It is Tamiya part #22049 which I was referring to and only $25. It is an overall better design.

That’s why I race Tamiya’s… the challenge of pushing them way beyond what they were intended for.. the look on people’s face when they realize it’s a Tamiya.. priceless 😎

Does anyone have a part number for the tt02 gear diff screws with Allen head.? can these be bought?

I’ve done this exact thing, and ID the diff stiffness by the number of washers I use on the diff screws. 4 screws in the tightest diff with Bad Horsie diff grease, all the way down to no washers in my loosest diff.

Its a pretty obvious difference between the tightest and loosest settings but it keeps the in between settings in order.

But since getting an XV02, I’ve been getting more oil filled diffs and using the different XV02 diffs in the TT02. Even the 40T diff in the rear of the TT02 feels pretty good (to me at least).

Thursday, which means my weekly battle with the TT-02 Mustang that does "Mustang things" as it clearly had multiple personalities with attention spans shorter than a 5min race as the car's drivability changes several times in a race it seems......

But I feel like tonight is the night.

Since I was busy with my TLRs over the past week since the last TT-02 race I literally haven't taken the body off to tinker at all, therefore, I expect nothing........but I had it somewhat drivable after the Main when I reverted the rear suspension and ride height to the higher setting......so we shall see.

Any betting action on whether I have better results or come back with my usual "the car was a mess" post lol........

Fine, no takers......lol

Race was fun, the TT-02R was much more competitive this evening in our Tamiya tub-chassis class. I technically took 4th in a relatively small field but really I took 3rd as I passed the 3rd place guy twice but there was a transponder glitch, all in fun, it is what it is.

The fastest guys are 2 Euro trucks with really good drivers.

The car handled much better with the rear suspension raised as I did after last race, was able to turn consistent laps in the 12.6-14.0 second range with the winning laps being consistently in the 11.5 to 12.5 range.

I will say, my car is much quicker down the straight than my closest competitor with the TT-02 Subaru kit, most likely the R's gearing........

I'm just jealous you have some Euro trucks racing, I'd get back into my TT02s if I had that nearby.

Out of the box the Euro Trucks on the TT-01 platform seems to handle and perform well, especially in the hands of a good driver.

The TT-02s seem to require more constant attention to setup and tires vs. the trucks spec electronics in both (Torque Tuned etc.)

Figured I would inject a little life into the good old TT-02 thread.....

Had our weekly carpet race last night with a couple regulars finally getting TT-02s up and running as well some guys getting the Euro Trucks going (just a matter of time for me).

Some of the regulars raced in a recent TCS event with mixed results, per their feedback the level of gray area cheating was kinda disappointing and they raced in several classes so it wasn't limited a spec class etc. But I can't say I am surprised. Many folks live by the mantra of "if you aren't cheating you aren't trying".....

Meanwhile, 2 guys literally finished up their TT-02s prior to the first Qualifier and it reminded me how sketchy the TT is right out of the box without tweaking the End Points back to dial out steering etc, Poor guys were all over the place. We got them somewhat sorted but it also showed me how far I came with mine.

Took 3rd in a full "Main" and was leading for a bit......finished very competitively right behind the two best drivers running the M chassis as we run "Tamiya Tub Chassis" to ensure a full class. Although I took a really hard hit in my Q2 race and somehow that hit knocked my ESC into "crawler" mode with full drag brake and we never figured out how to dial it out so for the Main I had to turn on my controller, the car and then dial up my throttle trim to 70 to back out the drag brake and make it driveable which got me to 3rd in the Main and this week I'll figure out what is going on with it and a proper fix......

But I am also racing clay on Sunday and I am in the middle of a Schumacher build so plenty of RC projects in additional to other warm weather hobbies etc.

TT-02s......silly fun for relatively short money

The TCS races I have done seemed to be pretty fair.. you do run into some hardcore Tamiya racers.. so just because they are crazy fast, doesn’t mean they are cheating.. they probably spent their entire lives racing Tamiya cars.. just think of it this way.. you started on your TT02 journey a couple months ago.. and now you are running A finals.. now imagine if you keep at it for another 20 years 😎

Oh I get it. On the flip side, the guys that I know that went, are some of those Tamiya 20+ year guys and they were kinda frustrated with the experience. It is what it is.

At the end of the day I think their biggest gripes were in the "built per the instructions spec" rule where the Euro Truck's should not have the shock bodies packed with grease to add additional dampening and they sure as hell are not installed inverted. But whatever......not my pig not my farm......

Regardless......what I DO love about Tamiya is their variety of vehicles and platforms that allow for easy entry to racing and for those of us who can and do afford some of the fancier and more spendy platforms the Tamiya TTs offer really fun and close racing in a somewhat spec class. I love our informal "Tamiya tub-chassis class"....TT-02s, TT-01s/Euro Trucks/ M chassis FWD etc......if we have enough for separate classes for TT and Euro, great, if not......we run them together and have a blast. As you mentioned I have come a LONG way with this TT-02......and honestly it scratches my "on-road" itch for now.

