Servo So Good

Man, I can't even tell you how lucky I feel to have gotten this crawler before the Corona lockdown started. And that it was a crawler, and not my near second choice, a Slash 4x4. I probably still would have run the Slash in the backyard, but it wouldn't have been nearly as fun as the Blazer has been.

Tip: have the Blazer and still running the stock servo? Order a replacement today and love the results. There's better steering to be had out there than what's provided stock.

I've been working on my backyard track. There are some things about it, though. It has to be out of the way enough so my wife doesn't get mad, and strong enough so my 3 year-old daughter can climb on all of it. The latter one makes it a bit tricky, since she'll climb over rockpiles and rearrange the rocks every time. I'm always looking for a new line through things with that going on.

I wanted to make a cool two meter climb out of some wood planks, but I can't guarantee my daughter won't try to climb them, so I won't. Keeping it all low and a bit spread out through the backyard keeps everyone happy.

The track is starting to wear in. There are seven obstacles dotted around a track that runs the perimeter of the backyard. It also goes under the trampoline, behind a few different sets of bushes and through a particularly nasty set of ivy. There's a stump, a wood stack, three brick piles, a tricky tree root challenge, and some precision driving that has to happen throughout the course.

Replacing the Servo

I thought after replacing the servo horn that I had possibly permanently damaged the servo itself through over-flexing[?] it. It made weird sounds, wiggled without any help, occasionally dropped out.

It all started early on, probably the second or third session. I noticed that the truck would turn left fine, but when I turned right it only went part way, then there was a whirring sound. A mechanical wheezing, if you will. I remember thinking early on "I should look into that", but then focused on the servo arm when it stripped instead. I always knew in the back of my mind that I would be having actual servo issues later on, though. In fact, I was so prepared that I already had bookmarked the servo I wanted were I to need a replacement. It has been ordered as of today.

Cruising the vistas....

It's Day 26 of the Coronavirus lockdown. I've been running the truck every good day that we've had, and we've had a few of them lately. This past week has been spent in the garden, building my RC course and running the truck. With this servo exception it has been running perfectly.

How To Tell When Your RC Servo Is Dying

All servos are different. Mine in particular is the Tactic TSX45. It's the stock servo that comes with the Axial Blazer, as well as other models I believe.

Totally seized up. Will not function.

I first noticed that the truck was having trouble sometimes getting back to going straight. Sometimes it would lull to the left, then after a quick flip of the wheel, it would straighten back out again. Over time this got to be more noticeable.

What would also occur was usually on startup, and sometimes at random times throughout a session: the front wheels would quiver side-to-side. It would stop after a bit, then later require a quick flip of the wheel, and then it just did it on its own. It got to be so bad that my 3 year-old daughter pointed it out to me once. She's 3.

The last symptom was sudden loss of response. It happened at random times, and usually would be unresponsive when I was trying to turn. I would jiggle it, then it would come back. But that didn't last long. With the other things going on as well, I got about a half a session out of it before the steering croaked altogether.


I'm not surprised this happened. In fact, I was expecting it. Everything I read and saw said that the servo was the weak link on the truck, as it is with most RTR crawlers. But after spending time with this thing, with all the various parts involved to make it run, to have one thing be a weak link..that's pretty good. It's about par with what I was expecting regarding the upgrade path of this machine. Next up would be shocks unless something else craps out.
But I admit that I helped accelerate its demise early on. I was excited, and I wanted to play with my new RC car. So I may have cranked it a little too hard and not paid attention to the servo arm catching on the truck frame. But it didn't matter. The servo and arm were bound to fail. But that's okay.

Today I had a new servo delivered: Savox SC-254MG. It cost me 25 euro. I had read good things about Savox in many places being a reliable, sturdy servo. I got a bit anxious when I ordered it, thinking it might not be the right size or something, but it's almost identical to the Tactic servo.

I bought an RTR because I wanted to play NOW and not have to risk not being able to build the thing from scratch. Looking back I probably could have done it, but I still think this RTR truck was a better decision for me. I knew I would have to get to wrenching eventually, and here we are.

I removed both front wheels for easier access. Then I detached the suspension parts near or connecting to the servo arm. Once that was done I flipped the car back over and disconnected the servo from the frame. I figured I would put it back together in reverse order I dismantled everything. Once I had the servo out, I took the wiring out, which meant I had to get to the receiver to disconnect the old one and wire in the new. After having the new servo connected, I started up the truck and tested it. It was working [whew]. I took the care to tuck the wiring back into the channels so it wasn't all over the place.
I should have mounted the servo arm onto the servo at that point, but instead I waited until after I installed the servo and was ready to remount parts. Had I gone the easier route and did it earlier I would have saved 15 minutes of annoying work. But here we are.

I took it out and ran it around for awhile. I not only did great, but it's clearly a better servo than the Tactic. Much more responsive, tighter, quicker, and stronger when climbing. It didn't get mushy like the Tactic, or turn a softer corner than you wanted. All-in-all a great little unit. It's nice to know I can replace stuff on this truck with affordable parts.

