atomic garden

iTrader: (1)

the blue, silver, pink, gold springs are not progressive,

the progressive ones are yellow, red purple:
http://smj-rc.com/products-2/springs/smj1026?lang=en

you can go easy under 1350, all the screws and turnbuckles are still standard.
a lighter lipo is also very easy to find.

i have run the car 2 days now, with the basic setup and silver springs on carpet and its going well. Didn't break anything yet, car is easy to drive so i crashed a lot less than i used to

disaster999

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My friend who owns a hobby shop recently stocked this car and hes been running on the track for a few months now and have nothing but praise about the car. A few more locals bought the car and have the same impression. They assured me the build quality of the car is top notch and the drive shafts and drive cups showed no signs of wear. As I was getting fed up with the lack of parts availability for my Tamiya 419X and the leaky shocks and worn out drive shafts and arms, I quickly sold it off and bought myself the CX11.

I started to build the car and about half way through the build. Im thoroughly impressed about the quality of parts, but at the same time, was disappoint to find they used plastic parts instead of providing aluminum given the price of the kit. Also totally not a fan of they way they chose to strap the battery to the chassis. I gotta find a way to change that. But if the car performs as good as Ive seen on the track, I can overlook these minor flaws.

atomic garden

iTrader: (1)

i ran the car for the outdoor season, and just started indoor season, still very happy with it. Easy to drive and consistent.

i actually really like the way to mount the battery, is easy and quick to do.

some great details on the car are how the sway bars are mounted with bearings (compared to yokomo and tamiya), and my favourite the front DVC doesn't need a expensive smaller bearing (5x10x3mm) like a lot of cars do, uses 4 standard size 5x10x4mm bearings just like the back.

I will get the aluminium chassis this week, will post some more pictures when i have it.

would love to hear more feedback from other drivers.

check out this blog from UK driver John Timberlake:
http://johntimberlake.uk/blog/
he is also driving an SMJ and will post setups and tips regularly.

disaster999

iTrader: (1)

Heres my finished CX11


I never had/liked the idea of clamping a fan to the motor and always like the clean looks of mounting the fan directly to the chassis. But with the narrow chassis, there's hardly any space to securely stick the fan on the chassis. So I 3D printed a shroud and utilized the holes behind the motor to mount the fan. I used 2 screws to mount the fan, the countersink screw mounts the fan to the chassis, another screw (which you cant really see) is used as a locating pin so the fan wont move when running.

atomic garden

iTrader: (1)

nice motor-fan mount, will you upload it to a 3d printing service for others to use?

i just received the aluminium chasis today, it looks very nice, matt black:

original carbon one is 67g on my scale
aluminium is 97g

i need a lighter battery to run it, i still have an older heavy battery (310g), will post back when i have been able to run it

disaster999

iTrader: (1)

Heres thing STL file on thingy
http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1841527

disaster999

iTrader: (1)

Took the track to the track this past weekend and had a blast driving it. The more I work on the car the more I find out about it and really impressed me.

• All screws that came with the kit is class 12.9 meaning less chance of stripping out the screw head
• The kit comes with 3 complete set of SMJ spring, 12 springs in total which is worth ~$40
• Spring steel drive shafts all round. 3 piece front universal drive shaft up in the front which usually doesnt come standard.
• Ultra stiff ball cups which are a bitch to install, but virtually impossible to pop off during a crash or when adjusting camber/toe
• This might sound weird, but Im kinda glad they didnt include any shock and diff oil since most of the time we toss them out

For setup, I lay the shocks down a bit to the second hold from the bottom for both front and rear, 40wt shock oil all round and 10k diff oil. 2 degree camber front and rear and used the 0.5 block in the rear for a little more toe in in the rear. 4mm droop front and back and 5mm ride height. Spring I was using the new Race progressive springs which felt pretty good.

The car had more turn in than the Tamiya and more stable through the turns. I was able to lay down the power a bit earlier and the car just carried through the corners. Time will tell if parts overtime will start to feel tired and worn, but so far from what Ive seem with my friends car, they have been driving for a few months now and the front and rear drive cups on the car looks good as new and the setting on the car stayed put.

One slight complain...well cant really say its a complain, its mostly my fault...I had 2 bad crashes over the weekend which resulted in some serious damage. Felt like this chassis is more "fragile" than others, which I cant really blame SMJ, Its my fault for crashing so hard...



The force was so great I managed to bend the top deck as well


I was able to hammer this as flat as I can and continue with my track day


But then I had another crash on the same part of the car and completely shattered the chassis


I soaked the chassis with CA glue and clamped it down with some vice grips which managed to fix it car and was driveable. Surprisingly it didnt affect handling one bit

atomic garden

iTrader: (1)

Thank you for the 3d file, going to look for a source in europe to print it!

i did a race this weekend on ets carpet and the car was amazing, perfectly planted, used the basic setup from the manual with 5000 axon diff oil. fun weekend!
i only broke 1 steering knuckle, car has been very strong, i guess due to the design in very heavy crashes the bulkhead can get hit very hard.

the blog i posted above shared some setups and gear charts, check it out:
http://johntimberlake.uk/blog/

atomic garden

iTrader: (1)

INFINITY racing fused together with SMJ, they both came out of the ashes of HB racing so it is kind of a reunion

This is very good news for SMJ and the CX11, INFINITY has a very big professional team and they invest a lot of money into all classes of Rc Racing.

Best news for the car is that drivers like Jilles Groskamp and Andy Moore will be racing the car in big events worldwide like ETS, while the INFINITY team and Miura-san from SMJ develop the car further.

Here is the Car Grosskamp raced in china last week, its a CX11, but with 20T pulleys instead if the 19T in the kit. He qualified 2nd and finished 3rd, Andy Moore finished 5th with the same car:

http://site.petitrc.com/reglages/swo...Kou2016111820/

disaster999

iTrader: (1)

It's definitely nice to hear Infinity took them in and have more exposure. The car is too good to be hiding somewhere and not many ppl know about it.

I've heard from a few local racers who have this car say there's not much to maintain on this car. The setting pretty much stays put and the parts don't break that often (unless you drive like me).

I do have to say the chassis and bulkheads are very expensive. The chassis is $70, one side of the bulkhead is $32, top deck is $30. Not even x-ray or tamiya is that expensive.

atomic garden

iTrader: (1)

Here in Europe SMJ carbon chassis is 86euro,
X-ray is 94euro
Yokomo is 96euro
Awsomatix is 104euro
Cant find stock for Tamiya, it price is about the same,

So 70 sounds cheap to me, not sure how they can sell X-ray chassis under 70dollar, as X-ray is a European brand and it costs 94 here.

disaster999

iTrader: (1)

I'm guessing prices in Hong Kong is really competitive so parts are relatively cheaper.

My friend made a batch of chassis for the SMJ and it's less than half of the original price which helped out a lot

atomic garden

iTrader: (1)

i need to visit Hong Kong next year !

atomic garden

iTrader: (1)

i just installed the aluminium chassis, wil be testing it this weekend

looks very nice

disaster999

iTrader: (1)

My buddy is the only importer of SMJ cars and parts...let me know. Ill give you his address to his shop. Im sure you will be lugging a lot of parts back home haha.