I have a LOT of $ invested in off-road right now with 2 TLRs and building a Schumacher L1R..........

That being said, I see a Euro Truck coming,......I mean $160 with motor and ESC seem's like a no brainer.......$50-60 for a servo, $45 for receiver and go race another class.....

Agreed on the Euro truck being a box stock class.. I am surprised the race director let folks get away with that..

The performance difference with the tt02 and euro trucks comes down to the treaded euro truck tires. On equal tires(usgt spec tires at my club) it's a whole different story. But if they were running the euro truck tires.....good luck those actually work really well.

Went racing yesterday at my local indoor carpet track (btw if anyone is in the San Francisco Bay Area, look up Pole Position Lemo Carpet Racing on Facebook - they have many classes and are run pretty well for their first season. I had a blast racing!).

Their Porsche Cup class is a TT02 with specific allowed option parts. I got the 54752 Steering Upgrade Set and unfortunately shortly into the main, the 5mm ball connector snapped off clean, leaving the thread inside the steering arm. I have never had a ball connector snap off like that. The thread portion is completely within the steering arm, and there is no protruding screw from the other end.

How do I get this out? Thanks in advance.

You'll have to drill it out.

Yup they are running the treaded Euro Truck tires and they do grip really well.....they also have their tire prep game down really well, and can drive. They are fast. Those two drivers are fast no matter what.....as they had their M chassis going in the Tub chassis class with me and I finished 3rd to both of them one lap down. The M chassis is smaller and corners on rails and they are wide open 75% of the time vs. me only able to go 100% throttle in 2 places for 1 second each or so with the TT-02, but I can impose my will on them on the straight and force them to get around my big ass Mustang body......lol

I was pretty confident that was the case on equal tires it's the tt02 all day but those tires are probably close to half a second quicker. I spent 3 seasons in production Tamiya, I could easily write a book on them....

Now by three seasons I'm talking probably 10-11 race days but I paid attention and learned a lot.

No doubt.

Good drivers with those stock Euro Truck tires prepared correctly are running high 11 to mid 12 second laps and I am mid 12 seconds to 13.8 secs on average if I keep my crap together. The bulk of the difference is their driving skill but the rest is the killer tire setup for carpet while I am on Power Hobby spec tires.......

Input needed. So we started a TT-02,01 class a few months ago. Our goal was for someone to come in, buy a kit & build with minimal expense & needed parts. We stocked all sorts of TT-02's & 01e. We allowed bearings/shocks/front cv's. We use Gravity USGT tires as spec. Everything was going smooth until a couple people burned up pinions and also noted that pinions & ratios are different kit to kit. Seems rally vs gt car.

So now the question. Do we allow open gearing & let it sort it self out? I picked up1 sec/lap with my 01 going from the kit 19t to a 22t.

I did make a huge graph showing fdr on both 02 & 01 with Tamiya spur & different pinion sizes. Seems both 02 & 01 are 2.6fd

Edit, if we allow open gearing, what is the best method to do so? Everyone already has 48p & 64p in their tool boxes but these are mod .6. Do we stock the Tamiya spur gears & pinions? Is there a way to switch to 64p? Or 48p?

I think the challenge you are running up against is that someone could show up with one of the TT-02 SRX or older RR kit and have all sorts of "hop up" advantages. I have the TT-02R as my base with the high speed gearing and I will say I can easily pass folks with the stock gearing and technically mine is just 100% kit built drivetrain.

Maybe the "most fair" way is to allow people to upgrade gearing and necessary parts to match the top tub-chassis spec and everything in between. The other idea would be to design the course so there is more of a pro/con to gearing decisions. If you have a long straight away then of course the "high speed gear sets" will be quicker apples to apples.

Just my $0.02

For TT Production classes where folks run the TT-01e or TT-02 kits, gearing should be 19/61 on the TT-01e and 22/70 on the TT-02 kits. They both come out to about the same FDR (8.35 and 8.27).

And up here in the Northeast, most tracks that run Production allow: Bearings, servo saver (or horn), Front CV's (Tamiya Part #53792 used with #54477 on TT-02, or used with #53790 on TT-01e), Tamiya Diff putty or any grease in front diff, aluminum center shaft/joints and aluminum wheel hexes. Body must be a Tamiya body. Tires are USGT belted gray for carpet and regular USGT tires on asphalt.

That is basically what we run with the exception of the tire as we run a different spec tire. High speed gearing is allowed like in my TT-02R as it is a popular and affordable kit.

Those items cover the reliability challenges with the TTs.....the servo saver, dog bones and plastic hexes......add some bearings and go racing....that setup is reliable.

Allow open gearing but keep the stock spur gears, Tamiya uses 0.6 pinions which you can get from Robinson Racing or a few no name manufacturers. Most Tamiya pinions are made of butter and will wear out in a couple of runs.

