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Old 2005.11.12, 01:36 AM   #1
james399
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weight distribution question

in the park near my house, they have a little play ground with a sand pit, if the sand is dry, then i stand no chance, but with the super swampers, after the splinkers come on wetting everything down, i can do donuts and drive the truck around like a rally car... but here is the weird thing, it only works when i have the 9 volt strapped in the back (check the picture to see what I mean)

i know there has been mention of using alloy parts for this reason, to give extra traction... to what extent does the alloy caus suspension to bounce... does it do anything but way the car down??

i also think it helps that the batter is hanging way over the rear of the tires on a longe lever (the body) which means that when it bounces it will give extra traction when it bottoms out on the back no??

has anyone else played with the weight distribution to get varying affects?? has anyone else been able to drive their truck in reasonably loose sand??

i am more and more surprised by the capabilities of these little trucks... although i do admit, i do play with it far more than i should be at my age... lol....


james
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Old 2005.11.12, 02:08 AM   #2
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whoops here are the picts...
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Old 2005.11.12, 03:01 AM   #3
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Quote:
... although i do admit, i do play with it far more than i should be at my age...
and just what do you mean by that statement?

this isn't a "kids and thier toys" thing is it?

cause I have kids old enough to have kids and I still "play" with mine (mini-z's) near every day, but then I consider mine a seriuos hobby rather than a toy
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Old 2005.11.12, 06:37 PM   #4
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Quote:
Originally Posted by DogbreathRacing
and just what do you mean by that statement?

this isn't a "kids and thier toys" thing is it?

cause I have kids old enough to have kids and I still "play" with mine (mini-z's) near every day, but then I consider mine a seriuos hobby rather than a toy
as you, i do play with mine near everyday as well... not here to piss anyone off or to offend anyone...

but to me, hobbies are to adult men/women, as toys are to children...
for example, if a child is obsessed with a videogame or electronics, spent all their time an energy on it, it would be called toys...
as an adult male if you are equally obsessed into videogames, and spend considerable time and money pursuing videogame, its called a hobby...


with that being said, to me my OL is a toy, (and yes i am pretty much a child stuck in an adults body, you can readily tell this by the things that i do with my disposable income...) ... the trucks i have are my toys... i play with my toys everday... then again the motorcycle i built from the frame up is also a toy... and if i didn't sell it i would probably play with that everyday as well also... i am also in the process of hopping up my daily driver... to me that is a toy for me as well....

so to DBracing... I did not mean to offend you... but i am fast approaching the end of my 20's and it made me laugh that i was sucking down a cigarette outside in the park at 2 oclock in the morning, shivering from the cold, with a big goofy smile on my face as i discovered that my truck can travel over loose sand... 2am is when the sprinklers go off,

*side note* on the OL box/packaging, it states, that the OL is not a toy, and suitable for ages of 14+.....

-james
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Old 2005.11.12, 07:13 PM   #5
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Didn't offend me.....Heck I have loads of "Toys"
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Old 2005.11.12, 07:28 PM   #6
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Quote:
Originally Posted by DogbreathRacing
Didn't offend me.....Heck I have loads of "Toys"
lol... i feel like im running out of space and time... *sigh*
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Old 2005.11.12, 10:46 PM   #7
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i feel like im running out of space and time...
Yeah I felt like that 20 years ago when I was your age!!!!
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Old 2005.11.13, 02:15 AM   #8
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LOL....I'm only 11 and i play with Mini-Z and rated Mature games....hehe....I think OLs are not "toys" actually...they're too expensive....What i think are toys are like Power Ranger action figures....which i still play with...hehe
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Old 2005.11.17, 07:06 AM   #9
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hi

I did want to get to the original topic and ask James if he had thought about the extra weight added by your 9v, it is suspended wieght, however alloy gearbox or servo case, is not suspended, this must affect the truck in differnt ways