Quarantine Day 16

Getting out of the house has been a requirement for all of us nowadays. We try to get into the garden at least once a day unless the weather isn't cooperating. We're only going out for groceries now, and we're trying to make that once every two weeks.

So it goes without saying that I've been running the truck quite a bit. It's performed wonderfully. Since the initial servo horn issue, there have been no other problems with the Blazer. It's been a fantastic getaway for me, and my 3 year old loves playing with it. She likes to take it exploring in the backyard. We have large bushes running along the perimeter of the backyard, and she likes to climb around in them. I follow along in the truck as best as I can, although she's had me on more than one occasion dropping everything to pry her and the Blazer out of a jam. So we mostly stick to playing in the grass and along the track I've made up.

The Blazer can approach a brick face-on and climb over it. The angle of approach is just that good. Knowing that, I can use bricks as my measurement on other parts of the track to give the truck a handleable challenge.
I also want to keep as much of the course as natural as I can, so I'm not cluttering it up with a bunch of scrap wood. We have a wild side to our garden that has various natural weeds and things growing in it, and I've been driving a desire path through it. It's starting to look pretty good, and feels like a good challenge. It's very unstable terrain with an ivy bed and thick weed stalks sprouting up. It runs about three meters along the garden edge.

There's also a great stump in the ground, which I've now managed to clear at every approach angle I've tried. It just barely makes it, though. Super easy to get hung up. My wife keeps putting this clay pitcher on top of the stump, but my daughter takes it off every time we go in the garden. She knows we need to use it.

I'm so glad I got this truck. It's been a great inspiration to get me to go outside in these stressful times. It's making me have fun. It's working.

[Sorry, I don't have any pictures of recent fun. I took some video that I hope to have up on YouTube soon.]

A Week Later - Quarantine

I hadn't thought about writing anything about this, since I'm not a professional or anything. The Corona virus is upon us, and as of this writing we are on our 6th day of quarantine. We're locked up at home, with only grocery stores, pharmacies and gas stations available to us. It's a weird and tense time, so say the least. On top of that I just had my second root canal procedure in a month, and the left side of my face feels like it was hit by a truck.

Speaking of trucks, with exception of yesterday and today I've been out with the truck every day this week. I've gotten to the point where I'll take any weather except rain. But it's been great. Since we're staying home, we've got the backyard to play in, and my wife is cool with me building an RC course, as long as it isn't an eyesore.
So I've been working on some ideas. I've gathered scraps, strips, rocks, branches, bricks, stones...just about everything you can think of, and have started playing build-it. At first I made a small brick practice bump. That grew into a larger, more challenging surface. Then it got taller, and longer. It's looking pretty majestic.
I've been working out a lap of the circuit. I'm trying to keep it mostly out of the way of regular traffic, but still able to be seen. The lap works its way around the perimeter of the backyard, going around and through the back of things. Under the trampoline. Through the planter and right up against the neighbors fence. All-in-all a good few minutes run for a beginner. My plan is to keep it easy yet challenging, so anybody could come over, grab the controller and go. As I get better, I'll make tougher challenges.

What about the virus?

Well, thankfully RC car driving is one of those things you can do alone, in your yard, or even in an enclosed area. In a time like this, where people are being forced to stay home and have no experience how to do it, it's an absolute plus to have plenty of hobbies and things to do. It doesn't have to be RC cars, either. I'm just lucky to have one.
My family is here, my wife getting slowly used to the situation and accepting the predicament. My 3 year-old not knowing what's going on except lots of playing and mama and dada are both home all day. And the 18 year-old being terminally bored, so basically nothing new there.

I just thought of something, I haven't taken any pictures of what I've been doing lately. I took some video, and have been slowly assembling it, and we're going to have a nice couple days coming up. So maybe I'll set up a massive 3-camera shoot and see if we can get some quality action footage.

I've also decided that I'm going to turn my table back into a slot car table full time. The RC car can go practically anywhere, but the slot cars need to be on that table to operate. And if they're not up there, they're not operating. So I'll be taking a lot of the scrap wood I used to build my indoor course outside for the backyard course. If figure if I make that course look good, and not look like a bunch of scrap wood...spruce it up a little...maybe my wife will be okay with me leaving it up.

Truck's running great, by the way. No complaints. I noticed that Axial is just announcing the SCX10 III, which kind of explains why mine had a sale price. That's cool.

So if you have the stuff laying around that you always wanted to get out and play with, build, run or construct, now's the time. Don't just sit around on the internet stressing out. Make a puzzle. Paint a picture. Learn to cook. Climb with your RC car. Whatever will help you get through it.

But stay home. Be safe.

Lipo Cutoff for Axial SCX10 2

I had been a bit skittish waiting for the lipo cutoff to switch on on the Blazer. The first time I didn't wait for it to kick on, chickened-out and recharged it, but this time it happened. It kicked in as I was driving it this afternoon. This was the end of the 2nd complete battery charge since I bought the truck.
What happened was the truck started running at what felt like half power. I noticed it right away, gave a couple of throttle punches, then took it inside and charged the battery. I figured it would take about an hour and fifteen minutes to fully charge, and I was almost exactly right.

