R/C racing on Monday Night.

This past Monday, I took the plunge and ran my first full race with the re-bodied SC10 truck.

SC10 truck in the pits during Monday Races at Bremerton RC Raceway.

It was a real blast, but I have A LOT to learn about truck setup before I’m going to be competitive. The most challenging issue I’m facing right now, is the speed of the steering servo. It’s too fast! It makes the truck feel really loose. When hitting full throttle down the main straight, it’s very difficult to put in a little steering correction. Instead, I’m finding myself loosing control, needing to slow down, and often getting passed while trying to regain control of the truck.

The RC controller I have is made by Futaba. A well known, and respected name in Radio Control for decades. Checking through the manual, I was disheartened to find the radio I’m using does not have any ‘Expo’ (a configurable low-action or dead-zone) settings. It does, however have a Dual-Rate capability on the steering channel (#1), which might allow me to tone down the very fast steering servo. My concern, having not tested it, is that it might make the steering too slow, making the better servo a moot improvement. :/ Things you learn, right?

Even more daunting that the steering issue for me last Monday, was the fact that 45 minutes before the first heat race, I completely destroyed the stock rear differential I’d put after breaking the output shaft on the race differential that came with the truck. Ugh! With not much time, I had to rip apart the entire back end of the truck, remove the transmission, split it’s case and try to slam in a brand new Team Associated ball differential. With the cost of a rebuild kit of the stock costing $30, and a complete new competition ball differential being $40, the decisions was pretty easy. Go for the adjustable diff and learn to set IT up as well. Having been a racer for a long time (full-sized vehicles, that is), I’m well versed in the climbing of the learning curve. You just have to do it. Good racers have a lot of wheel time.

Upside for me, was that Brian (owner of BRCR) was kind enough to build the differential for me, while getting everything else ready for the race, so I could concentrate get the truck apart and back together in time for the race. Final 5 minute call to line up for the race came as I was putting in the last two screws. I selected one of my qualifier battery packs, ran from the pits down to the track and got in line, JUST in time for first heat.

I finished last, several laps down from the leaders, but it was great experience, a lot of fun, and I plan to race again this coming Monday, assume I’ve not broken the truck in the mean time. 🙂

Re-Bodied the SC10 R/C truck.

The old Mod-class SC10's body shell.
With a few days off, I finally got around to working on a new body for my SC-10 R/C truck. I bought the truck used back in November, and the body on it was trashed. Tires had worn through the paint in the tops of the fenders, every corner was ripped and flapping around, and it was about as visually exciting as a Keanue Reeves movie.

There were a number of options available for the truck from both the OEM (Team Associated) and aftermarket supplies. Prices ranged from $30-$50. There are likely differences I’ll never be aware of, but for me, I decided the $30 OEM body (a Ford) was just fine for me.

Now, the tricky part of working on these things, is the bodies are made of Lexan. Lexan, is a flexible, tough but a rather ‘oily’ feeling plastic, so you need a good paint. One that will adhere to the material, and is formulated with a lot of flex agent in it. These bodies take a beating!

$12 for two cans of spray paint and a couple of hours in the garage, and I was underway. The kit comes with masks for the windows, which were easy apply. This makes the production of a decent looking shell (body) a lot easier. It’s also supplied with a few of the standard Team Associated body decals. There are no sponsor decals in the kit I purchased.

One thing some readers might not be aware of, is that they shells (bodies) are painted on the insider, not the outside. This has a variety of benefits:

  • Durability – these things crash, A LOT and paint on the outside of the bodywork would not last long. The decals are very thick vinyl, and they still show the wear of normal abuse
  • Aesthetics – which is akin to the durability already mentioned, however, when one paints these shells, one can be, well, I’ll just say that one can be less than meticulous in your painting, and yet the appearance is always bright, shiny and smooth (at least until you send the thing sliding down the track on it’s roof, which you will do).
  • Others – there may be others, but at this late hour, I’m unable to consider them

Now, not only do you paint these on the inside, which requires some planning. You can’t simply paint over a mistake, it’s there, on ‘top’ of the paint, for all to see. You can’t just ‘re-paint’ over a mistake. So, plan wisely, paint the darkest colors first, then go to the lightest. Often it’s best to finish up with a white ‘backing’ color.

After the pain is applied, next you’ll need to get out another special tool, Lexan compatible scissors, to cut the vacuum formed shell to it’s final shape. Cutting out the wheel openings, wings (if it’s equipped with such), number boards, etc. It take a little time to get one of these things from this:

Standard unpainted SC10 body.

To this:

SC10 body painted and trimmed.

And finally this:

Final result. Custom painted SC10 Championship body, ready for action.

From start to finish, it took about 36 hours (wall clock) to complete. Effort required, about 3 hours for masking, painting and trimming. And, a lot of waiting while it cured.

I’m pretty happy with the final result, and the old used SC10 looks right at home with it’s brand new stable mates, an Associated T4.1 Truck and an Associated SC10 Short Course (Makita RockStar):

Unfortunately, in the first lap running full-power with the Mod SC10, I blew up the roller-ball limited slip differential. But, that’s an article for another day:

One broke truck.

Amazing VW ‘Glass Factory’

Thanks to the mail list I’m on, this video appeared in my mailbox today. It’s a 6 1/2 minute (you won’t believe it how quickly you find it’s over) tour of a new VW factory in Dresden Germany.

Give it a watch. Although I’ve only had one VW, this same ‘passion’ (can that be used for Germans?) for construction of cars is why I never buy anything else.

Enjoy.