Kraton Question - Does a pinion gear come with the Kraton EXB 1/8?

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SPMRC

Fairly New Member
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Arrma RC's
  1. Granite
  2. Infraction
  3. Kraton EXB
  4. Senton 3s
  5. Typhon 3s
  6. Vorteks
Hi All,

I'm new to the hobby and decided to build my own Kraton EXB 1/8 After watching the reviews and unboxing of the product I see there is a pinion gear that I'm supposed to attach to the motor. However, I have opened two supposedly new Kraton EXB 1/8 and found no pinion gear inside. I'm wondering if I'm missing something or is this completely wrong? Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks!
 
I got a pinion with mine. From other threads I’ve seen, it’s really hit or miss if you get one or not. I ordered my exb from amain. I’d be curious to see where others got their exbs from and if they received the extras or not. Maybe we can figure out a pattern. 🤷‍♂️
 
That is what I thought. So far I've received two from Amazon and they both do not have a pinion gear. They were in an ARRMA box with ARRMA shipping tape sealing it.
 
I reckon the later versions don't come with one. It's a mixed bag really. My Mojave EXB came with a 12t as far as I remember
 
I would agree with you if the documentation specified it was needed, but it doesn't. An to the fact others have received them, leads me to believe either ARRMA knew the batch didn't have gears and still shipped them out, or their QA is really bad with this batch.

ArrmAPinionPN.PNG
 
My documents that came with my EXB show that it has a pinion gear. There is also a list in the documents that state what you need after market to get the RC running. It does not list the pinion gear as being needed.

That being said I did not get a pinion gear with my EXB. Nor did I get motor mount screws. And the servo arm on the my EXB was a 23 tooth even though the documents show the servo arm was supposed to be a 25 tooth.

I emailed Horizon Hobby three separate times. The first time was regarding the pinion gear and they sent me one within two weeks of my email. After digging further into my EXB is when I noticed the motor mount screws were missing and the servo arm was the wrong one. So I emailed Horizon Hobby again, twice, and those emails have gone ignored for over a month now.

I'll still support Arrma as my brand of chose based solely on their design. The K6 EXB kicks some ass and beats the hell out of that other brand I no longer trust. It sucked that Tra**as' RTR RC's were so poorly designed and broke so easy. I can't believe how much of my time and money I wasted on their brand.

I really do love the Kraton EXB design. I think it is solid and performs very well. But Arrma's inconsistency in delivering what is promised out fo the box and Horizon's poor customer service leaves me disappointed.
 
My documents that came with my EXB show that it has a pinion gear. There is also a list in the documents that state what you need after market to get the RC running. It does not list the pinion gear as being needed.

That being said I did not get a pinion gear with my EXB. Nor did I get motor mount screws. And the servo arm on the my EXB was a 23 tooth even though the documents show the servo arm was supposed to be a 25 tooth.

I emailed Horizon Hobby three separate times. The first time was regarding the pinion gear and they sent me one within two weeks of my email. After digging further into my EXB is when I noticed the motor mount screws were missing and the servo arm was the wrong one. So I emailed Horizon Hobby again, twice, and those emails have gone ignored for over a month now.

I'll still support Arrma as my brand of chose based solely on their design. The K6 EXB kicks some ass and beats the hell out of that other brand I no longer trust. It sucked that Tra**as' RTR RC's were so poorly designed and broke so easy. I can't believe how much of my time and money I wasted on their brand.

I really do love the Kraton EXB design. I think it is solid and performs very well. But Arrma's inconsistency in delivering what is promised out fo the box and Horizon's poor customer service leaves me disappointed.
Now I feel I need to examine the two cars more thoroughly since you mention the servo arm can also be incorrect. I had read that it was supposed to be a 25T as well. The servos I ordered are 25T, but I know the new line of Spektrum servos are 23T, so maybe they are switching them over without updating the documentation?

So far this experience has left a bad taste in my mouth with Horizon Hobby as a company. I do love the ARRMA brand, but if it isn't supported by decent customer service, then it makes me not want to support them. And for something like not including a pinion gear is crippling to a novice, it really makes the some of the DIY experience suck. Now I need to shell out another $15.00+ to Horizon for parts that should be included. Shameful....
 
