Notorious I have some work to do....

[bicketybam]

OK. So I literally took the diff cup and held the outdrive in my vice so I could grab the pins with needle nose and manage to work them back-and-forth until I was able to remove them.

I then cleaned the parts so I could get a better look. Remember this truck had only maybe three battery packs run on it. At that point totally stock un-modified.

I can’t believe what I am seeing.

I thought that the fluid seemed much much darker than the front and back, but the condition of the internals is horrible.

No wonder I couldn’t just slide the parts out like normal, they are deformed and worn as is the case itself.


Can’t say I am happy with this at all.

If I break a part, then does on me fine.

But I can’t imagine how I possibly caused this on my center diff??

Does anybody else have any thoughts?

Are those shims in the first pic?

 

[PowerDubs]

Are those shims in the first pic?

Those are the washers that go on the 2 intersecting middle bars behind the little gears. As you can see they are destroyed.

 

[sforsancho]

Everything else in this thread has been ‘normal’ for someone who wants to use an arrma ‘enthusiastically.’ I went through it myself on my Kraton and am doing it now on my Notorious. The light at the end of the tunnel is worth it!

That being said the diff thing is not normal. I’ve taken apart six Arrma new diffs and never had anything like that

Im sure you’ve figured it out by now but the Tekno part numbers are
TKR6140B - shock ends
TKR5049A - shock end balls

Make sure you set your droop screws!

 

[PowerDubs]

M2c droop screws sitting next to me waiting to be installed.

 

[PowerDubs]

M2c droop screw vs stock.

Combine this much beefier option with the steel insert on the M2c chassis where these contact and I should never have any issue, hopefully for the life of the truck.

 

[PowerDubs]

Fixing what caused me to tear the truck down from the beginning.

I had installed the TBR front bumper, and did not realize the part I removed was holding the pins in place.

This piece from voltage, has grub screws that lock the pins in place which keeps them from sliding out.

 

[PowerDubs]

Everything is ‘fixed’- working on reassembly.

 

[PowerDubs]

Back in the garage trying to get something accomplished... been a long project.

New motor mount, three bolts and the motor is out, four bolts and the center diff is out.

 

[PowerDubs]

Ok.... so weather was nice today. Work was slow. So I get a lot accomplished..with a disappointing ending.

Car is back together.

Might be forgetting something,but here is list of other than stock-

M2c chassis, M2c motor mount, M2c droop screws, M2c skid plates.

Voltage F/R shock towers, chassis braces, and front lower part that holds the pins that started this mess- I left off the plastic part on stock bumper and a pin came out. This piece has grub screws that hold the pins in place.

TBR front bumper and rear wheelie bar

Tekno 14t pinion, shock ends w/ spring caps, metal balls.

Eddie bearings

HR diff cups front and center because both of those were damaged.

Diff fluid now 30r/500c/60f

RPM A-arms

Some servo mount off Ebay

Dusty cover

Deleted wing mount with Arrma parts

Threw stock wheelie bar on the roll bar just to see what happens.

And oh yea- finally put on my black body. I ordered the black car end of December- but the seller (Ebay) wrote and said sorry- thought he had a black one, but only blue and black was on back order for a week or 2.

I waited a month before he decided to send me a blue truck to run and said he would send a black body when he got one.....which took many more weeks.

So here she is after all back together this afternoon-

 

[PowerDubs]

Forgot to post what happened.

Everything was going great. I started from scratch and readjusted end points, etc.

Less than 1/4 through the first pack this happened. Is this common?

 

[Notorious J]

Forgot to post what happened.

Everything was going great. I started from scratch and readjusted end points, etc.

Less than 1/4 through the first pack this happened. Is this common?

I've read that a few forum members have had issues with tires coming unglued. I checked mine after about 5 runs, and touched up with a little CA where I thought there might be issues. So far, no fails. Good news, that's definitely a warranty item. Bad news, who wants to wait that long for tires. Sorry it went so badly. Your build has been fun to watch thus far. Hope you can get some rubber up front and give that beast a real test.

 

[PowerDubs]

As soon as it happened I ordered a pair off of Amazon so I can have them to run for the weekend.

I’m not one to warrantee something that I am not sure was defective.

Given what these cars go through, it very well could be road hazard.

I did check the other front tire and it is coming loose in a couple spots on the inside as well.

I have a tube of ‘Amazing Goop’ that I am going to glue both of the tires back onto the rims, and seal up the tear.

I will probably run them first before installing the new tires and see how they hold up.

Kills me to just throw them out when I have only driven the car three or four times, and never had a full battery pack ran through it before something happens.

 

[ScaleJunkie]

Very well put together build thread. Keep up the inspiring work sir! Fast Eddies bearings are the first thing on my list of things to upgrade

 

[PowerDubs]

So – the “amazing goop” worked even better than expected and the tires seem to be very well repaired and secured.

So I charged up a battery and went to run and discovered zero steering.

Looked at my stupid servo saver and it was all the way down at the chassis again.

After only the last 1/4 pack since reassembly!

I have already raised it once before this instance, and remember at this point I do not even have four packs ran in the car, or let’s even say four incidences ran.

Even out of the four times I’ve had the car out I have not had a single time that total I ran the battery down even close to complete before something went wrong.

So- the first time I thought OK let’s raise it up and tighten it and hopefully it will behave itself and the spring tension well maybe hold it tight.

But since it happened twice now, it is time for better living through science.

Green Loctite is the best for something like this. I raised the nut to almost where I wanted it, applied a good amount of this on the top of the nut, and then raised the nut a few more turns thinking tighter will be better than looser, and if I chew up the servo I will just use that as a reason to buy a better servo.

I let it sit for a few minutes in that position, and then flipped the car upside down as I don’t want any overspill to get between the lower shaft and the chassis.

Technically the green I should not even need to adjust the nut up over the application as it should find its way through the threads on its own.

The advantage to having a hobby of working on real cars and motorcycles is that I already have things like this green loctite, and the naphtha already sitting on my chemical shelf. ?

 

[PowerDubs]

I'm still keeping up my record of not being able to run a full battery pack through without breaking.

Made it maybe 1/4 of the way through a pack...and most of that was already knowing it was broke and I kept driving it because I was pissed off.

Breakage report-

Wasn't even jumping- was at a wet soccer field with my 3 other family members with RC- we started off just ripping around chasing each other, doing wheelies and flinging mud.

First thing I noticed was my 'repaired' front wheels did not stay stuck. They both came off the rims again so I swapped on the new spares I brought with me.

Then we were trying to drag race each other to see who was fastest. I ended up crashing and cartwheeling.

Turned around and the car wasn't running right- seemed to be FWD and if I punched it it would just pull to the side, as one front wheel took most of the power.

I said screw it and just turned the wheels the other way to countersteer and kept playing for a few minutes sliding around in the wet grass.

Then I lost all steering. Just get a chrunchy noise out of the servo, and no it is not the saver nut dropped down- I loctited that up already.

So once we got back to the house and I hosed it all off- I took a look to see what is going on that would make me fwd.

Turns out one rear wheel turns completely freely with no resistance whatsoever and no effect on any other wheel. The other rear wheel is very hard to turn- probably all sorts of broken metal jammed up in it.

Also- the rear diff housing snapped off up where the rear chassis brace mounts.

So- looks like I'll need a new servo, diff housing, and probably start from scratch with a new rear diff and all the guts.

WTF- ugh. On a soccer field!!

 

[PowerDubs]

Broken stuff

 

[PowerDubs]

Servo def crunchy. I’ll open it tonight.

 

[bicketybam]

Did you shim your rear diff? Maybe it was shimmed to tightly?

 

[ScaleJunkie]

I got my Noto a month or 2 ago. I have ran maybe 30 packs or so thru it, (SMC 6s 7400 MaH 90c, around an hr or so each pack) and so far the servo is the only thing on mine that has broke/been an issue. To be fair though it may have been my fault as I had the servo saver nut ran just about all the way up with red threadlock. Sorry to hear about so many problems after so much $ spent, that sucks.

 

[PowerDubs]

Did you shim your rear diff? Maybe it was shimmed to tightly?

No. Shimmed exactly as stock version three. Only difference was 30k weight fluid.

I just ordered a bunch of the new version 4 shims and a third hot racing diff case.

I am going to rip all three apart and shim the new way.

I also ordered a voltage hobby aluminum of this broken plastic piece, and after watching your video I also bought the voltage steering rack piece since I was already placing an order.