The truck also has acquired a name, coming from my 3 year-old. "Dadacar." So there you go. She loves it, by the way. She likes me to chase her around the backyard with it, and it's the perfect kind of thing to do that. Not too fast, not too spry. Tough enough for a kid to handle [within reason].

Here's Dadacar, ripping a mean line over the bricks.

It's also weird the things you'll get used to. It's been raining a lot, and I've been getting out whenever it hasn't been raining, which means lots of pretty wet conditions. Mostly surface stuff, but there's some mud, too. The truck surprisingly doesn't kick up that much mud into or on itself. I'm a bit surprised by that. The Pro Line tires G8 tires don't pick up that much mud either.

I've been looking at shocks, and it looks like I could outfit the truck with a pretty decent set for around 50 bucks or so. I think I want to get good ones, and not just mediocre replacements that aren't any better than the stock shocks. A nice set of aluminum shocks that won't leak.

No other breakages or weird anomalies to report. Dadacar has been running great.

Getting Some Backyard Time

Got some not rain today, so I went out in the backyard and tore it up a little bit. I notice I'm starting to carve out a natural path through the edges of the yard. I should probably knock that off, because if permanent tracks get carved into the grass my wife won't be too happy about it. So I'll have to vary my layout each lap a bit.

The other day I mentioned practicing driving at a high rate of speed. That was fun and all, but not long after I decided to do that at a low rate of speed, and have been practicing that ever since. I set up a small, ever-growing brick mountain to crawl over, and have been practicing doing it with no errant wheel spin or erratic movements.

Okay, more like Brick Hill, or Brick Berm, but you get the idea. A guy's gotta start somewhere.

It seems to me there's a way this thing likes to go up obstacles. It prefers you don't approach something with both wheels at the same time, but stagger them so the suspension has more to do. If you attack something straight on you risk tire spin, or at least that's something I noticed. I found it also easy to get an itchy trigger finger and punch-bloop it over stuff sometimes. Once I noticed myself doing that, it stopped.
So I think the key to driving one of these things is to be consistent, use care with the throttle, and be thoughtful in your approach and path you take over the obstacle.

My truck has way more capability than I give it credit for. It's breezing through everything.

Early on I mentioned that I would need to eventually find a throttle that I can use left-handed, but I don't think that's so important anymore. I've had enough time now that it feels pretty natural doing it this way, so I'm going to stick to it.
I also wanted to comment on the amazing battery life I've gotten so far. Being able to go a week on a charge with a 5000mAh 3S Lipo is really impressive. I absolutely expected 30 minute run times and 24 hour charge times before I bought the truck. But picking it up today knowing I had more than enough charge was a great feeling. But a week? That's averaging hour and-a-half long sessions just about every day. And the 4 AA's I put in my controller? Still working.

One Week Later - Was It Worth It?

So I've had the Axial SCX10 II Blazer for about a week or so now, and I've been picking at things here and there, but I haven't given my summary of how I feel about having purchased the truck now and what I found good/bad about it.

The Good

Everything I read about, everything I saw on YouTube, all said pretty much the same thing, and they all were right: this is a great RTR truck. Great looks, quality workmanship, everything about it has been top notch. I feel like I'm getting into the hobby on a good foot, and I'm glad I bought it.
I love being able to crawl over rocks and obstacles and look good doing it. And that I found this truck on sale, at a price significantly lower than other trucks in its range was a good thing. It made me feel much better about getting those immediate upgrades I wanted.

But out of the box the truck is great. You could take that sucker out on trails all day and have a great time with it. I'd love to do all the lights up with the light kit, and maybe I'll do that some day. Nice option to have, and it looks great from the ones I've seen.

There's lots of room for upgrading, but the stuff it comes with is pretty damn good on its own. I can see blowing loads of money to make this a sick crawler [not that it's not pretty sick already], or even just replacing failed parts with upgrades. Either way it's going to remain a great truck.


The Bad

Blazer with ProLine tires.

The first one I don't want to call truly bad, because I don't think that's fair. The Falken tires aren't bad, there's just better out there. I think the Falkens would be great tires to take out on a long trail run, going over everything and anything. They're perfectly capable of doing something like that. But they run into problems on the rocks. I think they're a bit too lively for the demands of rock crawling. They don't grab on like a tire should, and spin helplessly. I think if I was grading these tires in two categories, I'd say: trails, 8 - rocks, 4. I wish that wasn't the case with rocks, but I had a feeling it was going to be, and I'm really happy I went with the upgrade ProLine Hyrax G8 tires right away. So it's not all bad.