I have just added a alloy gear & servo case to my G55 and its a little less quick to pull away but tips over much less and drifts where before it would dig-in and tip,

any thoughts
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Old 2005.11.17, 08:05 AM   #10
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Quote:
Originally Posted by redz
hi

I did want to get to the original topic and ask James if he had thought about the extra weight added by your 9v, it is suspended wieght, however alloy gearbox or servo case, is not suspended, this must affect the truck in differnt ways

I have just added a alloy gear & servo case to my G55 and its a little less quick to pull away but tips over much less and drifts where before it would dig-in and tip,

any thoughts
I'm no offroad expert but have been around heavy equipment enough to know that heavy weight on a trailer presses the tires into the sand much harder than without the weight. This in turn gives you more traction. The weight of the 9v at the rear of the Ol gives more weight on the rear tires.

I know this theory is true. Wether I explained it right I don't know but weight over the axles gives more traction than none at all. Here's an example. I was doing a project at Coranado, Ca where the BUDS(S.E.A.L.s tryouts) training is and it was approaching the winter season to build up the dunes along the ocean side. I watched a tractor trailer tow a dozer to the area where it was going to be used. The tractor trailer wasn't far onto the sandy beach. Once the Dozer was offloaded the tractor trailer attempted to drive off but lost traction and was stuck. It got there perfectly fine but once the weight was gone the tires just spun.

-Byebye
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Old 2005.11.17, 08:07 AM   #11
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It's been my experiance that when you move weight to the front it gives you more steering. If you move it to the rear it gives more acceleration do to an increase in traction, though you get less steering. If you add weight to both ends you add traction equally, and the cars handling should stay static ( except for a loss in speed do to the extra weight ). Now how high the weight is placed on the chassis will effect it's CG and there for how it handles. The higher the weight the more body roll you'll get and the lower the weight the more stability you get. If you need to add weight, the optimum would be down the center as close to the ground as you can get. And it should be balanced from front to back, unless you're trying to give or take steering. The levered weight on the OL is given you lots of rear wheel traction, but at high speeds on a bumpy surface i would think that being suspended that it would cause alot of bouncing and loss of traction and be harder to controle. When you watch a trophy truck fly throu the dessert the body/chassis pretty much stays level and everything under neath moves. If you look closely at them they are completely stripped of anything that isn't needed to save weight. But then you have all that extra weight from the beefed up chassis and roll cages and suspension parts. All this regained weight is down low for the most part. Now they also mount their 2 spare tyres in the bed of the truck at the back behind the radiator. This is to get it out from under the chassis for ground clearance and to speed up the tyre changing, but it also adds weight tothe rear. I've seen a team have a flat and just shred the tyre to the bead rings and when they got up and flying again the back end seemed to get more air since there was basically just a rim sitten back there.

I like to watch what the real racers/mechanics do to their cars, cause about 95% of it can be applied to R/C. Hope this helps and doesn't add to your confusion.
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Old 2005.11.17, 11:00 AM   #12
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Something else i was thinkin about is that the front end of a trophy truck sits higher then the back. This puts shifts the weight onto the rear and puts a kind of pre-load on the suspension.

I would figuer out first what the intended use of the OL is gonna be and that will help you get a "base" to start from and you'll be able to mod and accessorize accordingly. If you're gonna use it as a multi purpose vehicle then you'll need to figuer out a balance for the set-up to tackle different things with minamul adjustment. I would get a couple of bodies and you already have atleast 1 2nd pair of different tyres. Use velcro or shoe goo for placing weight in different places untill you find the "sweet spot".


