The best guy on here to answer your questions on the CEN is probably JHautz, he built the Matrix TR Fre that I bought off of him and let me tell you its just plain sick. Its got pretty much every upgrade/trick done to it to handle the brushless motor. Unfortunately I have like an hour of run time on it then my MMM crapped out on me and still waiting for my V3 to show up.
My tips for you are:
- Def get the Spektrum or other DSM at some point makes life much more hassle free as you dont have to worry about frequency conflicts. However if money is an issue then you can save this upgrade for later as most people are running DSM so there is usually a lot of channels available at races.
- IMO the best servos for the money are ACE, the DS1015 is just plain awesome, you may see other servos rated better, but I think the ACE's numbers are under rated and the price on them is good. They are a little power hungry and the nitro guys complain, but shouldnt be an issue in an electric truggy unless you are using a separate power pack for it.
- You def. want at least a set of bow ties and crime fighters for tires, that will give you a decent tire in most conditions, may not always be the best setup for the track but it will almost always be good. You can also mix and match them is you need more drive in the rear and more lateral grip up front run the bowties on the back and crimes on the front, etc.
- I have the Mikes mount on my Cen and it works well, but as you note above a smaller spur gear must be used with Mikes mount. Here is what JHautz wrote in his description of my truggy:
Quote:
|
. All 3 difs have been upgrades to the Hotbodies hardened dif sets for 2 reasons. The hardened HB difs are the strongest around and stand up to the insane brushless power, and the front/rear difs now run at a lower ratio (10/43) than the standard CEN difs (11/38) which allows a 46T center diff gear to be run rather than the huge (and kind of ridiculous) 66T Cen center gear. The center diff is also a Hot Bodies hardened diff set with the 46T gear. The center dif mount has been replaced with the RC-Monster.com Kyosho brushless motor mount and a matching stock Kyosho dif support. It is a direct bolt in replacement. The holes all line up perfectly. This modification lowers the diff down closer to the chassis vs. the stock diff position for a lower center of gravity and it keeps the motor mounted as low as possible also to keep the center of gravity low for better handling.
|
- Here is what he wrote regarding the 17mm hubs:
Quote:
|
the wheel hubs have all been converted to the DACE Manufacturing offset 17mm hubs so it can run any 17mm zero offset truggy wheel and be the stock width. This required installing the Cen buggy axles in the rear and adding a spacer behind the hub on the CVD to allow the correct alignment of the 17mm hubs. The spacer on the front CVDs also solves the problem of the front CVDs occasionally popping out of the front drive cups on a very hard front landing but positioning them farther into the drive cup.
|
Hope this helps you out a bit with your upgrades to the Matrix TR to get ready for racing. If you have any other questions let me know and I will try to help out.