Preparing for Spring
 

I did some work on the MMGT:

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- The truck has had every last Phillips head screw replaced with a Socket-cap screw.

- I made suspension travel limiters to lower the ground clearance and help with roll-overs. The part list is in the slideshow. They work very well! :yes:

- I mounted the Rx on the bottom of the radio box cover and ran the antenna back up through the cover. It's pretty slick looking and it keeps the sand/water out of the Rx. Ignore the fact that the cover is cut in half...that idea never made it to fruition but, sadly, you can't "un-cut" plastic...

- I strengthened the motor mount by using another motor mount. :smile: The motor now has 4 screws into it, and 4 more holding it to the chassis mount.

- I replaced the stock POS Z-bend steering link with a custom ball-end linkage. This removed a lot of the slop from the steering.

- Gorilla Snawt was purchased and is used throughout the truck in the center transmission, F/R diff bevel gears, and in the U-joints. The diff bevel gears were difficult because the GS would end up in a ball in the corner of the diff case and not much on the bevel gears. I made a wiper out of body shell polycarbonate that keeps the GS from drifting away from the gears. It collects on the wiper and is recycled back onto the gears by its own goopiness. This works in forward and reverse.

- I bought a set of Revo CVD boots and they fit pretty well around the U-joints at the wheels. You can sort-of see them in the first picture...

- That "thing" in the radio box in white heatshrink is a per-wire ferrite ring that I made out of some small pre-wound ferrite cores from Radio Shack. I forgot to take pictures while making it... :oops:

I still need to make a wheelie bar and I'll need to buy a new battery, too. The NeuEnergy pack has lost too much capacity due to storage... It cycles at 2800mAh. :cry: I need to stick with 5s as my gearing choices are severly limited........

More updates will follow.

If the embedded slideshow doesn't work for anyone let me know and I'll just post link. :smile:

looks nice! you really grease up them diffs! Is that usual or excess? I didn't put nearly that much on my mini truggy....hmmmm

Thanks! I had put that much on to try and keep some on the gears before I came up with the wiper idea. It might be a little too much...but there definitely isn't any added friction from using too much of this stuff like there would be with regular grease.

Yeah I liked the wiper idea, pretty neat!
let us know how it holds up in the long run.

I will. It's going to be a while before all the snow in my yard melts though.

What are the rods running next to your shocks? Some kind of sway bar set up?
Never seen something set up like that.

It's explained in the OP, try reading ? :whistle:

Very clever getting the out runner in there
Looks VERY nice, excellent job !

Thanks Bondo. The transmission input shaft was pretty long and 5mm in diameter which is what gave me the idea for the outrunner. It turned out to be too short so I replaced it with this one- http://www3.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/wti0001p?&I=LXLBL8 It was a drop in fit. :smile:

Suspension travel limiters. It's mainly to limit the ground clearance. They do work like sway bars to a degree because when you go into a turn the wheels to the inside of the turn don't extend when the weight comes off of them. This phenomenon is commonly referred to as "body roll". :mdr:

Ah, thanks.

What KV ?

If you stick with the stock shocks give the RC-Raven dual rate Tmaxx springs a shot, they should help with traction roll also and they work very well with out being to stiff.
http://cgi.ebay.com/T-Maxx-E-Maxx-Bl...item564289d408

500kV. It works out to around 40mph IIRC. I haven't run it at all since these upgrades (save for a lap around the basement) so I'm not sure exactly how it will perform. I sort of want the shocks to be on the stiff side since I will be doing a lot of street driving. I think stiff springs and large hole shock pistons would be a good combo when combined with the travel limiters. Should keep body roll down for onroad but respond quickly enough to handle offroad bumps.

I forget who make them but the springs are brown/bronze and they are stiff as hell.

The advertisement says that gorilla snawt is formulated for +30,000rpm shaft speeds..The snawt is not as good as they claim? too bad you still need the "wind shield".

No no no... :smile:

The GS was transferring off of the gears onto the diff case because of it's own stickiness, not because it got flung off. I made the wiper to "intercept" the GS and keep it close to the gears. I will report on the "clingability" of the GS when I get a real chance to run the truck.

