Fireteam Haastnooit’s Fireteam 6S BLX

[Haastnooit]

It apparently is the season of change in my garage. After giving it a lot of thought I decided to trade in my Traxxas TRX4 for a new Fireteam at my favorite hobbyshop. Due to the current special offer price on the Fireteam I was able to make the trade without having to pay extra. A clean swap it was. I figured I probably won’t get back to walking the trails because I get more fun out of bashing nowadays, so it seemed like a good deal to me.

The fact that it did not cost me a single euro to get the Fireteam finally got me over the line. To be honest I am not a big fan of the body style, although I must say that it is starting to grow on me a little more now that I have it here on the bench. But the kind off toyish look always withheld me from wanting to own the Fireteam.

So when I decided to get it, I also decided to change the body. Now I am gathering parts and will post my progress in this thread, I am awaiting delivery of:

- Mojave sideguards
- bodymounts and posts
- HPI Savage XL body

I know it is not a very spectacular buildthread but you got to start somewhere !

 

[parcou]

It apparently is the season of change in my garage. After giving it a lot of thought I decided to trade in my Traxxas TRX4 for a new Fireteam at my favorite hobbyshop. Due to the current special offer price on the Fireteam I was able to make the trade without having to pay extra. A clean swap it was. I figured I probably won’t get back to walking the trails because I get more fun out of bashing nowadays, so it seemed like a good deal to me.

The fact that it did not cost me a single euro to get the Fireteam finally got me over the line. To be honest I am not a big fan of the body style, although I must say that it is starting to grow on me a little more now that I have it here on the bench. But the kind off toyish look always withheld me from wanting to own the Fireteam.

So when I decided to get it, I also decided to change the body. Now I am gathering parts and will post my progress in this thread, I am awaiting delivery of:

- Mojave sideguards
- bodymounts and posts
- HPI Savage XL body

I know it is not a very spectacular buildthread but you got to start somewhere !

Gald to so see another person with one. I was dragging as well due to the body. A cool user here offered a good deal, so I bought it only had 3-4 runs on it.

I removed the men from the body and used the idea of a user here which was cool. JayTee YT'er had a cool video where we swapped the FT body with little work think just the front post only he swapped. The truck body looks good on it.

All the Arrma rigs and 6S I own, the Fireteam is by far the one I like the most. Bashing is all I do...no big air, but I do get some air, just not to the moon....the FT just handles and performs well. If you are looking at sending it to the moon, this is the wrong rig.

Look forward to the build!!!

 

[Dan B.]

Welcome to the forum! And when you swap the body, make sure you burn those little men from your FT. They will come for you…
But seriously, enjoy the rig. I’ve heard a lot of positive feedback on it.

 

[Haastnooit]

Thanks Parcou. I got the Notorious for moon exploration, I will get some air with the FT if I can but it is not the main objective for this truck. Like you I jump my cars but with sense …

Thanks Dan, I will have those guys boxed in so they have nowhere to go ! Better save then sorry !

Today I received the new body for the FT, cut it and fitted it to the body. The bodyposts I ordered are not in yet, but I used some that came with the Notorious as spare parts. Turned out I did not had to order the bodyposts to be able to fit the body. At the rear I changed out the stock long bodyposts for some short ones, also I moved the bodypost holders up one hole on the shocktower.

Stock bodyposts

New short bodyposts

Up one hole on the shocktower

At the front I left the stock single bodypost in place and added two longer bodypost holders to the front shocktower and some new bodyposts. First I tried the shorter ones, equal to the rear.

Below a sideview of the car with the shorter bodyposts, as you can see the body sits somewhat to low at the front.

Not completely happy with that so I tried the longer bodyposts I removed from the rear.

Hopefully the sideguards come in soon so I can take the next step. Meanwhile I will investigate of the front mudguards can be added to the car.

Due to the size of the FT it is really difficult to get good photo, I think the car looks really good and I am happy with the outcome so far. The pictures do no really do it justice in my opinion.

 

[Dan B.]

Thanks Parcou. I got the Notorious for moon exploration, I will get some air with the FT if I can but it is not the main objective for this truck. Like you I jump my cars but with sense …

Thanks Dan, I will have those guys boxed in so they have nowhere to go ! Better save then sorry !

Today I received the new body for the FT, cut it and fitted it to the body. The bodyposts I ordered are not in yet, but I used some that came with the Notorious as spare parts. Turned out I did not had to order the bodyposts to be able to fit the body. At the rear I changed out the stock long bodyposts for some short ones, also I moved the bodypost holders up one hole on the shocktower.

Stock bodyposts

View attachment 258265

New short bodyposts

View attachment 258266

Up one hole on the shocktower

View attachment 258267

At the front I left the stock single bodypost in place and added two longer bodypost holders to the front shocktower and some new bodyposts. First I tried the shorter ones, equal to the rear.

View attachment 258268
View attachment 258269

Below a sideview of the car with the shorter bodyposts, as you can see the body sits somewhat to low at the front.

View attachment 258270

Not completely happy with that so I tried the longer bodyposts I removed from the rear.

View attachment 258271
View attachment 258272

Hopefully the sideguards come in soon so I can take the next step. Meanwhile I will investigate of the front mudguards can be added to the car.

Due to the size of the FT it is really difficult to get good photo, I think the car looks really good and I am happy with the outcome so far. The pictures do no really do it justice in my opinion.

That looks great, man! Looking forward to seeing this one come together. Looks like it will be soon, nice work!

 

[Haastnooit]

A little poll about body position. As shown on the pictures above I can use different bodyposts to set the body.

1) short bodyposts: the body sits lower at the front then the rear. At first I did not apreciate it, but the longer I look I think it looks kind of good. More aggressive. Downside is I will need to trim the corners of the body at the frontside because the arms will hit the body on full suspension travel.

