saw on the other forum here is my bersion but my FLM chassie isn't cut:sarcastic:
this is a 4s 5000mah with a lexan homemade box
http://i265.photobucket.com/albums/i...DSCF0009-3.jpg
http://i265.photobucket.com/albums/i...DSCF0008-2.jpg

Yeah Quebec I've always liked your truck!

Although I don't see your lexan battery box I do see your homemade spoiler. Nice!

... Bad news:
http://i420.photobucket.com/albums/p...a/100_1123.jpg

http://i420.photobucket.com/albums/p...a/100_1126.jpg

Hopefully I can get this worked out before too long.

Pictures from the mountains should be up 2night.

Alien, great advice! It will certainly be my main point of reference! I can't thank you enough! All this is very exciting! Would any of these make a good tungsten carbide cutting bit?

No problem man... how the hell did that happen to your diff? Let me guess... hmmmmmmm.. too much power? :lol: Hope you get it sorted soon.

:mdr::party::wink:Too much power (i think this may become part of my sig. for awhile)to be landing difficult jumps while hard on the throttle to correct with a locked slipper.

Just got 4 more super shocks, along with a Gen IV servo saver from JD Cruson. You guys should have seen his sale! Im going to ask if I can post some of his trucks here...

Edit: Also ordered the $18 UE 8spider maintance kit with the 2 broken parts plus some. Another fan is coming my way from CC aswell. January or February this project should be almost complete.

-Zack

I think I'm going to do what jordan did except extend (give wings to) the center skid where he mounted the CD(i'm going to do that also)CLICK. He didn't give batt wings(haha see what I did there) to the center skid because he already had a GMaxx chassis.

Very exciting!!!

Alright I finally did it. And pretty much the way I said...

I wanted to see if I could do it without inverting the tire. I managed to and they run amazingly true and balance is no worse than it was, at least.

I was able to get one full run around the center as the profile is flat enough that there isn't much wrinkling with the tape. As for the outer sections, in order to get it to lay flat I used 3-4" sections overlapped at least 1/4". You have to do a zigzag crosshatch type thing to get the tape where you want it.

Major handling improvement, and didn't lose much at all on speed. I was expecting about a 5 mph drop, but apparently the weight on my Mute was keeping the diameter roughly the same on the contact patch, even while the rest of the tire was playing pufferfish. I locked a front wheel to get 2X speed with the diff and got no sign of ballooning, so theoretically they should be good for 60+. Not happening, but nice to know.

Strangely after so long with minimal wear, they are showing wear after 3 or 4 runs with the tires taped:neutral:

Not pretty, but very effective!

Cool cool I'm glad it worked out! I bet it took a while. Strange indeed about the wear. Is that some sort of tubing on the inside lips to hold the carcass open?

Those are the ring halves for the beadlocks. They were a huge help with taping, and I was careful to let the tape down slowly and not distort the natural contour of the tire. The tape made the tires significantly stiffer even unmounted, acts almost like a real tire carcass to some extent.

The beadlocks made things quite a bit easier vs. glued tires, and most of the time was just cleaning the shredded foam out and getting the tires clean inside. The compound of the ZM tires is like the rubber they make those wallwalker toys from, you have to pry it apart from itself, so the tape stuck like crazy. I'm not sure how well some tape sticks to the various compounds, but it worked great for me.

Great, good to hear redshift and good to have you posting here.

I wonder if modding my chassis in this way will prohibit me from racing. I mean the gorillamxx takes this even further and they can race.

Trying a new racing battery setup. I can't claim this setup all to myself as I've seen it done before. Pretty neat I think.
http://i420.photobucket.com/albums/p...a/100_1682.jpg

How safe are they hanging there?

I have seen it done before.
I guess as long as the straps are good the batteries are safe.

esh i dont know about that... id be worried about hitting a rut just right and slamming into the lipo...

yeah... I am thinking it goes a little more than the batteries falling off... I was also wondering about them getting struck from below during a rough run or a hard landing...

But the batteries are higher then skids. It would have to be a major rut.
It is possible though.

Yeah I won't fall off or slide forward, its got zip ties in the front and back keeping it from sliding in a lawn-dart maneuver or landing on the rear skid. You'll be pleased to hear that I won't be bashing like this, just racing where there are no big ruts. Only thing would be landing on another truck's body post which would be really hard to do.

It really helps handling but I still can't wait until I devise my own way to mount up a CD/motor mount and sling the batteries even lower on a proper tier or tray.

http://i420.photobucket.com/albums/p...a/100_1685.jpg
Super quick mock up ignore the bit holder, its there to balance the rear suspension on the chassis, and the turnbuckle links will be over the top CD plate not under. This is highly accurate though this is it.

looks trick... do you have any shots from above? also... are you ditching FLM Chassis?

No, and I will get the new cd unit in a few days. And more pics will come tomorrow I have to get a counter sink kit! I haven't decided about the shocks either... LOL I now have 8 Power Strokes and 8 Super shocks. And all the turnbuckles on the truck(6 in all) will be TRX Red Tubes. WB is 15 inches. I have to study for a bible test now! See ya!

That DD wing-mount, Mugen MB-X5T wing-stay & XRAY 808 wing (with uber-awesome UE/Supermaxx stickers) sure does look familiar! ;)

Anyway, I really like that layout, it looks great...as well as like it will work extremely well! What material is that chassis made out of?

Thanks guys! Chad you should not only recognize your wing parts but the chassis as well as it is a trimmed HCR Mutant (so its titanium of course) without a top plate sold to me by user 3.3maxx if you look hard you can see the top plate in the back ground. I ditched the top plate for several reasons, the three main reasons are as follows, some of the posts were striped, I really wanted to lay the servo down like a losi truggy and, it really gets in the way when trying to do an electric conversion.