So I bought a new battery...

http://www.rc-monster.com/proddetail...=HPLG33542005S

http://www.rc-monster.com/prodimages...35-4200-XX.jpg

It fits in the same tray I'm using now which is a big plus. It also shows how far LiPo tech has come in the last year... The old pack was 3300mAH 25C and was 160x44x50mm. This new pack is 4200mAH 35C and is 137x43x46mm. I am counting on the extra punch to make starting the outrunner easier. :mdr:

Wow. That is a well thought out and very clean looking build, which is a lot to say considering the amount of fabrication.

That's gotta be the baddest MMGT out there. I dare someone to find a better one:yes:

Thanks _P_. The motor mount was deceptively easy to fabricate. More time was put into designing the cardboard stencil than was actually spent fabricating the aluminum. It's made from 0.08" 7075 T6 plate. The stuff holds a 90* bend without cracking and cuts with tin snips... :surprised:

All in all I hope it runs as good as it looks! :yes:

Video time!
 

I forgot how hard it is to drive and record at the same time! I was holding my Droid in my right hand and driving with the left.

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It runs really well! Nothing gets hot, and I was out there bashing for about 20 minutes total.

The crack you hear at the end of the video- that was my front shock tower breaking. Funny it did it then and not the 50 or so times I flipped before that...

Whats nitro, would appreciate if you could report back on the 'clingability' of gorilla snawt. Really interested to know. Thanks!

So here's the result of that "crack"...

I am replacing the diff cases with the Integy alloys. I would've preferred FLM or RCM, but Integy is literally the only MFG making alloy parts for the MMGT. They should still be stronger than the plastic ones, though.

http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g4...330_160502.jpg http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g4...330_160353.jpg

@Mothman: The GS is working well. In the pictures below you can see that there is no evidence of "slinging" in the case. Just more migrating. This is the front diff case (as you can see) which had less GS put on the gears relative to the rear diff case (which is in the slideshow above). The only place I noticed any slinging after the run was on the center U-joints, which don't have boots on them (yet). The dirt/grass would would get stuck to the GS on the U-joint, and then be flung off later, taking some of the GS with it. This will be avoided when I get the other two Revo CVD boots.

http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g4...330_160618.jpg http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g4...330_160553.jpg

I got the Integy diff cases in the mail yesterday. I'll be installing them/taking pics after work today. Yes, it's 12:49 AM so "today" is appropriate. :smile:

They appear to be better quality than I am used to with Integy parts. I'm probably going to get the Integy skid plates as well. Although Integy has an alloy replacement, the shock towers are going to stay plastic so to act as a failure point. I need to find a 17mm adapter. I have some offset beadlock wheels/tires that I want to use on this truck.

I made an "overkill" power switch for the truck, too. I could probably put this switch on the main power leads... :mdr: I'll get pics up later. I forgot to charge my phone and it died on me before I could take any.

Integy Alloy Diff Case, & Power Switch
 

The diff cases look/feel great. The alignment of the shock tower and the mounting holes in the case was off by ~1/32", so I did have to run a 1/8" drill bit through the holes to allow the screw to fit. Other than that there were no fitment problems.

http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g4...2326442564.jpg http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g4...2326945657.jpg
http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g4...2317688400.jpg http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g4...2317646151.jpg

The switch is a Cutler-Hammer Mil-spec toggle rated for 1.5HP continuous duty. I did say it was overkill, right? I like it because it has a very positive action (much more than a typical light switch in your house) and probably won't turn off on it's own. It is very securely mounted, as you can see. The screw heads on top of the switch are actually holding the switch together as well as securing it to the truck. There were 1/8" rivets in those holes before, so it was a no-brainer to run screws through there as a mounting system.

http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g4...2489974100.jpg http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g4...2490038795.jpg
http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g4...2490181083.jpg http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g4...2490262325.jpg
http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g4...2490350439.jpg http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g4...2490414104.jpg

This is a 1/12 scale, no? Or more? Anyhow, how does it compare to the other mini's, such as Mini-ST truggy etc?

I love the look of this mini though, looks super sweet. Is the alloy chassis standard?

The MGT 8.0 is 1/8 scale, the MMGT (MGT 3.0) is 1/10 scale. I don't know enough about the other trucks to make a comparison. Yeah, the alloy chassis is stock. It's pretty strong, too, since the diff/tranny cases are part of the structure.