MLX JQ 1/8 GT conversion kit
 

I’d like to introduce you to a project my father and I have spent a huge amount of work since late 2015. The GT class was growing locally and we had a spare JQ buggy, and we decided to make a GT out of it. I mean, how hard can it be? It turns out pretty hard! GT has grown into a very popular class with cars becoming more on-road specific year by year and we soon found out that the project would have to be done properly if we wanted to be competitive. We started racing with a basic conversion and as time progressed developed the car more and more. Today the GT class is probably the most popular and most competitive class in Croatia, and we like to think our car is up there with the best.

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After a successful national campaign last year, culminating in podiums and lap records, we are committed to an international programme this year to see what we can do. The biggest modifications are:

-new Italian CNC machined C-hubs for improved on-road handling
-new front and rear shock towers, with new GT geometry
-lower arm shock absorber mounts, 1:8th open style
-upper plate and side mounting plate to accommodate the Kyosho IGW008 2-speed
-carbon plate arm stiffeners
-new steering knuckle arms

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We have plenty of parts in testing right now, which we will include in the conversion if they prove to be working. The conversion can be used with any White Edition or the new Black Edition. Yellow Editions can be upgraded as well with a bit more work and donor parts. For an electric GT you don’t need any parts from other cars, just my conversion kit. If any of you are interested in the parts, you can shoot me a PM. If there’s interest I’d like to make a small run, I'd love to see feedback from other people.

Thanks for reading :nod:

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Last round of Croatian Nationals, victory, TQ and fastest lap

Awesome GT Denis !!!

Converting a JQ car into a gt racer? I'm very interested to see more!

Thanks for the comments guys, more pics to come :)

Very impressive to say the least.

Absolutely amazing, really want to get into this class as well.

So what items are needed to convert a JQ Black edition?

Thanks for the positive comments guys, means a lot to us :)

To convert a Black Edition you'd need these parts: new CNC machined C-hubs with much less caster (symmetric design, so you'd need only one spare :) ), new GT front and rear shock towers, 4x lower arm shock absorber mount and new steering knuckle arms (because the C-hub is different the Ackermann positions are different as well, hence new parts). Carbon plate arm stiffeners are optional, but I'd suggest them for the GT. You also need the upper plate and side mounting plate to accommodate the Kyosho IGW008 2-speed. I have all of these parts left over from the initial run so feel free to shoot me a PM if interested.

From other cars you need, apart from the Kyosho IGW 008 2-speed, new dogbones (JQ 104mm for the rear and HPI86057 78mm for the front) and a 150cc tank to take advantage of the truggy fuel tank rule for GT (I've used both Serpent and Sworkz, both fit very nicely). Also you'd need a front bumper set (mine is from a Serpent, basically fits perfectly, only the bottom holes need a bit of trimming) and a rear body post (I use this from a Team C).

C-hubs were a particular pain in the ***, it took a lot of work and redesigns. Imagine producing a C-hub on a manual mill- every cut needs repositioning. Finally we have ordered this CNC one and we're very proud of it :)

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I can appreciate the amount of work that went into making your 'c carriers'.....I had an engineer do the 'cadcam'design stuff for me off of a Chinese knockoff of the CNC carrier, thinking I could mod out the darned 'caster devil'. When I got the first bid back from a manufacturer that could handle the CNC at $3700.00 for each 'pair' (of my 3,5 and 7°) versions I decided to buy a different car that was more conducive to playing with 'caster bugger'.
I can see the thought you've put into the 'stance' on your conversion. How is tire wear ?? Are you running 'long' A Mains ?? (45 min or longer) (tire brand ?) 😎

Yeah, they are quite expensive to make, I've gone through a few companies until I found a good one which does excellent work for a reasonable price. Weirdly, it isn't in China! :lol:

We are running 30 min mains and wherever I go abroad the rules are the same, 30 min. I can finish a main with a set of freshly broken in GRPs without any issues (on my track it's GRP S2-S4, depending on the temperature) and still be good for a few more practice runs. The fronts do wear slightly more than before (with the original 16 deg carriers) but the performance has improved greatly. Recently I've tried harder fronts but I'm still not sure what to think of it, my personal best is still on same front and rear. Anyway, to answer your question, I'd say the tire wear is the same as other fast local drivers with Serpents, Mugens and Xrays. Definitely no worse :)

Hey there, awesome project , question , have you tried running the black edition diff case spacers ? But instead of running the 2mm use / make some that are 5mm it will make a world of a different there are the reasons why
•lowers the chassis
•reduces roll
• increases stability at high speeds
• increases rotación
• better grip
• get the roll center to a point where is suppose to be

Yes, that is next on my agenda. Although still not sure if I will try it with the 0mm (which is BE standard) or +2mm C and D plates (LV, which would give a total of +4mm on the arms with the gearbox spacers). I'm not very comfortable with those changes as I like to play with stuff I understand (or at least I think I do), but hey it's a good opportunity to learn it :)

what body shell is this?

It's a Deltaplastik Toyota TS030, number 0171. Make sure to get the 1.5mm one though, 1mm is not very durable.

Kyosho 2-speed with hoi dogbone, and a bigger fuel tank - got all that.

Can you let us know where we can get these machined parts? As Scary Jerry mentioned, paying over $3000 for a pair of machined c-hubs is not feasible for most of us.

I have the parts, if you are interested send me a PM, I have a few left. I can make a new run if there is interest.

Well the season started off very nicely! We managed to win the first nationals, against great competition. The BE parts are a very nice upgrade. More testing now for the first international races of the year, some new ideas to try.

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Long time without an update, sorry about that! No, we didn't give up- we are working harder and our cars are faster than ever :)

We made new parts and worked on setup, to find more speed. This year we successfully defended our 2018 national title by adding the 2019 title as well, winning every race we attended but one, in which we had a technical failure. More importantly, we had a good international season, with the season highlight being the Euro GT race in Leipzig, where we finished 13th overall against the best drivers and factory teams in Europe. We were so thrilled, especially considering my modest driving skills :) The car is now as fast as anything, with bulletproof reliability. I ran the car a lot for the last 2 years, testing a lot of different stuff, and the basic setup is now really good.

Here's a nice "under the hood" the german site Mika news did on my car, after I finished 2nd in the Euro GT warm-up race in May. You can see nice closeups of the car.
https://mikanews.de/2019/05/19/chass...-denis-milvic/

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Action pic from Mika news, thanks!
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If anyone is interested in giving this conversion a shot, I'll be making a small run for next year. I'll take preorders during the following days- organized preorders will make the kit cheaper for everyone :) Feel free to PM me with any questions. The kit now consists of the new C-hubs, new front and rear shock towers and shock geometry, new Ackermann knuckles, 2-speed top and side plate (to replace the center diff ones). That would make all the parts needed to convert an electric car (you wouldn't need the 2-speed plates obviously)- for a nitro conversion you'd need to provide your own parts including the 2-speed, 150cc fuel tank, dogbones and front and rear bumper. I'll help with everything, including assembly tips and setup sheets.

If you have an extra JQ laying around, you're missing out on a lot of fun :)

for an electric conversion using the Grey edition as a base (basically same front and rear clips from the black edition based on what has been said), are you thinking a different battery tray at all like say serpents car that uses 2 stick packs (or shorties) for better LCG or just a full sized 4S lipo?

I'd just keep the full sized packs, the Black ebuggy is pretty well balanced :)