Conference vmszoo::rc

    Jim,
        I asked a friend of a friend ( who races at Hudson BTW)
    what he had "done" to his RC10. The answer was more like
    what hadn't he done. Turns out his "RC10" doesn't have a
    single part of a stock car. I can't remember all the names
    of who made what, this is  what I can recall..
    
    1. MRP graphite chassis
    2. Kyosho "gold" shocks and shock towers
    3. ?? differential unit
    4. ?? front suspension A units
    5. A Parma body that's for an RC10, but isn't really an RC10 Body
    
     And a variety of Trinity motors with different characteristic's,
    used as the mood strikes... 
    
        Doug

    The dog bones in my SuperShot are protected by a pair of black rubber
    boots.  Get the spares for the Frog and hot-glue them to the dogbones
    so that they extend about 3/16" over the end of the sphere.  Fill
    the boots with moly-EP grease, and mount 'em up.  The Frog replacement
    parts set is four boot ends ( boots are molded as pairs, you have
    to cut them apart to install them).  You need two Frog sets (eight
    boots) to do your 4WD completely.
    
    
    Blowup drawing:                   
    
                                Boot
                         /\/-----------
        Hot           /\/
        glue       /\/         __||__    <----put lots of grease in
          OO------/           /      \
    =========================|       |   Dogbone
          OO------\           \__  __/
                   \/\           ||    
                      \/\
                         \/\-----------
    
    
    The bad news is that it's hard to get the boots over the dogbone
    ends, and you *do* get a little extra drag/small amount of dirt
    inhaled.  The good news is the drag is small, 99.9% of the dirt
    stays out, and 99.9% of the grease stays in.  
    
    I had one boot torn (by an antenna of a vehicle I decided to drive
    over). THAT dog-bone failed.  None of the others show any wear beyond a
    slight shine. 
    
    I use hot glue because it can be scraped off with a pocket knife,
    and it sticks OK to both rubber and metal.

    There are a number of things that should be considered when trying
    to improve the performance of any car.  I know that when I first
    got my car I thought performance = speed.  I've modified my opinion
    since then and now think that performance is the result of speed,
    handling, and driver skill.  I am severly lacking in driver skill
    so I probably will not spend money trying to improve the speed of
    my car.  I am concentrating my efforts on improving the cars handling.
    The first thing I did was to rebuild my differentials (4wd). This
    dramatically improved speed and handling.  I have seen a couple
    of articles on improving the RC-10 and they always spend alot of
    time on the differential. I'm considering purchasing a higher speed
    higher tourqe servo for the steering to improve response time and
    am planning on getting an electronic speed controller for the better
    response time as well.  I rationalize that some of my bad driving
    can be attributed to poor response time in controlling the car.
    The faster the car the more critical this is. Don't forget to consider
    trying different tires as well. Depending on the surface you race
    on this can give a big performance boost as well.  With the exception
    of the electronic speed control all of these changes shouldn't cost
    alot of money.  Of course you can play with hotter motors but this
    can be exspensive.  I haven't tried any new motors yet in my Optima
    but I have played with the gear ratio's.  I ended up using the original
    gearing ratio.  The simple way to change the gear ratio is to change
    the motor pinion gear.  Smaller gears give you more tourqe at lower
    speeds but reduce your top speed.  Larger gears give you less tourqe
    but may give you higher top speeds.  Determining which is best is
    a tradeoff.  With more tourqe your car can accelerate quickly but
    may not achieve great speed on long straights.  With higher rpm's
    you can get the good speed on long straights but acceleration is
    probably less.  I found my run time went down with the larger pinion
    gears.
    
    Todd
    

    I forgot to mention the steering linkage in the my reply (-.1).
    I have found the linkage in my Optima has alot of slop (some of
    it was my fault).  I'm going to try to get most of the slop out.
    I've seen mention of kits to improve RC-10 steering. I'll post the
    refernce here when I find it.
    
    Todd
    

    The RC10 I originally purchased two years ago has had about every
    hop-up added to it that there is.  This includes the following:
    
        * Duratrax graphite chassis
    	* adjustable titanium linkage tie-rods
        * Houge ball-bearing stearing linkage
        * Stealth Tranny
    	* McAllister lowering kit
    	* Parma full-body mounting kit
    	* Andy's wide front arms and light weight rear arms
    	* Trinity ball-bearings
    	* TEKIN 411 ESC (torgue control, battery regenerating, digital
          proportional, etc.)
    	* Novak receiver
    	* Futaba 132S high-speed servo 
        * 48 Pitch spur gears from 78 - 86 teeth and a slew of 48P pinion
          gears 
    
    Now, Team Associated has the RC10 in what they call the "TEAM CAR"
    version which comes with the graphite chassis, wider front arms,
    stealth tranny, and ball bearings for approximately $189.  I have
    essentially bought my car twice by modifying it from its original
    congiguration to what it would be out of the box today. The performance
    gains in 4-minute dirt oval races has been an increase of an average of 
    32-34 laps to 36-40 laps. I generally use a 48 Pitch 81 tooth spur gear 
    and anywhere from 24-32 tooth pinion gear depending upon the battery
    being used, the motor, the competition, and rather it is a qualifying or 
    main heat.  I haven't seen the new JRX2-PRO on the ovals yet, but thus
    far the RC10s with the Stealth trannies are ripping the classic JRX2s,
    Kyoshos, and every other brand up in the 2WD classes here in K.C.
    
    
    Phil
    KCO EIS

    re. .6
    
    Phil, when you can, would you comment on the Stealth tranny?  How
    much better than the old RC10 unit do you think it is?
    