But this I don't understand, and maybe it's because I'm a noob at all this, or maybe not. Hopefully someone with knowledge will come by and read this some day and comment on why it is what it is. But it seems to me that the RC hobby has a thing where, no matter what vehicle you buy, there will always be that one weak spot. The one part that will break to end the first session. In the case of the Axial Blazer, it's the servo horn.
And this is going to be the last time I mention the servo horn here. But maybe I'm making a bigger deal out of this than I should be, and I'll probably look back at this and laugh in a couple years.
But I think the placement of the servo wasn't very well though out. It seems almost like an afterthought. I think they should have made it so the servo could be lowered if needed by maybe 5mm max. Something enough so that the servo horn can clear the frame rail. I mean, how do you set up such a sweet truck, then go and make a bonehead move like that? It's almost like two departments didn't talk to each other, the thing went to production and they discovered the problem there. I'm curious what other owners of this particular truck are doing about it. It's just weird that, sitting in all this sweet tech is just the dumbest thing. Makes me sad. Doesn't look like Axial has come up with a solution for replacement, either.

Summary

Servo horn issues aside, I think this was a great purchase. I'd do it all over again the same way I did before [although this time get tools]. I've been very impressed with how the truck has operated, and it's much more durable than I was expecting it to be. 3S Lipo capable, which gave me a much longer charge than I was expecting. If you're considering purchasing one, I would suggest ordering a 25T short servo horn. Install it while you're charging your first battery. Set the steering trim and you're good to go.

I wish I could take this everywhere.

Two Days Running

We got a slight break in the weather and I was finally able to spend some time outside. On Monday afternoon I got about an hour and a half of driving in, including working on and building a brick hill climb challenge. I think it'll be pretty cool once it's a little more figured out.

I tweaked the steering so it would go to the maximum without the long servo horn hitting the rail. I got okay steering out of it, but nothing great. I was still waiting on the delivery of my new, shorter servo horn. Didn't come Monday.

It came Tuesday. It was pretty much the same length as the original plastic servo horn that came with the truck, but was made of aluminum and a little thicker.

That silver aluminum object buried under all that hardware is the servo horn, or servo arm. It's one of the first adventures someone has with a ready-to-run truck. 

For the Axial SCX10 II Chevy Blazer I replaced the servo horn with one from Absima, 25 short alu servo horn [#2030038]. It was shorter than the previous horn, which was also from Absima, and it fit much better. While still hitting the frame rail, it does so after turning the wheels significantly more. In fact, it's at just about the same setting I had them at before all this occurred.

The problem with the setup is that the original plastic servo horn brushed up against the frame as well, which contributed to it going bad. If I thought I could get away with cutting or bending the frame rail so the horn wouldn't hit it, there's considerable amount of plastic mounting stuff going on in that spot. So that's not possible. Instead I had to dial in the steering just to the point before it would hit the frame rail.

Good turning radius, I think.

Granted, it's not the complete turning potential of the truck, but maybe 85%. It had an insane turning radius to begin with. If that frame rail was out of the way, or if there was a way to lower the servo a bit to give the arm a little clearance, that would help. But I can live with what I have now. The reason I rolled it back in the first place was because the tires would always rub on the body when I would turn all the way. It was almost comical the tight turn radius that could be driven.

On Tuesday I took it out for a couple of hours. It performed magnificently and made me believe again. I keep forgetting to take my camera out when we go, so there aren't pics. I have some video, but I need to work on that first.

I learned a lot with this first lesson in repair. If you don't have the part, it takes time to get it, and it might not be the right one, so you might have to get something else. Replacing a part isn't always as easy as replacing a wheel. Sometimes you have to take apart quite a few things to fix a thing. That's not a bad thing. It's just a thing. And it's important to pay attention to the tuning knobs and to make sure the settings are correct. I've gotten to checking the trim and throttle settings at the beginning of a session.

Great truck.

Sunday Cancelled Due To Weather

Nothing much to report here, except no new broken pieces. I was out for about 30 minutes today in the backyard, just running around. I think I'm finished with my speed practicing. Not that I'm worried about hurting the truck, but I'm a little worried about hurting the truck.

With that too-long servo arm installed right now, I don't have very good turning radius, so it's a bit of a pain to handle. Big loopy turns and everything. And since today is Sunday, I won't get much chance to go out again until the smaller servo arm arrives. Oh, it's been sunny with intermittent hailstorms. And cold and windy.



I'm a bit worried that I might have damaged my servo. I hope not. I won't be able to afford a new one for awhile. I stopped driving when I noticed the issue, so hopefully I caught it in time. Nothing weird is happening, but the steering does twitch occasionally. Either way I'll put in the new arm when it gets here and use it until the servo stops working.

But I gotta say this: this kind of RC truck isn't meant for ripping around and bashing. It just isn't. It's a trail and rock truck. And because of its size it's at a bit of a disadvantage, but that's what it is. So caution has to be used. It's a great truck that'll handle great, as long as you respect it for what it is.

I haven't started counting how many days I've had this first charge on my battery going. I thought the Lipo Cutoff would happen today, but I didn't get enough time. It started to rain and get nasty out.

Waiting For Tools

Not much to report here, since I can't do much. I'm still waiting on the tools so I can rebuild the servo horn and get to it. Until then I'm stuck looking at a pretty truck that doesn't steer.

Axial SCX10 2 Chevrolet Blazer with rear ride height adjustment.