Here is a link to a thread by toyjnkr that is about his modded OL into a crawler. If you read through it he goes into about how he weighted the chassis and got more traction. Toyjunker's thread
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Last edited by saiyan; 2005.11.17 at 11:06 AM.
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Old 2005.11.17, 03:32 PM   #13
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with the weight sticking way in the back there is a ton of body roll, and sayan is absolutely right about loss of steering... but byebye is also right about the added traction... so it looks like a pre runner/trophy truck when its moving.. the whole body shifts back, and the battery with the body acting as a lever, makes it look like the front of the truck is sitting higher than the back...

i do have the battery velcroed because i wanted to play with the location of the battery... my truck will actually run on semi-fine sand (cheap playground sort), and with some finess it will drift and looks like a trophy truck, it does get bogged down at times, but if i reverse slowly i can usually get out of it without digging myself in deeper... but its aweseome the body does bounce some but from the side you really see the rear suspension getting a work out... however you rarely see articulation in the front... also the added battery weight in the back will help swing the entire back of the chasis around when your turning helping your drift... but at the same time, you need to be able to break traction on the back very easily or else it will just flip... but if you time it right and give the truck gas as the body is rolling out of the turn, it will swing the body around and spray up sand pretty high, surprisingly....

as i was saying sayan is right also, the steering is very tricky, because sometimes the tires will be fully planted, but at highspeeds, you definitely see tires coming off the ground, sometimes it will even pull a wheelie or a jump if it hits a clump of sand just right.... (and don't forget this is on loose sand)

as for the body with the battery and lights, i have dremeled away almost all unnecessary parts, (not going for the scale look with a 9 volt in the bed of the truck) and the lights are necessity for night time driving... the body with the battery is 99.9 grams, the battery alone is 46.9 grams... but here is the clincher....

this truck with the sand ready set up is absolutely useless on any surface except dirt and sand.... on cement and any type of paved surface where you can get some decent grip it will flip ....

for several reason..
a. its on the super swampers, with the xrms, that alone will raise the center of gravity making it more prone to tip...
b. i do not have any offset on my wide racer rims, on offset rim the tires will sit wider requiring more force to flip it over...
c. the battery in the back adds to the truck being top heavy since the batter is attached to the high sitting body and not the lcg of the chasis...so it will add to the flipping...

to experiment with this i tried various bodies... stock h1, 97 tahoe, and battery toyota.. and hands down the toyota kicked ass on the sand... with the other two bodies, the truck couldn't go as fast on loose sand, and got bogged down a lot...
to see if it might be another aspect of the toyota body that caused these particular driving characteristics, (after all all the bodies are different length shape and size) so i even tried the the body wihtout the battery, and it performed very much like the other bodies... indicating the battery was of importance in determining driving characteristics...

but with a simple swap of some lego tires on wide racer rims, with one of the lighter bodies, and voila less flipping and more road ready... the tires are smaller lowering the center of gravity, plus no added weight on the body trying to flip it over...

i wish i had some decent video equipment so i can show you guys exactly what im talking about...

i have read the toyjunker thread thoroughly (any of you who want to make a custom truck... read that thread... it will inspire you lol...)
so i experimented with the weight shifting, and it work great for rock climbing!!!
i tried using plastic wheels with two nub xrm tires in the front (for maximum weight reduction, with highest axle clearance,) and alloy with three nub xrm tires on the back, will pull wheelies all day on carpet from a stand still...... sometimes if the rear tires get stuck on the foam obstacles or between a couple of rocks i can raise the front of the truck using the torque from my motor alone, and you will actually raise the front of the truck by giving very little gas... its cool just to see it come up on its own... with alloyon the front i just hear a whine as it is trying to free itself, but the front isn't as prone to rising by itself...

but other than that going back to redz question....

sayan and byebye explanations are very similar to what i have learned/read/ figured out... the alloy parts on the back will definitely cause acceleration to be slower because you are simply pushing more weight to get an idea you should weigh your truck with and without the alloy, and you will see the difference ... with stock plastic wheels and tires... my truck will go faster than when on alloy wheels... and much much faster without the battery....