2) long bodyposts: the body sits perfectly straight. No trimming necessary

Which body position is your favorite ? And why ?

 

[calebgilmore]

A little poll about body position. As shown on the pictures above I can use different bodyposts to set the body.

1) short bodyposts: the body sits lower at the front then the rear. At first I did not apreciate it, but the longer I look I think it looks kind of good. More aggressive. Downside is I will need to trim the corners of the body at the frontside because the arms will hit the body on full suspension travel.

2) long bodyposts: the body sits perfectly straight. No trimming necessary

Which body position is your favorite ? And why ?

I would worry about the gap between the body and the chassis. I know you said you have some side guards coming in. Talion towers may be the answer to get it lower if you go that route. I did it with my stretched talion. I wish i wouldn't have trimmed the center up where it was supposed to be and i had trimmed it a little longer to help cover that spot. I get rocks in the chassis all the time. With it being a just bash it chassis i can't run the side guards off say a kraton or something.

 

[Haastnooit]

The gap between the body and chassis is approximately 50mm with the longer bodyposts, which is also the height of the sideguards. So the guards will close the gap completely

I don’t like the idea of using lower shocktowers as this will change the total suspension geometry.

Your Talion looks very nice by the way

 

[Haastnooit]

The Mojave sideguards where delivered this afternoon, I just finished the installation on the chassis.

I 3D printed a supportbrace for the longer bodyposts at the front shocktower.

As expected the sideguards fully close the gap between the body and the chassis. Got to look in to the front Notorious mudguards, if possible I might add them to the chassis.

 

[Singletracksean]

Nice build! I’m doing similar with a Black Friday FT. Does the body cover the rear tower? Are you adding a wing or wheelie bar?

 

[Haastnooit]

Yes the body covers the rear shocktower. No wing or wheeliebar, I am going to leave the stock bumper on.

 

[Haastnooit]

Today I received the Notorious mudguards and fitted them to the chassis. I needed to cut away a little piece of the mudguards due to using the longer bodypost mounts on the shocktower. When using the shorter mounts the mudguards are a direct fit, no modding necessary. As I already cut holes in the body I was not able to switch the shorter mounts.

Apparently the shape of the chassis at the front is a little bit different between the Notorious and Fireteam (Mojave), guess the difference in length is obtained by stretching the chassis in the front and back. Result is smal gap between the mudguard and sideguards.

Not ideal but the guards will still do what they are intended for and keep rocks, dirt and debris out of the chassis.

Next up is painting the body, I ordered some spray paint today. Now we wait on delivery and opportunity to paint the body. This will probably be near the end of december as the “birthday season” in our family is starting as off this weekend. If I can squeeze the work in I will …

 

[Haastnooit]

Past week I noticed a difference between my FT and what was shown in the exploded view on the Arrma website. It has to do with the 3 plastic shims that are used on the hingepin of the front upper arms. My FT had 3 shims at the backside of the upper arm. The exploded view shows 1 in front and 2 at the backside. Pictures below.

I contacted support and they state that the car is assembled correct and the exploded view is not.

My Notorious has the 1-2 configuration, apparently all 6S cars do except the FT.

 

[Sandracer_NL]

I’ll check tonight, but if I recall correctly my FT has the 2-1 shim configuration

 

[Haastnooit]

I’ll check tonight, but if I recall correctly my FT has the 2-1 shim configuration

I am curious to know how your configuration is …. Below the reply from support I received.

 

[Sandracer_NL]

I am curious to know how your configuration is …. Below the reply from support I received.

View attachment 260753

I just checked and my FT also has the 3-0 shim configuration. I must have been confused with the Mojave, that has shims on both sides.

 

[Haastnooit]

No opportunity to paint the body yet unfortunately. I really would like to see it finished, but I reckon I finally will have enough time to paint it after Christmas, just before the end of the year. For now my time for RC related stuff is limited, but not useless. I was looking at the FT pondering my mind on how it would look finished when I noticed the attachment points of the nerfbars on the Mojave side guards. Then a look at the Bigrock made me decide to investigate the possibility to add runningboards to the car.

Yesterday evening I sat down with my calipers, ruler and the FT and drew up a design for the runningboards in Autocad and fired up the 3D printer. Just before midnight they where done. When removing the supportmaterial I broke one of the ears off. Unfortunately I underestimated the strength implemented in the part by the print parameters I set. So V1 was a fail, however I could testfit the part and concluded the fitment is spot on.

This morning I adjusted the print parameters and printed the V2 version with 100% infill.

I think it fits perfect to the sideguards but it could be raised another 5mm to close the gap to the body some more as you can see on the pic below. So I tweaked the model and the printer is now printing the V3 version.

 

[slick2500]

Is that the stock Savage XL body or the 1979 F-150 Supercab? I can't find the F-150 Supercab in stock anywhere except for the scam site Active Power Sports.

 

[Haastnooit]

Is that the stock Savage XL body or the 1979 F-150 Supercab? I can't find the F-150 Supercab in stock anywhere except for the scam site Active Power Sports.

No, not the supercab. It is the GTLX-1 vintage body, number H110238.

In europe Savage XL body’s seem to be better available then … and relatively cheap as well, only € 38,50 a piece. I ordered 3 extra body’s as spares so I will be good for a long time. I have got a extra GTXL-1 body, a Ford Supercab (H105132) and a Gigante body (H7124). Perhaps I will do one shelfqueen body, don’t know yet. First I need to finish this one.

I got the body’s from Germany, It seems I grabbed the last Supercab and Gigante body available at the webshop as they are now out of stock on the site.

 

[slick2500]

I found this one on eBay but haven't really dug into the search yet https://www.ebay.com/itm/3337846917...gH8wY9CSNK&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY