Johnny Wishbone

iTrader: (6)

By the way, saw some pics from the NATS, if that was you, how'd you fininsh? Are you posting your setup anywhere? Any pros or cons about the car?

Thanks

Marcos.J

iTrader: (239)

I use the black tc6 rear bar it's 1.2 and a perfect fit

cwoods34

iTrader: (10)

Eh......

The grip was low, and the two heats that I found traction I had electrical issues.... Only got to finish one A-main (13.5) due to rain but first couple of turns I clipped the curbs and tweaked the chassis really bad, so I limped it into 9th.

I tried grey and black springs, but those were too stiff for the grip level.... can't say I really found a setup I liked, but I don't have any experience with asphalt so it's not the car's fault.

Benzaah

iTrader: (24)

Gary, Are you drilling out the 3 hole pistons with the extra holes or using blanks? Also, Is this with the RCM shocks or the RCCX?

TJames987

iTrader: (11)

Has anyone else had excessive amounts of slop in the 411, especially the front end? All the parts are stock from the kit. It seems like the a-arms and uprights are almost a rubberized material. Is there a way to remedy this?

Toughbeard

iTrader: (2)

Do you have the original 411, LE or the TE?

Serpent has 3 different stiffness on the parts, originals are soft, then Medium and hard parts.

Original kit came with the soft parts. they were actually great for real low traction surfaces and they didnt break

LE and TE has Medium on them but the chassis is 2.25mm original had 2.5mm

Many running changes are made during production so you might have the soft parts on your car.

for some odd reason the car works perfectly fine with the slop. using harder parts and hitting less solved the slop problem I was having but then the car becomes more nervous.

Johnny Wishbone

iTrader: (6)

Since the 3 hole seem to be my fall back piston, i used the 4 hole and drilled the 2 extra holes. This was using the stock plastic pistons, not the machined nylon ones. I think the nylon would be the better ones to use, but I didn't have them. Just be carefull when you drill them, use a very sharp bit, and start with a smaller hole and work up to the 1.3. I only say this because the holes are very close to the edge of the piston and you could distort the piston if you jam the bit through rather than drilling, which will lead to sticky piston movement. If you do mess up, you could probably sand the piston but the plastic just isn't a really friendly material to work with. I'm sure the nylon machined pistons would be a much better material to work with. Currently I'm running this on the RCXX shocks, I still really like these, but will do some testing on the RCM with the same piston mod, although I don't suspect I'll see a difference. I stole this idea from the HB guys, Hiro had some interesting shock ideas, so I figured I give them a try. The thing about the shock, when this is done, is that the up stroke feels very similar to the down stroke, but not a dead rebound, but a actual feel like its dampening more consistant thru the entire travel of the shock. I think the nice thing about the RCXX shock is that with this mod, it gives you that proper feel and the bladder doesn't effect the final pac/rebound feel on the shock. Hiro said they have been trying this on all surfaces and it seems to be working for them on everything, all I can say is give it a try as it seems like a solid setup. When I looked at the HB setup sheets they where running different shock shaft lengths as well, this was so they could locate the piston in similar locations of both the front and rear shocks to get similar piston pac feel, but this is only required when the shock gets to extreme angle on the shock tower. I think if the shock tower shock locater holes are done with the correct arc or sweep it should keep the piston in same postion, this is probably a issue now, since some of the cars have gone to the short tower/short shock combination. If this is of concern to you, just measure the shocks at length and see if they are considerably different in lenght.

I run a combination of hard arms with med c-hubs, uprights and steering blocks, and don't really have any slop issues. I can tell you that the only slop I really notice is with the stock ball links, which when loose seem to amplify the slop feel of the rest of the parts. To fix this I just put a piece of plastic bag over the ball and pop the link over that, it cuts its own piece, and then I pull the leftover off, (usually makes a perfect hole in the plastic). One layer is usually enough and this really tightens the car up, but doesn't bind any of the links.

Johnny Wishbone

iTrader: (6)

I hear you, don't think I can really ever fault the car with the final results either.

At least you where there representing, thanks for that.

Johnny Wishbone

iTrader: (6)

So it seems everyone has gone crazy with coming up with mods to secure the steering servo from the top rather than the chassis. I think we have a pretty good system right now, but do a couple of mods to it, that I think add to the car.

First, I still hack stuff pretty well, so I still use a servo saver, but, to get the clearence for the saver I take a drum sander and notch the servo mount so the servo saver sits in a hollowed out part of the mount. I'll take this down so that at its thinnest point it is one layer of laminent, similar to the thickness of the motor depression on the chassis.

The other thing I do, is eliminate the button head screw on the outer portion of the servo mount. This one I actually counter sink so that you can use a cs screw, which moves it up considerably and pretty much eliminates any chance of touching surface on hard roll situations. Just be carefull when doing this as there isn't much material to work with there and you can easily burn thru it and mess up the mount. I use a old well worn dremel grinding stone that is very close to the proper pitch of the screw head.

cwoods34

iTrader: (10)

I've been running just the center servo mount with no issues. A slice of servo tape underneath prevents movement.... although a really hard hit can knock the steering trim off a few points. This can be fixed by having a "standoff" mounted behind the servo to prevent it from being pushed back.

Funny that you mention a "floating system" like the XRAY now... I was brainstorming it while at work today! I have a busted chassis to cut some mounts from, so the Dremel will get a workout this evening

Johnny Wishbone

iTrader: (6)

Post some pics if you come up with something.

Although I really wonder if its worth it, I know in theory what its suppose to do, but don't know if the car has ever really suffered in that area. Guess its one of those things that make you go HHHMMMM!

StevenOlsen

i have mounted my servo just with some really strong dobbelt sided tape, and it do the job just fine, it have come los 2 or 3 times but only in crashes so hard that something other broke to.

TJames987

iTrader: (11)

Thanks for the explanation. I replace my front hubs and c hubs and much less slop. It just looks like the soft (kit) frt a arms are very soft.

For carpet are the kit (soft) parts the best? Thx.

Holmenkollen

I think the hard parts are almost better in all conditions. On super high grip indoor carpet the soft parts could absorb some traction and make the car traction roll less. But I think the corner speed will suffer.

Toughbeard

iTrader: (2)

There is no best setup or part unfortunately. it all depends how you drive and setup your car. I have customers that will only buy the soft parts and then I have some that will not use anything but a combination of them. it all boils down to what you feel is best for you.

if you do not have traction rolling issues, I would suggest Hard arms and hard C-hubs, with medium other stuff as a starting point with the 2.25 chassis. this gives you good flex and stable suspension. from that point on you will have to find which will be a better way to go.

If the grip goes up and the car starts to traction roll I move down to medium arms without changing setup to see if that will solve the problem without loosing too much speed.