This is my second attempt at trying to contact support. I'll let you know how it all works out. Might have to return it and purchase it from another seller.
 
There are many brands of pinions you can use like hot racing, robinson racing, losi... it doesn't have to be an Arrma branded pinion. Honestly, I always pick up the Traxxas mod1 pinions at my local hobby shop because they are only 6 or 7 dollars. I am running a 21t traxxas pinion in my mojave that is powered by a 1650kv motor on 6s.
Also, it is not horizon hobbies fault your EXB did not come with a servo. Yes, horizon hobby has been lacking on customer service, but tbere is more to the picture. RC cars have been selling out like crazy, so there has been an influx of customer service inquiries. Think of the bigger picture before passing judegement, because I have had great HH customer service dealing with a Losi i purchaced with a faulty servo and rx.
 
There are many brands of pinions you can use like hot racing, robinson racing, losi... it doesn't have to be an Arrma branded pinion. Honestly, I always pick up the Traxxas mod1 pinions at my local hobby shop because they are only 6 or 7 dollars. I am running a 21t traxxas pinion in my mojave that is powered by a 1650kv motor on 6s.
Also, it is not horizon hobbies fault your EXB did not come with a servo. Yes, horizon hobby has been lacking on customer service, but tbere is more to the picture. RC cars have been selling out like crazy, so there has been an influx of customer service inquiries. Think of the bigger picture before passing judegement, because I have had great HH customer service dealing with a Losi i purchaced with a faulty servo and rx.
There is never an excuse for poor customer service, ever. Stop being a fanboy.
 
There is never an excuse for poor customer service, ever. Stop being a fanboy.
There are many brands of pinions you can use like hot racing, robinson racing, losi... it doesn't have to be an Arrma branded pinion. Honestly, I always pick up the Traxxas mod1 pinions at my local hobby shop because they are only 6 or 7 dollars. I am running a 21t traxxas pinion in my mojave that is powered by a 1650kv motor on 6s.
Also, it is not horizon hobbies fault your EXB did not come with a servo. Yes, horizon hobby has been lacking on customer service, but tbere is more to the picture. RC cars have been selling out like crazy, so there has been an influx of customer service inquiries. Think of the bigger picture before passing judegement, because I have had great HH customer service dealing with a Losi i purchaced with a faulty servo and rx.
I agree I can choose another aftermarket brand, but that isn't the point. The point is I paid for a complete product, not a 90% complete. An the fact the customer doesn't know this until after they receive the product is misleading. If it is a part they stop supporting, they should be informing their customer base. If we lower the bar of expectation, we don't get what we pay for, we get what they feel they want to give us.
 
There is never an excuse for poor customer service, ever. Stop being a fanboy.
That called being a realist, not a fan boy. I literally own losi, traxxas, arrma, and axial. I recently, as in the last 2 months, dealt with horizon customer service and they took care of me. The replaced a servo and rx/tx quickly. The best way to get a hold of them is to call and request a callback. If you don't get a callback then try again. You can take that "fan boy" crap and shove it.
Honestly, if you want the best customer service, buy something from Traxxas.
 
Hi All,

I'm new to the hobby and decided to build my own Kraton EXB 1/8 After watching the reviews and unboxing of the product I see there is a pinion gear that I'm supposed to attach to the motor. However, I have opened two supposedly new Kraton EXB 1/8 and found no pinion gear inside. I'm wondering if I'm missing something or is this completely wrong? Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks!
Didn't get one with my Mojave EXB 😑
 
So an update to this issue is I contacted customer service by phone and requested a call back. About 30 minutes later I received a call back from a Horizon customer support Rep. I told him about my situation and he looked up the parts to see if they were in-stock. To my luck the mounting screws were in-stock, but the pinion gear wasn't. He mentioned mid July they would have them back in-stock. So he made an order to have the screws sent to me and when the pinion gear was available, that will be shipped to me as well. But in the mean time, he suggested I purchase a pinion gear until the backordered one arrives. So after everything was said and done, I got a e-mail confirmation with an order number.

After the phone call, I decided to check the Horizon website store and see if the parts where in-stock there. After searching I see that both parts were in-stock, but the Rep had just told me they weren't in-stock. So I started to wonder why I was told something different? So I called back and got a different Rep this time, and I told him about my previous call. He was able to locate the part in another warehouse location and is having that shipped to me. So when and if I receive the items, I'll update on the situation.