I'm wanting to give it some kick-up as the mutant uses all rear bulks and has no kick-up. I'm thinking I'll put some shims under the bulks to give some suspension kick-up, but that'll still leave the chassis without any kick-up. What do you guys think about bending the chassis alittle and using a front bulk anyway?

Lito after talking with you in another thread you seem to think that the plastic rod ends are a bad idea and that I should use metal. Can you link me to the correct size, I'm going to be using TRX Red Tube turnbuckles and was planning on using Dubro Monster ball links which are much bigger than what you see in the picture above.

Thanks,
Zack

The rod ends are too small, might not give you the stiffness (while allowing some degree of flexibility) and might be prone to breakage. If you want to use rod ends like that, get the thicker ends from Ofna(you can use the shock ends from any 1/8 shocks). They are thicker and more durable. If you have UE's motherlode of shock parts, those rod ends will work.

I pondered about converting my JT truggy to electric before selling it but I got too lazy. You can also make a plate to connect bulkheads to the cd mount instead of using the links.

Here's my old JT truggy. I sold it last year.
http://i256.photobucket.com/albums/h...Picture031.jpg

Yessir I've seen your JT truggy before! I love it, Lito! It was one thing that made me want this Mutant. I've heard that the bottom of the chassis where the bulks attach is made for VBS thus has 4mm screw holes, counter sinks all that for 4mm. Is that right? Did you tap your bulks out to 4mm? Don't the bulks attach in different places to the skid/chassis.

If you still had it and converted it you would definently want to minimize the top plate probably to the point to just over the steering. I got this idea from the OFNA Hybrid, the use of turnbuckles. Can you direct me to some metal ones? I've seen the ones at RC4WD. BUT I should have been more clear I was planning on using TRX Red Tube turnbuckles and Dubro Monster ball links to tie bulkhead to CD to bulkhead/steering. I've used the Dubro's for 8 months now on my maxx and never broke one after breaking 10s of the 3.3 spec ones. They are bigger than OFNA. Also I'd like to note that I going to erase the red anodize on the CD plate and secure the top of the screws with another plate made out ot carbon fiber, does that make sense? Kinda like a sandwich: CD plate -- 4 turnbuckle links -- CD plate(carbon fiber). Going to do essentially the same thing where the other ends mounts to the bulks.

As far as the plate goes it would be kinda strange because the CD is at a different level than the bulk tabs.

What do you guys think about kick-up? See above post.

Thanx,
Zack

I actually have a Mutant-Maxx chassis that has been bent to have kick-up and use front bulkheads in the front, and it works great! You can't use the top-plate anymore after you bend in the kick-up, but you aren't using it anyway, so no problem there.

I like how you chopped off the rear section in order to mount the UE Mono-Block, that's cool!

Also, the JT chassis uses standard bulkheads, not VBS...only the UE VBS version uses VBS.

I saw the better pictures you have and came to think maybe the chassis does have kick-up prior to buying this one. But it doesn't. Did you bend it? If so can you give me tips about it. I don't want to mess it up. I know even titanium doesn't like being bent but the bulkhead will probably give a backbone in that spot.

Anyway, I actually haven't cut the chassis. HEHE

Thanks for the VBS confirmation.

I didn't bend my Mutant, but as long as you do it in the right place, it will be fine. I would use a front skid-plate to figure out where it needs to be bent, then make sure each side of the bend is supported, don't just try to bend it or it will just fold instead of bend right. Make sure a flat edge is across where you want it to bend so that the front section where the bulkheads mount remain flat, and the chassis behind the bend remains flat. In fact, bolt some bulks to the chassis before you bend.

A vise seems like it would be a good tool. Although I don't know if the vise will work after I have bolted it to bulks.

How do I countersink this titanium?? I've bought some hardened steel bits that work great on aluminium but they take ages to sink this titanium, like 15 mins for one hole.

I have the plastic center braces from my new RC8T-e I upgraded those right away but you can have them, just cover shipping. They mount from the front bulk area to the chassis http://aedownloads.com/kit_photos/rc8t/809114.jpg then u can at least decide if you want to go that route

I would say try titanium bits buts that wouldnt work lol.. just keep lube on it and try to keep the bit cool as possible it takes some time. Even with di grinder it took a bit to trim the rear for the Tru track kit

You need a high-quality carbide counter-sink bit...they are about $35, but they will counter-sink anything and last almost forever! They will even work on carbon-fiber without getting dull (CF dulls every cutting material except carbide, tungsten, and diamond-tipped).

Yup, carbide, and it has to be a true carbide bit. I've seen a lot of cheaper tools throw around the word carbide in the name when it was just carbide coating or an alloy with minimal carbide content.

truth!

http://i420.photobucket.com/albums/p...a/100_1745.jpg

Its a titanium HCR Mutant Maxx without top plate converted to brushless extended about 1 inch to a 15-1/2inch wheelbase. Just a couple of mm longer than a Losi 8T 2.0. The top plate is not needed as I mounted the servo flat to the chassis and use red TRX 7075 T6 billet Tubes with Dubro Monsterball links to give the chassis rigidity. The chassis also has been modified to have alittle more kickup than stock. The Mutant doesn't come with any kick up.

This is my main truck and what has become of this project. I'm building a waterproof high CG river runner/trail truck with the tons of left over parts.

Thank you guys for all your help!! What do you think? It handles very much like a BL 8T. I'm perfecting the steering but it is good.

Excellent! You did an awesome job, man...it really looks great!

Fap-tastic! Thats r/c porn right there :yes:

Got anymore photos from different angles?