Granite Voltage 2WD brushless conversion, Velo’s learning curve build.

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This was not really necessary but I love the look when I see it done right. Mines far from done right but at least it’s done. I’ll do better next time. Yup.

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Threw some chunky monkey tires on the brushless voltage and they are very nice! Makes the Voltage…way more funner. Hardly notice the toe-in now. Still waiting on the 94mm traxas connecting rods to fix that.
Found some m5, 89mm Arrma turnbuckles to try as well. Also got a programming card to wake up the esc. Not much, just need a little more 🔥

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There. Body is done. I will call it… ‘the distressed look’.
Obviously a bit more practice is needed 🤣

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It’s done lol. Since I melted the body then ironed it out and while prepping it for shoo goo/fiber tape, sanded off more of the inside paint then intended…after doing that I gave up on shoo goo/fiber, just wanted to paint it black so that the black shows through, giving it that distressed look 😂

This is my first attempt ever to wrap electrical wires with PET and use shrink wrap. I love this look when done right. Though this is far from done right and it was very good practice for next time.

I figured out how to get that fan mounted in there. Cut an aluminum heatsink in half and slipped the half with a fan mount in there. Not sure how effective it will be yet.

Like I said before, it’s a 1/10 ‘country drinking truck’ body. The one you drive home From the bar not To the bar.
It drives great but is just a bit faster then stock right now with factory esc settings and 15t pinion. I am also going to keep it on 2s.

The ZD shocks are perfect for the voltage! Hobby Park has the same ones in orange (for my wife’s car, she likes orange). All I had to do was top off the shock oil and bleed good. I turned the voltage battery tray into a temp shock holder. Worked well. The front are a bit longer than stock and the backs are a little bit shorter, giving it the old school drag ass Stadium Truck look. But what this does for the steering angle is fantastic! Turns it from a sloppy squirrelly drive to a fairly solid even ride, even with the stock tires.

On the rear the shorter shocks stop the dog bones from over extending at loose and full compression. Seems to be a better transfer of power over the stock set up.

I am keeping all the plastic bits and pieces for the drivetrain to see how long I can get them to last. I refuse to spend $100 on a metal drivetrain for this car lol. I know with shimming and Care they will last. The inside three gears are huge! Extremely wide and solid so I don’t see them stripping. The spur gear is the one that will strip, but only costs like 3 bucks. After several hard runs the drive train, cups and all, are doing great.

I also used some red and tacky on the inside gears which seem to have even evened out the power between the rear wheels, giving it far better tracking on acceleration. A little dry graphite mixed in a little thermal grease smeared on the spur/pinion works real nice. I left the stock bearings but will replace them after a few more runs. I did do the o-ring washer thing on the front of the motor. This car was brand new when I tore it apart and started working on it. Man, It’s so quiet nowcompared to brushed!

Weighs 5.2lbs including the 6200/50c battery. I got an esc program card to wake it up and 18-21t pinions to try (has a 15t now).
This was fun…I can’t wait to tear apart my granite mega 4x4 in a couple three weeks and make it brushless…Turning Blueberry into ‘The Flying Blueberry’ 🤣
Peace and rubberside down ⬇️

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That was fun. Kinda. It wasn’t that hard getting a T-bone bumper on the Voltage. There are instructions in the reviews as well as utube videos…It was the supplied hardware. It sucks. Two white nylon spacers that didn’t fit correctly and shiny smallish Phillips head crap screws. Most of the time I spent installing these was looking through a lot of old parts and gaskets for a couple of 4mm alloy spacers and a 2mm nylon spacer. Substituted stronger hex screws and longer ones on the front support spacer with small lock nuts securing the bumper to the spacer. Feels very solid and looks like it’ll protect the front nicely. I had so much fun I threw another one on my wife’s Voltage. Too bad they don’t come in orange 🍊

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If I thought the bumper was fun…this was even funner! Same crappy screws but decent alloy spacers at least. Did the same type thing as the bumper, longer hex screws and lock nuts. The front bumper was 11 bucks and looks it. This thing though…it’s very nice. But twice the cost also. So my wife’s Voltage doesn’t get a wheelie bar/bumper yet lol.

Man, I need to stop spending money on these things…I got a Granite and Vorteks to support now 🤣
 

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Old CDT (country drunk truk) got a little sticker makeover, lots of body protection, a slightly bigger pinion, better rubber on the stock rims and…a softcase 3S lipo battery that will fit in the goofy battery tray. This thing has not seen 3s since I upgraded it to brushless, so I’m curious to see what happens. I am hoping to really need that wheelie bar.

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Nice. Which battery?
A small one lol. I had to make sure it fit in that battery tray (battery tray is a integral part of the chassis) and was light (and cheap 🐥). I installed the battery and it fits great. It ripped off, lifting the front end far down the street 🤣 I just love that.

Did a couple of those then…it just sat and spun. Figured I had killed the drive cups, but actually I had stripped out one of the wheel hex. I think I probably weakened this rim set during my month-long endeavor to remove the old tires (boiling, baking, soaking in acetone 2 weeks ugh).

No worries, I put the stock wheels on the back and kept two of the new ones upfront. It’s fast and is a bit difficult to control so I got to work on a few things lol. I know for sure I need stiffer springs for the ZD shocks i run. Having trouble finding some though.

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The two voltages that I’ve upgraded to brushless are an absolute blast. The 3000mah 30c 3s lipo I bought the other day for testing worked great…but I can go bigger. So I found a couple 3s soft case lipo packs, 4500mah 60c, that should fit well in the battery tray and weigh under 300 grams. These 5lb beasties rip on 3s!

