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. 

----------

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.