Dunno, it rained, lol :p

Nah, he was oke, but i'm no expert and he didn't finisch the clutch... it was rainy and we all went in.. next time i'll ask...

:D Too many options, i am not sure i get cutting the flyweights? But it all good as i don't have a car at the moment:)

BB

Hi guys,

Anybody here has their stock clutch not disengaging properly? How did you fix it? Thanks!

D,

Which has more bite? As in higher coefficient of friction. The yellow shoe or the ori black shoe?

Not engaging properly or not disengaging properly?

If not disengaging properly, perhaps you did not set the shims to space and that the clutch shoe is rubbing constantly when the engine is idling. That's bad and it will wear the clutch shoe prematurely. The clutchbell should be able to spin freely when everything is assembled.

Look and read Glenn Cauley's write up and illustrations at mytsn on how to build the Centax 3 clutch step by step.

Using it like normal weights would mean mounting the flyweights into the flywheel pins as per the manual or IN BETWEEN the flywheel pins?

I left the original hole in each of my flyweights after I cut it up. Somebody pointed out that it may not be good as it'll create imbalance with just one hole at the side. I guess you could cut it out when you trim the flyweight to fit in between the flywheel pins?

Anyway, some time late last year, I drilled another hole on the opposite side of each flyweights so that with two holes on each flyweight, I could mount 2 each M3x4 grub screws. After that, I found the clutch was better without those grub screws and now all the flyweights have two holes each on opposite sides. :)

No I don't. It's not the flyweight that was lightened. It was the clutch shoes !

Just ream out with the bodyshell reamer and create several dimples on the back surface of the clutch shoe. Make sure the holes do not get to the front side surface of the clutch shoe.

If I recall, it's about 1.5 to 1.7mm. But that measurement would depend on the track. I suggest to set the tension of the Centax spring at the track.

Don't you have any Serpent guy that can help you at the track side in Florida? :confused:

as per manual, he did, idd...

InitialD:

Thankyou once again for your imput:) I have always found the support for Serpent to be alot better then that of other cars i have owned. This being both from the factory an fellow racers, come Christmas i will have to see what Santa brings;)

BB

InitialD: I think he is out bush on tatical manovures... :D

InitialD: Because i am still trying to get a grasp on these clutch mods, i have another silly question for you :eek:

You said before that your modified flyweights had holes in them from previous attempts with grub screws... If someone was to cut the flyweight to sit in between the clutch pins without the holes in them will this have an impact at all? :lol:

BB

manual milling machine

It if had any impact, it would not be so significant like night and day but I'm just guessing...

Perhaps if I can get a new set of flyweights, I'll try starting it out from scratch.

Thanks everyone for your help on my clutch problem. Anyway, can anyone tell me where I can order serpent parts/optional parts from in U.S? Can I order from serpent directly? Can someone give me a link directly to them? Thanks!

So JAg, how did the new setup work?

The key word here is "manual" :lol:

Hi GFD,
We have a few dealers in California. Please send me an email to [email protected] and let me know your location to give youa list of the nearest dealers

Thanks

Paolo Morganti
Serpent USA

Paolo...congrats on the double win at the Great Lakes Challenge. I hope to see a really good report on Mytsn :) I'm sure it's alot easier writing after a victory. BTW...you should tell Scotty he needs to start posting.

Funny you should ask Julius, I finally got to take the car to the track last night. I got there a little late and I had not finished setting the car up so I did it at the track. I rushed thru the setup and got the car on the track. It was working pretty well but the steering wasn't great (understeer). I ran 2 tanks before I noticed that, in my haste, I forgot to attach the rear sway bar. :o I fixed that and sent it back out... WOW! The car has more steering now than it ever has. I had to turn down the D/R on my radio. I was turning into the rails all over the place. Now my problem is traction rolling. I have 37's on the car but I think I need 40's or 42's. Last week I ran a tank with 40's and they weren't working for me. Now the 37's aren't working. The front end is great but the rear is only pretty good.

Now my question is, when I switch to 40's the rear will probably get a little worse (more loose). What should I do to get more bite in the rear?

My setup is:
Droop:
F - 0
R - 6

Ride Height:
F & R 5 mm

Camber:
F - 1.5
R - 3

Toe:
F - 1 (out)
R - 3

Sway Bar:
F - Flat
R - Stock (2mm from end)

Diff:
F - Slightly loose
R - Medium

Shocks:
F - Red springs, 35 wt, 3 holes, mounted 1 hole up from lowest
R - Red springs, 35 wt, 3 holes, mounted 1 hole up from lowest

Roll Center:
F - stock
R - Lower (up), Upper (inside middle)

I was thinking about increasing the rear toe and/or tightening the rear diff. What do you think?

Thanks for your help. I think the car is very close and it is a major improvement. A little more rear traction and get the clutch right and the car will be excellent.

Thanks again,
jag

Hi Jag,

Good to hear the setup is an improvement. When changeing from 37s to 40s I find normally the steering gets laess and the balance shifts a bit to the rear. It's like you lose more in front than in the rear, which is what you need I guess.

If you still have too much steering I'd stiffen the front bar and/or increase the tension on the clamp of the front diff.

Good luck.
Julius

I don't know if I have too much steering. I would say that I like the way the front works and I will adjust my driving to suit the car. The car always seemed to have a push that I didn't really enjoy. This is a whole new experience for me. I am not a very good driver (yet) so I think the steering will help me. So if I want the front to stay relatively the same but I want a little more traction in the rear, can I get that or is it a trade-off between the front and the rear? Is it simply that the front is so tight that the rear can't keep up or are there adjustments I can make to help the rear without hurting the front? It maybe that the rear is good but I am over-driving the car? It's hard for me to tell.

