Profoxcg

iTrader: (2)

I ran my car today for the first time only to realize that my chassis came with a slight bend from the factory. As soon as I hit 2nd gear the car just flew to one side.

Do you guys think serpent will exchange my chassis? who do I need to contact?

sparksy

iTrader: (14)

I doubt very much if it came bent from factory. More likely you have tweaked it during assembly.

Place a straight edge along the chassis to see where the bend is, and then loosen the "fittings" and braces to relieve the bend.

Remember to keep the chassis firmly held on a flat surface when fitting the side braces and upper deck.

Data

And the Lord spoke, saying, "First shalt thou take out the Holy Pin. .........thy Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch towards thou foe, who, being naughty in my sight, shall snuff it."[/QUOTE]

what is your favorite colour ?

modellor

Actually a very common thing. We have seen more Serpent 200mm cars come with bowed chassis than I can count. Even my own came like that. Not necessarily Serpents fault though. They tend to bow in transit with the way the boxes can sometimes be thrown into the lorry and heavy things put on top off them. We all know delivery guys and aircraft porters dont give a damn about the goods

rjl

what is your favorite colour ? [/QUOTE]
Ni!!!!!!!!!!

Profoxcg

iTrader: (2)

so what do i need to do to fix this? Do I need to contact Serpent USA ?

B

iTrader: (13)

you cant really expect a chassis to be 100% flat from the factory, that is too difficult to manufacture.

Esp the thicker the chassis, the harder it is to get it flat..

So a little bit of chassis tweak does not matter at all, because the replacement one will most likely be the same.

OZDC

iTrader: (16)

Blue, No Pink, AAAARGhhh


Similar to what Sparksey suggested, make sure you have everything screwed in properly. A misplaced or misalligned screw could do this.

Also is a bend front to back or side to side?

DC

whynot

iTrader: (18)

I had a 950 that came with a bent chassi it was bowed about 3-4 mm and I sent it to them and they sent e back the same on so I sent it back again and finally recieved and flat chassi,since then I sold it and bought a kyosho evolva. first contact them by email and they will let you know what to do.
mike

SupermaxxRich

iTrader: (16)

If it has a slight tweak, why can't you just straighten it??? Can't you put it between two pieces of flat and straight 2x4's and hit it with a hammer. Should straighten it right out! Done this many times with tweaked pieces of aluminum in my machine shop.

Profoxcg

iTrader: (2)

yep, ill write serpent ..

no I dont want to hit my chassis.

its in the front to the side the car pulls when I brake... um.. could be related.

fastharry™

iTrader: (4)

have you put that car on a tweak station yet?..

RCSavant

hey harry , i have a tweak station but it unfortunately did not come with any instructions !! And Ive been getting conflicting info about how to go about untweaking my ride !

Do i untweak the car left to right, or crosswise - ie front left shock corresponds to rear right shock etc. Or both !! but i can see that as being a big of a headache !

modellor

Providing you are positive the shocks are equal length at full extent from left to right you should actually adjust both a little to ensure you keep the same ride height.

If you lift the front of the car in the center and say the left wheel lifts before the right wheel you should turn the right rear shock collar clockwise to tighten the spring and loosen the left rear anti-clockwise to soften that spring (Turn equal amounts unless both collars are at the very top).

Repeat this for the front shocks by lifting the rear of the car in the center. But be sure to have both sway bars disconnected. Once the tweak is correct for this set up you then go about connecting the sway bars (say rear first) and repeat the process of lifting the front of the car and adjusting the rear sway bar until both wheels lift equally and then repeat for the front sway bar by lifting the rear.

This should give you a well set up car IF your pillow balls are set up correctly in the first place (camber, toe-in, width of car)

TitaniumR

Hi Profoxcg,

I'd like to share my experience with you on tweak cos I'm the kind that go overboard to keep every part of my car nice and balance.

Firstly, all materials will have internal stresses that prevents 100% flatness - God made it that way. The stresses can either come from machining or in manufacturing the materials itself. In checking for tweak, you should place the chassis on the hudy board or thick solid glass table. Place it down on the board using its upper side meaning the clean side that faces the radio tray, not the underside that faces the ground as there will be road inflicted scratchs to prevent a good check. Press on the centre and finger tap the front/rear ends - there could be little gaps<0.5mm. If you see no gap, then that's great! If your's is a brand new chassis, then putting either of its faces on the board is fine. Just make sure that there are no burrs from the screw holes and edges. This helps to sort your chassis tweak in the chassis itself. FYI, F=kx. The chassis cannot bend with a crash unless there is enough force to create a large deflection to bend it permanelty. It's quite difficult actually but this is debatable depending on how rough one crashes.

Next before installing the chassis, use a metal ruler to check it's flatness on its underside. If there is a slight gap between front/rear ends of the chassis with the ruler, it should not be more than 0.3-0.5mm, visually and it should be consistent with your checks on the board in earlier step.

Put the rear bulk head on the chassis, it should sit nicely and not rock about, else the bulk head is not assembled/or designed right. Then screw it down.

Put the front bulk head and it too should sit nicely like above. Then screw it down and assemble the rest.

Go back to using the ruler to check the chassis underside. It should be flat or if not, you should see the same as the earlier ruler check on the chassis. You need to know also that tweak can come from deformed plastic parts like bulk heads, radio support blks, other parts that screws to the chassis. Some times, after a crash or even a simple flip, you can find your chassis tweaked.

To round up, a small amount of tweak is OK as you have a independent suspension car.

Hope above can help you decide the tweak of your chassis/car.