Adjusting the ride height was pretty easy, once I found out how to do it. Right under the body mounts in the back are tiny screws. Undo them and you'll be able to pull the body mounts up from the posts, revealing more mounting holes. I went one hole up and the truck leveled perfectly. At first I tried two holes, but it ended up causing strain on the hood [bonnet], especially when the body clips were in. So I backed off to one hole and didn't need to go further. Any other ride height adjustment would likely be longer shocks compared to the 90mm ones that are on the truck now.

Once my hex drivers get here I'll have the truck up and running in 20 minutes. It rained pretty hard last night, so I'll have to check the backyard once I'm ready to go. It's wet now, but it's not raining anymore.

A 1:10 truck isn't really suitable for driving indoors, unless you have a lot of room. I cleared off my 20' x 10' x 5' deep slot car table, made a few obstacles, and it's pretty tight up there. Yesterday morning, before I wrecked my servo arm, I went out back and took a few laps around the grass. Even in longer, uncut over winter, slightly wet grass it runs great. My wife saw my getup on the slot car table and thought it would be fun to make a course in the backyard to run it through. I had already been thinking that, and had started looking at things I could use for good outdoor challenges. We have a big stack of bricks that I haven't done anything with. I was thinking of making a hill out of them. I've got a collection of stones and stuff like that, so I can add those. We also did half of our backyard in a few-inch-tall stone wall, to separate the grass from the plants. It's perfect height to use in a course. I also have lots of expendable wood scrap that I could build with. I'm thinking of a rope bridge, some ramps and a side wall. I have a bunch of these neon colored laundry marker thingies that would be great for stage markers. I have a feeling my wife is going to like doing this, even though she hasn't tried it. She thinks the truck is cool, but she doesn't know what I'm going to do with it yet. Once a course is set up, her competitiveness will force her to try it.

Other Noob Notes:

I'm getting better hang of the Tactic TTX300 controller. At first it felt really sensitive, and it's still a bit too sensitive for my tastes, but I'm getting used to it. I'm also getting used to right-hand drive, since I'm left-handed and thought that was going to be an issue. It felt more natural after the first hour of driving. Now I don't feel the need to look for a controller that can be swapped over. I thought it would be a bigger issue, turns out it wasn't.

I'm going to do a tire comparison between the Falkens and the Hyrax G8s. There's a big difference between the two, and I think it's super important to consider tires immediately upon first purchase. I know it sounds intimidating, especially when you're not sure what you want, but if you look for a good all-around tire, it'll be an improvement over the stock tire right away. And not just a little improvement, but a big difference. And I got these replacement tires with the wheels already installed. They're plastic wheels, but I can at least exchange them when I'm ready to.

I was surprised that I didn't figure out the rear ride-height thing sooner. There are little screws hidden all over this thing.

[NOTE: Just after writing the last sentence, my doorbell rang, and my tools showed up. I have already reinstalled the servo arm and am headed out back. Will report.]

This is what I was waiting for. Hex drivers. Nice set for 20 bucks.

SUCCESS!

I had the part replaced in 10 minutes, and after a quick coffee with my wife, was into the backyard for it's first real session. Went great. I think I'll need to go back into the servo arm and fine tune the steering a little, though. It wasn't right down the line, so it turned a bit better right than left. I need to zero out my steering control on the radio first. Otherwise, it already felt stronger and much more capable with the aluminum servo arm.
I spent about an hour outside before it started to rain again. The ground was damp, but not puddley. The grass is pretty long in parts, and there are a lot of pine needles and small branches all over. So I did get a few things caught in the truck, but otherwise had a blast. I'm definitely going to build some kind of course, though.

A few hours later - I found an issue. I feel a bit like HAL9000. There's a fault in the AE35 unit. Actually, there's a fault in the servo arm I bought. Remember how I mentioned that it was turning better right than left? Well, as I was re-re-installing it, I did some tests here at the desk and discovered that the reason why it wasn't turning left so great is that the servo arm was hitting against the inside of the chassis rail. I'm glad I caught that now. I reset my steering settings so that it stopped just before making contact, and it sorted out. It's only about 60% of the total turning ability, so I have ordered another replacement that's shorter and should give me a bit more turning radius. That should arrive sometime middle next week. Until then I'll keep the current replacement in. It's fine for outside on a trail or in the open, but it's about a 7 foot wide turn. That's pretty weak.
The servo itself doesn't seem to have any problems doing what it's told, so I don't think there's anything wrong with it. It's actually quite good.

I had the truck up at maximum speed for quite a bit today. I wanted to see if I could get and keep control of it. Since I had dialed back the steering control, I didn't have any jerky movements, which helped. I found it more fun at lower speeds, though. I tossed down some bricks and made a small pile, and it was fun going over that. This spring I'll start on the backyard course. My attic thing really isn't going to work, and I need my slot cars back up and running.

So now I have my tools and can get started on properly inspecting this truck. I'm going to go over all the parts and make sure they're securely screwed in.

Oh, and I am still running off that initial first charge of my 3S Lipo. Incredible.