You are supposed to get a pinion gear, grub screw, motor mounting screws in your manual & tool bag. If you are missing any items you should contact customer service and request them. I don't know the exact reason why some do not have the included pinion gear, but within these last couple of years, production on many things has went down and a lot of products are on backorder. With that being said, Horizon cant sit on these units to wait for a small part to be available, so they must sell or risk losing business.

At this point I am happy with the customer service I received by phone. The follow through on the requests will reinforce my overall experience with Horizon as a company. I still think they should inform their customer about any production issues or part shortages. A simple posting on the products webpage would do. My advice to anyone dealing with this company for service is to call them. Do not e-mail them and expect a timely response. I would only e-mail support to send the warranty information they request and to generate a case number. When you call for support, they have all the warranty information they need by referencing your case number.
 
So an update to this issue is I contacted customer service by phone and requested a call back. About 30 minutes later I received a call back from a Horizon customer support Rep. I told him about my situation and he looked up the parts to see if they were in-stock. To my luck the mounting screws were in-stock, but the pinion gear wasn't. He mentioned mid July they would have them back in-stock. So he made an order to have the screws sent to me and when the pinion gear was available, that will be shipped to me as well. But in the mean time, he suggested I purchase a pinion gear until the backordered one arrives. So after everything was said and done, I got a e-mail confirmation with an order number.

After the phone call, I decided to check the Horizon website store and see if the parts where in-stock there. After searching I see that both parts were in-stock, but the Rep had just told me they weren't in-stock. So I started to wonder why I was told something different? So I called back and got a different Rep this time, and I told him about my previous call. He was able to locate the part in another warehouse location and is having that shipped to me. So when and if I receive the items, I'll update on the situation.

You are supposed to get a pinion gear, grub screw, motor mounting screws in your manual & tool bag. If you are missing any items you should contact customer service and request them. I don't know the exact reason why some do not have the included pinion gear, but within these last couple of years, production on many things has went down and a lot of products are on backorder. With that being said, Horizon cant sit on these units to wait for a small part to be available, so they must sell or risk losing business.

At this point I am happy with the customer service I received by phone. The follow through on the requests will reinforce my overall experience with Horizon as a company. I still think they should inform their customer about any production issues or part shortages. A simple posting on the products webpage would do. My advice to anyone dealing with this company for service is to call them. Do not e-mail them and expect a timely response. I would only e-mail support to send the warranty information they request and to generate a case number. When you call for support, they have all the warranty information they need by referencing your case number.
Thank you for the update. I am glad they were able to help you out. Every time I have used the call back function I have been able to talk to a rep. Yeah, they are slow at the moment, a lot of parts are on backorder, and mistakes have ben made. No company is perfect, but it is evident that they are trying to do right by the customer. Hopefully they listen to the feedback and start putting notices on parts like thepinion, and maybe offer a little discount or something to make up for it.
 
Thankfully my local Hobbytown is 5 minutes away and they have plenty of pinions in stock.

Glad you kind got it sorted!
 
Thankfully my local Hobbytown is 5 minutes away and they have plenty of pinions in stock.

Glad you kind got it sorted!
Thanks! I have a hobby store near me, but they didn't have the Kraton EXB in-stock so I decide to purchase online. Next time, I'll probably just go down to the hobby store and order it. At least if anything is missing, the hobby store will most likely cover it and probably won't have to futz around with anything extra.
Thank you for the update. I am glad they were able to help you out. Every time I have used the call back function I have been able to talk to a rep. Yeah, they are slow at the moment, a lot of parts are on backorder, and mistakes have ben made. No company is perfect, but it is evident that they are trying to do right by the customer. Hopefully they listen to the feedback and start putting notices on parts like thepinion, and maybe offer a little discount or something to make up for it.
No problem. Thanks for the mention about calling them. It worked out better than I was expecting. I hope anyone reading this in the future will gain some knowledge from my experience. I don't blame a company for ups and downs, it happens, However, informing the customer should always be number one in any company to keep transparency. I'm glad they have good support staff or I would have turned to another maker for future purchases.
 
I pre-ordered my Kraton EXB so I probably got the first batch. Mine did come with a pinion (can't remember how many teeth though).
 
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