    Thanks,
    
    Greg

    re. .7
    
    Greg, I put a Stealth in my Sprint and Full-body cars.  They are now
    both significantly lighter, my stock motors seem to last a few more races
    and my acceleration and top-end speed have improved appreciably.  I was 
    averaging approximately 28-30 laps for a 4-minute race on a huge clay-oval
    in the full-body stock class and 30-32 in the sprint class.  Now, after 
    only a few of races I am averaging an extra 2-4 laps and have been 2nd TQ 
    and 1st TQ with the Full-body car, but have so far finished no better than
    2nd overall (I am not the only one with a Stealth).  I am not sure how
    much of this improvement is directly related to the Stealth though
    because I have been using the TEKIN 411 ESC as well.  With it and the
    Stealth no one has greater torque off of the starting line.  I am always
    right at the front on turn 1 no matter where I start in the field.
    
    The only thing I have not changed is my battery packs.  I use 6 and
    7-cell SCR and SCE batteries and they are not matched as well as they
    probably can be (I will be sending them in to STAGE III at the end of
    the season).  Nonetheless, I can now gear higher than ever before and
    still have plenty of juice at the end of the race.  My gear ratios now
    range from 3.24 to 2.53 as opposed to before when the lowest ratio I
    used was around 3.3.  I am very eager to see the results I can get with
    some hot well matched packs.
    
    As far as other racers are concerned, here in K.C. most of the hobby
    dealers are claiming they can not keep enough of the Stealth trannies
    in stock, but they will gladly sell you the Leathal Weapon or other
    belt trannies they have collecting dust on their shelves.  The Stealth
    is virtually maintenance free and has only a few components compared to
    the belt systems.  The setting of the differential is a one time task
    as opposed to the trial-and-error type setting on the old stock
    trannies.  
    
    The only other tranny I considered was the direct-drive style which I
    felt could yield more top-end speed on the straights, but other drivers
    I talked to seemed to very much dislike their direct-drive systems. 
    Apparently it is very difficult to pin-point the proper gearing with
    the direct-drive system and if you race on several different tracks you
    may never figure out the optimum set-up.  For the weekend racer like
    myself I do not have the time to spend several hours a week on a track
    figuring out what gearing to use before Saturdays race, I am lucky to
    get my packs cycled and charged properly through the week.
    
    
    The unfortunate thing for me is that these RC10s I bought two years ago
    and have been modifying ever since are basically now what the RC-10
    Team Car is out of the box at about $189.  Which is easily less than
    half what I have had to pay total for my two cars.  But if you already
    have all of the other hop-ups for your RC-10 then the $75 for the
    Stealth is a must to preserve your existing investment and remain
    competitive with the new RC10 and JRX-PRO.
    
    Hope this babbling helps...
    
    Regards,
    
    Phil
    KC EIS
    
    P.S. - I noticed in 3.4 that you and your son Justin were racing in
    offroad and onroad classes in Merrimack.  Are you both still into the
    sport ?  Do/did  you find it to be a good father/son quality time
    activity ?  I have a 1 year old and have visions of one day sharing
    this hobby with him, or at least that is the justification I gave to my
    wife for why I need to have 2 or 3 cars.

    re. .8
    
    Phil, thanks for the great report!  I'm developing the possibly warped
    belief that gearbox class race cars should be selected/bought/judged on
    two and only two factors: 1)they have a super-efficient, easy to
    service, adjustable gearbox (i.e. a top-notch design), 2)they have
    a long list of aftermarket manufacturers catering to them.
    
    I too have approached getting a good racer together piece by piece.
    Unfortunately for me, I chose the wrong platform to start with (Traxxas
    Bullet).  I overlooked factor 1 (above) and overestimated the
    aftermarket response to the Bullet.  So what I've ended up with is
    a very solid car that doesn't easily break and manages to make an
    A-main now and then, but really won't become a consistent winner
    without major custom mod's and the accompanying $$$ to make them!
    So what will I do?  First of all, I'll continue to race because I
    enjoy it, win or lose.  And yes, my son and I are still going at it
    together.  He's anxious to get his new JRX-Pro on the track and see
    what he can do.  While other factors are trying to drive us apart
    (14 year old hormones vs. 40 year old habits), racing and all its'
    peripheral activities pulls us together!  By all means, look to such
    a hobby as a way to "bridge the gap" that seems to naturally occur
    between parents and kids.  I feel doubly blessed now that my 9 year
    old daughter also wants to get involved: son's old Kyosho Raider
    is about to be transformed into a stadium truck racer for her.  She's
    anxious to pick out a body and get to work on a paint job.  We'll
    have lots of fun!  As for modifying my Bullet, well, who knows!  I have
    two very appealing ideas.  I either sell it and buy a car that meets
    my two factors or I spend more $$$ on custom mod's, the first of which
    would be a new tranny (now you know why I'm interested in the Stealth).
    Actually, the Losi "low-rotating-mass" tranny looks almost like a bolt-
    in!  If I end up doing it, that'll probably confirm that senility is
    taking hold of me at the tender age of 40, but it may indeed prove
    less expensive (at least in the short-term) than selling what I've
    got and starting over again.
    
    Oh well, I'm straying from the topic, better stop this now and move on.
    
    Thanks for the good info!
    
    Greg
    
    P.S.  One last note...the days of some aftermarket tranny's may be
    numbered according to ROAR.  I've heard talk of outlawing any "gearbox"
    that "contains less than three gears".  Not sure what it really means,
    but thought it might be of interest.