First Casualty

If you’re reading this and just bought your first RC car, look at the manual, find out what tools you need, and BUY THEM IMMEDIATELY. Don’t wait like I did.
See, I thought I was being pretty smart about this whole thing. I got the right battery, and the right charger, and even fantastic replacement tires. I also got an aluminum servo horn, because I read that it’s the first piece of the car to break. This morning, just after coffee, I was going through the driving course I set up, practicing driving with one hand. I made a slight mistake and clipped the base of a cabinet with the tire, slamming both front wheels hard left. I picked it up and attempted to continue, but the steering was all wrong. I wiggled it back and forth. It sometimes turned and sometimes didn’t. It never corrected back to true straight.

Deep in the undercarriage, beneath as many parts as possible, lies an inch long servo horn. I have to dismantle pretty much everything in this shot to access it and replace it.

The other day I dug around and was able to find a hex wrench that fit most of the screws on the truck. Unfortunately, it’s one of those cheap L-arm hex wrenches, so it takes forever to screw anything in with it. But I did it anyway. I got as far as getting the old servo horn out, but the screws on the new servo horn are smaller. So now I have to wait for the tools I ordered from the shop. And wouldn’t you know it, the sun is out today. Of course.

On the left sits the original plastic servo horn, with the larger end that connects to the servo motor completely stripped. On the right is the aluminum replacement from Absima. 

So now she sits, waiting for a few simple hex drivers to arrive in the mail. I tried to get them from the hardware store, but they didn’t have what I needed. So I ordered them from the hobby shop last night. I don’t expect anything until Monday.

The ridiculous "wrench" that I had to deal with waiting for my proper tools to arrive. Took forever.

Turns out the servo arm was indeed stripped. All of the teeth were worn down to nothing. Bottom line is, a servo arm gotta be metal of some sort. Plastic isn’t strong enough to do the job. There has to be a good connection between the teeth that’s strong and solid. I'm glad I spent the extra few bucks on it when I bought the truck. I'm surprised how quickly it happened. I mean, I've read and heard enough about it, but it didn't make sense to me that they would include a part so blatantly under-equipped. To put it in perspective, the first Lipo 3s battery charge lasted longer than the servo arm. 

Also, getting stuck needing tools is a rookie move. I'm ashamed.

2 Days Later

This truck is so fun. I can't leave it alone. The weather has been so sucky since I got it, and I've spent practically the entire time indoors, waiting for the sun to come out. It's practically freezing, sideways rain, no way going out to run the truck. But that hasn't stopped me from getting my practice on in the house. My 3 year-old likes watching it go. It's been great learning how to drive the thing, dealing with walls, corners, furniture, table legs, etc.

I think the black wheels make the truck look a little meaner.

Notes

Sorry for my stream of consciousness blabber. It'll get better as time goes by. I haven't broken anything more off the truck. I took the rest of the sideview mirrors off, and I think it looks pretty good. There's just the mounting hole there now, and it's small enough not to matter. I think the door handles will survive, so I'm going to leave them in.

I noticed some oil leakage coming from my shocks, so I'm on the lookout for a good replacement set for them. These will probably hold up for now, but shocks will be on my short list. I also am thinking of a shock mount adapter so I can lift the body a little. Not a lot, just a little. I'd like to just get the G8 tires to tuck under the wheel well.

__________

This has all been a great learning experience, and continues to be. And I'm happy that things make sense, don't seem too complicated, and that it's not such a delicate thing that it can't be handled. I've hit everything in my house over the last couple of days, some things at full speed, and it handles it beautifully. I still think I could have gone with a 2S Lipo and been totally fine. I gotta say, I'm STILL on the first charge. I was not expecting this.

Real quick: I just figured out how to raise the ride height, and it's in the mounts. I found the ones on the front yesterday, but didn't see how the back worked. I looked again tonight at the back and figured it out. So I raised the rear end by one hole so it sat more level to the ground. It was a little butt heavy. NICE!

Ladies and Gentlemen, I'm proud to introduce...

The Axial SCX10 II Chevy Blazer.

I haven't come up with a name for it yet.

The Axial SCX10 II 1969 Chevrolet Blazer.

You probably already figured I would buy a crawler, as that's the big RC noob purchase these days, apparently. Well, you're not wrong. And I wear that badge proudly. So let's explain how we got to this position. 

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A couple of years ago my brother bought a drone. It was a hot summer day, and he was ready to take it on its maiden voyage. Up it went, and over, and flew out among an orange grove. We looked on and off for a week for that thing, and never found it. While we were out there I was thinking that if it was an RC car, this wouldn't have happened. Then I got to thinking about how fun it would be to have an RC car, and hell, I'm old enough to decide if I want to spend the money on it. 

But I wasn't there yet. It wasn't until I saw a video of a Jeep going through a river, only to have a kid on the other side, controlling it. Up until that point it looked so real it was hard to tell the difference. I liked the thought of that, so I started looking around on the internet for stuff. Youtube was great for that sort of thing: reviews, tips, tricks, advice, car vs car, all sorts of things. It's actually a very well covered hobby on Youtube. 