as for the drifting... since you have added more weight to the back, as you are accelerating more weight will be shifted to the rear, having two affects on drifting... the rear of your car with the added weight when going around a corner will want to continue in a straight line, and if you add a little gas to help your tires break traction, you will be able to drift, since the low center of gravity of the rear axle, (one way to think about it is, that the alloy on the rear that is moving is going to want to stay in the same plane as it is traveling, parrallel to the ground, the inertia of the alloy will be greater than the plastic)... it's almost like saying on my battery truck the back is being pulled around on the top back of the truck thats why i need to break traction very easily where as with the alloy on your truck it is turning by the axle of your truck...one way of very easily understanding this is, put your truck on a coffe table and try sliding the back end around by pushing on the top back of your body, then try doing it by pushing the tire... it will probably flip when you push on the high back end of your g55, and it will slide your truck around when you are pushing on the tires... think of your alloy as pushing on your tires when you are trying to drift... having the affect of swinging your tail end around...

one last thought on sand dune style driving... unless you like to take apart and clean your truck... keep it off the sand... lol... after 4-5 full charges, you definitely hear grinding as the tires turn... not to mention the gears... even the xrm's start to bind... you will hear sand and small rocks bouncing around in your chasis when you shake it... so you will have to rip it apart and fully clean... much like a real trophy truck... lol... (makes it really obvious that this truck was not meant for rally style sand driving... lol)

just finished a midterm... no sleep, brain dead, eyes hurt staying open.... massive typing and gibberish... ill wake up in a few hours and reread this to see if it makes any sense...

-james...

by the way i'm selling a bunch of stuff i'm sure most of you guys are interested in on e.b.a.y. look for my james399 under community... no mini-z stuff though, just to warn you... ( i know i know, its a shameless plug.... )
oh as for the high shipping prices... i'm assuming anyone who buys anything on ebay learns real fast to check shipping... so please take that into consideration when you are bidding, but also, e...b...a....y... does not take a percentage of the shipping costs, so in a way im nickle and diming the 'man' lol..... (thats the real reason i do it... lol....)
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Old 2005.11.17, 03:53 PM   #14
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Quote:
Originally Posted by saiyan
Something else i was thinkin about is that the front end of a trophy truck sits higher then the back. This puts shifts the weight onto the rear and puts a kind of pre-load on the suspension.

I would figuer out first what the intended use of the OL is gonna be and that will help you get a "base" to start from and you'll be able to mod and accessorize accordingly. If you're gonna use it as a multi purpose vehicle then you'll need to figuer out a balance for the set-up to tackle different things with minamul adjustment. I would get a couple of bodies and you already have atleast 1 2nd pair of different tyres. Use velcro or shoe goo for placing weight in different places untill you find the "sweet spot".


Here is a link to a thread by toyjnkr that is about his modded OL into a crawler. If you read through it he goes into about how he weighted the chassis and got more traction. Toyjunker's thread
Saiyan, i think your right about that preload thing...a buddy of mine goes mudding and offoroading 1:1, and from talking to him, the angling of the truck has two purpases, one to shift the weight to the back tires for maximum traction, allowing for greater acceleration and speed(apparently very important in mudding where it is hard to get traction... )(the preload on my OL is basically the 9v battery adding weight theory) but he and i are also guessing that the front needs more suspension travel. (to take the blow when hitting jumps, and to be able to travel over rough terrain easier)

what do you guys think....

ill go out and try to shoot a crappy digital camera vid (i.e. no sound unbelievably pixleated, and grainy as hell!! )

-james
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Old 2005.11.17, 03:53 PM   #15
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I wonder if putting some BBs in the Super Swampers (if they're hollow) on the rear axle only, would have the same effect of adding grip without sacrificing steering? Now i wish i would of kept my OL to test some of these thoughts out. The park i take my daughter to 2-3 times a weef probably has the same sand you have ar your park. Or maybe taping some weight to the rear gear box would be a step inbetween the battery on the body and BBs in the tyres.
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