Last night carpet race was a mix of highs and lows. First qualifier was great, finished 3rd where I should have based on driver/car abilities etc. Second qualifier was going well until the car started handling oddly, right rear tire had come unglued so I limped through the last couple mins. For the Main I elected to swap to 4 new tires after running a few practice laps to break them in, the rear was a little loose so I went with some sauce and that was a mistake. I turned into a traction rolling nightmare.......oh well.

TT-02 racing is just a goofy amount of fun all things considering.

I had the same issue when we ran asphalt with sugar on it, at our local track. The veterans kept saying glue the sidewalls of the front tires. But I kept denying it and kept traction rolling. Finally I was frustrated enough to give it a shot and instead of trying to slow down more for corners I was able to dive in REALLY deep after I glued my sidewalls. My times also got faster with the glued sidewalls.
Now I always glue my sidewalls, and even more so that I started running on carpet.

Yup, normally my sidewalls are glued......

My fatal mistake/bad decision was swapping for 4 new tires, my first instinct was to keep the 3 that were running great and just swap in the one right rear that had the issue........live and learn.

Doing some asphalt rally racing. So far it's been super fun.

https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rct...d577696836.jpg
Tamiya TT02 Rally (body off). Associated Apex2 Rally in the background.

You're making me relive some childhood trauma every time I see those Tamiya connectors.

Any video/photos of the course or other vehicles?

https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rct...a382795adf.jpg
https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.rct...ed6adc3542.jpg

This is just in the parking lot in front of our home track, PDX RC Underground in Beaverton, Oregon. Starting small to see if there's potential interest. There have been lots of people wanting to see a resurgence in rally, so hopefully more will show up. Running on this small asphalt track was far more fun than I expected, even silver cans provided plenty of power.

So far, we've had my TT02, an XV01, and three other Apex2 Sports. The stock Apex2's actually work really well, even on the jumps. This surprised me because the Sport versions come with friction shocks.

Those Apex2s always seemed poor value to me, friction shocks, bushings, fixed links, yet they often retail for $200 more than a TT02 kit.

They're actually very well made when compared to the TT02, Fazer, and maybe even the Sport 3. The 4tec 2.0 is probably equal in overall quality. As far as features, they're definitely lacking for the money, definitely worst in class. However, the rally conversion is probably the best deal in RC. Rad threaded shocks, carbon towers, metal balls, center diff, new chamfered chassis, wider suspension mounts, and metal CVDs.

Ah yes the good old TT-02 thread.......

Been enjoying running the TT-02R in our "tub chassis" carpet class club races each week........after my little journey to gain some cooperation between car and "driver" I am now challenging for TQ and wins. Took TQ last week winning our first 2 heats agains modest 6 car competition but ended with 2nd in the Main 1.2 seconds off the win.....so some great racing.

IMHO once you get through the typical "reliability mods" and get the suspension to a place where it suits your driving style then it is 90% a tire and tire prep game like many other forms of racing and racing platforms.

Since I'm not planning on using this car for any TCS races I am contemplating some additional mods.....might play with a rear sway bar setup. The CVAs are adequate for me at this point (and I have an extra set of unbuilt ones as well). The 1060 ESC is giving me a bit of a fit at this point as it is stuck in "crawler" mode and the jumpers do absolutely nothing, so each time I power the car on I have to trim my throttle to +70 to eliminate the drag brake.......but I have also been fighting for wins with it like that so.......

TT-02s.......addictive....

Looks like a lot of fun. I suggested rally when there was a paving mishap at the lot the local race director was using, but no one seemed to be interested.

It's too bad AE doesn't sell a complete Rally Kit with the upgrades (Team Rally Kit), personally I'd rather choose my own electronics. I think that's why in comparison the TT-02 appears much cheaper, it's a kit. The Apex comes complete with everything you need while the TT-02 still needs paint, a servo, radio, battery, and a charger, so having said that the AE may be a better value once it's all said and done and I think a center diff may make the Apex the better car.

I had no idea the Apex was capable of using a center diff. I've been considering a PTG-2R for a while, but the thing holding me back was no center diff. Thanks for pointing that out.

With how Associated is coming out with kits these days (e.g. Reflex 14B, SR10M, Hoonitruck, & Hoonicorn), we might actually see a rally kit from them. It would be nice if it came with the sway bars and adjustable links as all of those individual upgrades are pricey.

On the center diff, the Tamiya XV-02 is also capable of having a center diff. It's quite a bit more expensive than any of the other rally cars, and I haven't ran mine yet to see if the cost is justified :D However, it seems like it would be much more racey, than the Apex2, purely based on its much lighter weight.

I've read that the XV-02 is great and really fun to drive, but it's pretty pricey, which is why I started considering the rally made by LC Racing, it's a great value and I've read it's a performer. I saw someone do a center diff conversion on one, but they didn't provide info on the build.

Never really looked at an Apex 2, they do look to be a bit of a tank and the ESC, Motor, and Battery are a lot further away from the centerline of the chassis than the TT-02. I assume the TT-02 performs a little better because of this and I wonder if the center diff makes up for that. Better transition or improved traction, which is better?