So I shopped via Youtube. I went through a number of different cars I liked, watched reviews of them, comparisons, that sort of thing. Then as my list got smaller, it came down to a handful of cars. Trucks. I should get used to saying truck. I'll start now. So my list got smaller, but each car was in a different category. It ultimately came down to two trucks, this one and a Traxxas TRX-4 Sport, and I picked this. Priced helped a lot in that decision. It also helped that the Axial platform is very well-regarded. I wanted something that was not going to require another 100 bucks in upgrades unless I wanted to give them to it. 

A shot of the Blazer box stock, just before I replaced the wheels and tires with an upgraded set.

The Traxxas TRX-4 Sport was going to need a new servo and servo arm, as the one in it apparently only runs for about an hour before breaking down. I don't know if it's true, but it showed up as a recommendation in a lot of reviews as the first suggested upgrade. 

The SCX10 II had pretty much a strong system, and didn't have many glaring suggested replacement upgrades. A few reviews suggested upgrading the servo arm, and while many said the tires were perfectly fine for trail riding, I got another set anyway. Other than that, I plan of upgrading what breaks. 

Some of the other trucks I considered early on was the Traxxas Slash 4X4, the Traxxas UDR Ultimate Desert Racer, the Red Cat Gen 7, and one or two others. The UDR would have been great, except for a couple things: the price and the fact that I don't really have that much chewable scenery where I live. There are trails, specialized areas, environments. The UDR needs a big chunk of flat land to really get going. I needed something a little more fitting to my needs. So that eliminated the UDR, and by relation the Slash. The Red Cat was also eliminated due to the extreme difficulty to find it around here. That left the two: The TRX-4 and the Blazer. 

The trucks were roughly the same price, with the Blazer being 30 bucks less expensive. But it wasn't until I started looking at parts and stuff that I saw how expensive Traxxas is. If parts are going to break, it can't break me to replace them. The Axial had less expensive parts, and a large amount of 3rd party supply. It wasn't a proprietary system like Traxxas is. I'm not hating on Traxxas. I would have totally bought a TRX-4 if I had the money, but it never could have compared to the deal I got for my stuff. 

Here it is with the new tires: Pro Line Hyrax G8 mounted on plastic bead lock wheels. They're not glued on, so I can replace the plastic with a better quality wheel at any time.

Quick word on tires. In the slot car racing world, the first thing you want to do when you buy a new slot car is to put on a good set of tires suitable to you track. It's always recommended upgrade number one, and slot car manufacturers are notorious for putting lousy rubber on their race cars. So going in I assumed the same to be true with RC. And I was right. Every reviewer had a favorite tire that they preferred to run on the trucks, and it's never the stock tire, no matter how good it might be. While I was deep diving into Youtube I came along the tire comparisons and other interesting videos, and decided to add a set of tires to the initial purchase. I chose the Hyrax G8 because I wanted a tire that was better than the Falken, yet was strong enough to be an every day tire. Plus, we have reasonable rocky and rough trails around here, so I needed a bit of a trail eater. 

The stock tires were okay, but right away I noticed things about them. They didn't sit properly, for one thing, as if they were improperly mounted. They wobbled around a bit, looking a little lame. Maybe it's poor mounting or gluing or something. They also felt overall stronger, more stiff, less giving, bouncier. Almost like they had air in them. 

The G8s were more pliable towards the other part of the tire, yet strong in the sidewall. They sat proper, and had more give in the treads. They also climbed a lot better, with nowhere near the wheelspin that the Falkens had. The G8s grabbed and gripped. The Falkens ballooned and struggled. 

Two evenings and a day [here and there] of play and discovery has passed. Here are some things that happened. I got my first break in the form of a side-view mirror. I was expecting this. Most came broken out of the box, but mine came intact. They’re held loosely in place by clips on the inside. Cheap, flimsy, plastic part. I’m taking them out today.

I ended up bringing both bumpers in: the front at the max and the rear one hole closer. This makes approach and exit angles much better, meaning you can take on more challenges. I think in doing so I might have ended up cutting/breaking the LED line to my lights. There's not much slack in that line, and I think the body may have chopped at it a bit. The light is blinking intermittently. If I can't fix it I'll detach it. 

The Pro Line G8 tires perform masterfully, and I’m glad I got them. They’re a shade larger than the Falken tires, and it causes a little rubbing in the rear in extreme circumstances. I tightened the rear shocks about a third of the way down, and that was enough to fix the problem. That reminds me: when I took the truck out of the box, it had a bit of a lean in the rear. I messed with the adjustment, but after about an hour it settled back into the right place. I assume that was due to the packaging. So if that happens to you, give it a bit and it should be better.

By the way, for those curious, it took less than an hour to charge the 3S lipo battery. I’m at the end of my 2nd day and still on my first charge. I’m very impressed by this. I was ready for long charge times and short run times, but got the opposite.

I’m also thinking that, although a great battery, I would have been totally fine with a 2S lipo. If I get a 2nd, that’s what it’ll be.