I also discovered that the stock front shocks for the vorteks fit the rear of the voltage perfect, and in combination with the front ZD shocks… the ride is fantastic. I already had an extra set of shocks for my vortex and just ordered 6S shocks for the front…so now two of the voltages will be set up with rear vorteks shocks.

All three are still running stock gearing. On 1 the spur has ground down 30% but still hooks up.

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Glad to hear it’s going well. What kV, motor size, and pinion are you using?

Any problems with the motor mounting holes? My plastic cracks there. Haven’t come up with a good solution.
 
Glad to hear it’s going well. What kV, motor size, and pinion are you using?

Any problems with the motor mounting holes? My plastic cracks there. Haven’t come up with a good solution.
My wife’s has a 3650/2300kv 120amp esc with…🤔changed it several times, think a 16t or 17t pinion. I just found a good 21t pinion that will work well on this 2300kv motor.

Mine has 3650/3600kv 60amp esc with an 18t pinion. I wil try a 19 or 20t next.

My step daughters motor/esc is due in Monday. 3650/3100kv. I’ll probably put a 16t pinion to start.

All 3 are cheap setups… but not goolrc. I don’t like goolrc. They ran from $25-35/set. I got them on Amazon on sale for about half price. Just watch and search, it works. The motors are pretty good (surpass). ESCs are questionable lol. I’ll get better ones as they die.

My biggest issue right now is the c-clamps…or knuckles. They break real easy. Hot racing makes a set for 20 bucks. Going alloy on just the c clamp should be okay so will test them out soon.
 
Huh, I broke a voltage differential. I did not expect this piece to break before all the other plastic pieces in the transmission. I have been beating the hell out of Redneck truck for 6 weeks now since I upgraded it to 3S with a 17 tooth pinion.

I had an extra differential so no worries there…But to get to the differential you have to disassemble the entire car so I also worked on the servo saver. Drilled out two new spots to place the ball heads as I was having toe-in issues with where I had placed them previously.

I was going to upgrade the steering rods to metal turnbuckles, but realized these pieces are a good failure point to keep from cracking other front suspension parts. On impact they pop off relieving the pressure. I also got rid of all the Phillips head screws finally. I am so glad I bought lots of 12.9 steel miscellaneous hex bolts for things like this. Using these in combination with my new MIP hexdrivers I haven’t stripped anything out.

Cool thing is I have learned so much about Arrma cars this year that I can take it apart, throw all the parts into a box and then easily put it back together from memory. I like that. Teaching an old doug new tricks 🙃

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I believe the motor mount is limited to 16, 19, or 25T pinion sizes. How are you using a 17T? Did you find/build a different motor mount?
 
I believe the motor mount is limited to 16, 19, or 25T pinion sizes. How are you using a 17T? Did you find/build a different motor mount?
Yup you’re right. It’s a 19t actually just remembered wrong. Got three of them lol.

Ive been thinking of way to reinforce the motor mount as CDT (country drunk truck) is cracking. I was thinking possibly an aluminum washer drilled out and mounted on the inside or outside somehow… I need to buy a couple of the cheap chassis I think. Or maybe I’ll warrantee it. Seems like they have a new warrantee system which hopefully will go smoother.
 
Was super excited to get redneck truck out today but once at the park…all noise no drive. I either forgot to secure the pinion (please…easy fix) or forgot a gear in the transmission (take the whole stupid car apart again ugh). Oh well I’ll crack it shortly and see.
 
Dang it…not a loose pinion. I did something wrong in the transmission so must take the whole damn thing apart again 🙄
 
One of the things I love about the voltage is its blank slate quality.

My wife wanted a black and orange voltage so I complied. I used rust oleum…6 layers of satin orange and 2 of black so it bleeds orange when scratched. Found some traxas orange protectors as well. Next I’m putting in a 19t pinion for fun and I’m waiting for TBone to restock, someday, so I can ditch the blue bumper. Just love these goofy cars!

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My dad just drove Redneck Truck into the lake 🙄 I mean were like far away from… ah fiddlestick it. I love my dad.

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Well…My wife drove her voltage into the lake sometime back. Fried it out so I upgraded it to brushless. Couple of days ago my dad drove redneck truk into the lake. It’s already brushless so aside from filling up the tires with water, no damage.

So why not go with it.

Yesterday I vented the tires using a red hot 1.5 hex driver and made sure the receiver boxes were water tight and we took em to the park.

With over 24 inches of rain in San Antonio this year, and close to 4 inches in the last few days, everything was sopping wet. We had a blast! Venting the tires worked, nothing fried out s the voltages are the wet cars from now on.

 
Rednek drunk truk got a small upgrade. Those Integy metal driveshafts and cups looked good so I finally got a set since I was constantly stripping out the inner cups. So at first I’m just installing the inner cups. I’m curious how long the Outer Drive cups will last now that they’ll be taking the brunt of stress. Or the differential. It could go easier now. I already broke three gears out of the five in one diff 😂

Isn’t there another set of drive cups from an Arrma car that fits these voltages? I think I remember hearing something about that…The stupid integy set was 30 bucks plus shipping.

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I had started running a set of stock vorteks front shocks on the rear a while back and they have been absolutely amazing. I kept the ZD 1/10 front shocks upfront, but the ZD rears were way too soft. The stock front vortex shocks are perfect. And since I keep destroying the rear shocks on my vorteks I have a surplus of fronts 😂
 

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