I’m also also thinking that I need a hundred buck controller. Something that’s easily programmed and has a readout. It also must have some form of sweep curve control for acceleration. My slot car controller has it, this should too.

I also think I need a different charger. This one's good and all, but it doesn't have a way to "store" batteries, like other chargers do. 

Also, I need tools, in particular long hex drivers. I found a small L-shaped one, but a lot of the screws are long and take forever with the little thing. I haven’t replaced the servo arm yet.

I made absolutely the right decision buying the Axial Blazer. I’m sure of it. It’s very well made and feels like care was taken into it. This is my first RC, but the last thing I want to happen is get some piece of crap right off the bat.

There are still things I’m trying to figure out.

Can I raise/lower ride height right now? I don't think I can, but I'm pretty sure there's a multi point shock mount I can buy for it.

The rear end is nicely built and works great.

On Order

The car has been ordered. I'm guessing it'll take until Monday or Tuesday before it gets here.

I did it.

I can't remember feeling so apprehensive about a purchase like this in a long time.

__________

Okay, so it's been an hour or so since I ordered it. I feel better about it, although I'm still a bit uptight. Did I get the right power supply? Battery? Anything else I need right off the bat? Did I even buy the right car? It's my first real RC car. I take these kinds of purchases pretty seriously. This isn't that cheap "RC" car I had when I was ten, goes in a straight line forward, or goes reverse and left.

I came to the decision to buy this particular car after doing as much research about it without actually driving it that I could do. I scoured the internet, forums, youtube, RC websites...everything I could find. I started doing this on-and-off about a year ago, with things picking up a few months ago pretty heavily.
I hadn't come to the decision of which car to buy until pretty late into the research. In fact, I not only floated between cars in a class, but I floated between classes. I couldn't decide which way I wanted to go. I kept looking, watched a lot of youtube videos, narrowed down my choices and started looking around. Some choices I took out due to price. Others due to availability in my area, and a group of other cars that seemed to display the same mechanical malfunctions or quirks through many various videos. Or the hosts say pretty much the same thing..."needs better stabilizers"..."needs better tires".... "servo arm".
I got to the point where I started price shopping, and came across one of the cars that had been on the shortlist since the beginning, on sale, and in stock. There it was. It's put up or shut up. If you don't get it now, blah blah blah.

I'd say take a guess in the comments which car you think it is, but it'll be a year from now at least before the first poor soul stumbles into this corner of the internet, the part with cobwebs on it. But yeah, pretend you don't know and take a guess. By this time next week it'll be plastered all over this blog. Until then I'll leave the blog format in it's basic state.

But anyway, I feel I should mention that there were a number of Youtube hosts that played an integral part in helping me decide on the vehicle I ultimately ended up choosing. If it wasn't for their thorough presentations and positive reviews, I might have not looked as deeply at this car as I did. I'll do a thing about those guys and how they affected my decision.

I will say this regarding my purchase: I went ahead and picked up the two most suggested upgrades when I bought the car. I feel like it was a good idea to go ahead and get it over with.

Okay, seriously. Next post will have the car in it.

A New Hobby - Let's Get To It

I come from slot cars. That's been one of my primary hobbies since I was a little kit. That and Lego. So RC is a natural fit. I have had interest in it for a number of years, and liked the racing aspect, although the cost intimidated me. There wasn't any race tracks nearby anywhere I ever lived, so I just put the idea on the shelf, or what I like to call my "crazy list".

My crazy list consists of things that would be too expensive to ask for from my wife for xmas. There's a financial limit to our gift-giving, and what is over that limit ends up on the crazy list. Other things you might find on that list may or may not include:

• motorcycle
• ATV
• triple-slate pool table
• fast car [tough to pin down just one]
• fully decked-out tool bench
• ice hockey gear
• 3d printer
• etc.

You get the idea. Things that if I told them to my wife she'd roll her eyes permanently into the back of her head. So in a week or so's time from this writing, I'll have a bit of money which will go toward my first RC car. I'm not going to divulge just yet what it is, but it is what I was looking for and within my allotted budget [battery and charger included].

The Plan

This blog is going to be a report on my discoveries while learning and using RC cars, much like my slot car blog is laid out. I plan on doing in-depth exploration of my car, trying different tunings and other things, changing and adding parts, doing field coverage through YouTube, and otherwise getting as familiar with things as I can. As I learn things I'll share them with my readers, keep you updated on things happening with my RC experience and hopefully provide perspective that someone who may be looking to get into RC can appreciate and find worthy of discovery.

I don't expect that I'm going to have a whole wall full of the latest and greatest stuff. It's very likely that I'll have one car for a considerable amount of time. But I'll get down to the nuts and bolts of it, certainly. So this isn't going to really be a review site. But I'm still going to do this and share what I learn with you.

Unless something terrible happens, the next post should be the introduction of my new car. I'm totally looking forward to this and can't wait to get started!

The blog will have pics, video, links, a decent layout and other stuff shortly.

Also, I fully expect nobody to ever read this. That's okay. It's a busy world.