Justrace, I need your help. Are you available this weekend?

BTW, I used to think brakes were over-rated... not anymore. :D

Thanks,
jag

Braking r0cks, with front diff, it rules :)

Julius, will thicker oil in the rear shocks help get a little more tracktion when powering out of a corner?

@ Jag, It is always a trade off. A good rear can be overpowered by too much front bite. If you have traction roll problems you'll need to get more rear or less front. Using 40's might be all you need to do as it just takes a slight amount of initial bite away from the front.
Anyhow more rear grip will always mean less steering in a way. Try the front diff and sway bar adjustments they are easy to make while running and you immediately feel the change and see if you like it.

@cyclops, normally lighter rear oil will not give more forward on power traction in the rear. More often stiffer damping will give better results.

Let me know how you go :p

BB

Since I always lose screws in one way or anonther I'm thinking of buying a stainless steel kit of screws from RCScrewz so I have some reserves. Has anyone tried those?

I'm still here. Just spending a little too much time with BF2.

It gets hotter in Malaysia. Well it was bloody hot when I was there at christmas. Espicially in the Bars in Penang and KL. :D

I use them and they work great for me . Since I have a multitude of R/C's I bought the monster racers kit .

ritcheyracingengines
 

@InitialD


I went through some old postings recently and you were refering to a link called "ritcheyracingengines" multiple times, when you wrote about engine tuning tips, etc.
The link seems to be gone. Could you please tell me the new http adress of this guy, or do you have any other interesting links abt. tuning nitro engines?

Many thanks in advance!

Greetings Mr Sparks,

I hope you an the Mrs. are well and she is keeping you out of trouble... :p

Good to see you playing BF2, i hope they have fixed up some of the bugs in recently :D Is it life like enough? :sneaky:

Talk to you soon...

BB

:eek:

:lol: :D

Ummm, I think that's Dennis Ritchey's website. I think it's already gone. I don't know if I copied the contents somewhere in my hard drive. Will paste it here if I find it. Hope Dennis does not mind.

Jag, some suggestions here. If your track is flat, I would try using very little droop in the rear, say 8 or 9. Maybe 1 in the front. What tire diameters are you using? Too much rear droop makes for too much weight transfer to the front. This would cause too much steering and loss of stability and secondly the car becomes lazy.

Ride height maybe 5 in front and 6 in the rear. I like the rear to be higher than the front because for one thing, the rear tires wear faster. Secondly, when you're on power, the rear dives under acceleration.

As for camber, make the fronts wear flat while for the rear, use as much camber to make the rear tires slightly cone from the inside to outside (slightly smaller diameter in the inside). Left and right camber need not necessary be the same depending on the track layout.

Probably lessen the front toe out to 1 or 0.5. Mid corner speed increases and initial steering into corners will also lessen. Depending on your driving style, it may be easier to drive this way to make the car less sensitive to steering input. If you're not getting enough ON power steering, lessen the rear toe in. 3 is a lot I think. If you're using this much to tame the rear, I suggest you look somewhere else to get the balance back to the rear of the car. Too much straight line speed is scrubbed off also with a lot of rear toe in.

For the front diffs, I would generally try to get the front HARDER than the rear and then work my way from there. I do this mostly for stability of the car when powering out of the corners. Tightening the rear diff harder than front diff will cause the car to twitch and the rear swapping ends when you power out of corners. If I don't get enough steering because the front diff is harder than the rear, I'll get steering back by hardening my rear sway bar till I find the right balance. I go as much as taking off the front sway bars to get steering back. I use the optional harder 2.5mm sway bar and mount it inside the the rear bottom arms (stock setting is mounting it on the outer side).

For shocks, you may want to try 40wt Serpent oil for more responsive car. Are you using 1.2mm hole pistons or just the 1.0mm ones?

The roll centers I use on my 710 are the same as yours except that I use the highest front roll center (no shims underneath). I like how the car reacts and responds from left to right with a higher roll center in the front.

Yes, I do this also. I find the harder the rear sway bar setting, the better side bite I get. Of course up to a certain setting and you don't get that advantage anymore. So much so I'd just stick to the same rear sway bar setting for more front bite and just adjust the front diff to get more or less steering.

I will slap some 40's on there and give it a go. I'll will also try tightening the front diff until It gets bad so I know how it feels.

How does the front sway bar effect the car?

Thanks,
jag

I was running 60mm front and 60.5mm rear (when I started). I didn't have a chance to check them since. It will be interesting to see how much they wore. The track is generally flat/smooth but there are a few spots where there are small bumps. I thought that by increasing the droop, I could keep the tires on the track. Wrong?

I will try raising the ride height in the rear... that's easy to do.

I think I have enough on power steering. You think 3 degrees is a lot of toe for the rear? Last time at Ft Meyers, Paolo told me to start with 4 and decrease it as the traction comes up. I think he was running 2.5 in the main. I agree that you loose forward speed but I thought less rear toe in makes the car more difficult to drive?

I think I have the diff's wrong. I have the rear quite a bit tighter than the front. Most of my rear traction problem is on-power coming out of corners. Maybe I'm just squeezing the trigger to hard :D . If I tighten the front that should help, right? If tightening the front diff hurts the steering then go with the stiffer rear sway bar to get the steering back?

I'm using the stock pistons. I am not familiar with the hole diameter choices. Will thicker oil hurt the car in the bumpy areas?

Raise the front roll center??? hmmmm. :)

Sorry for all the questions. I just want to make sure I understand what you are telling me.

Thanks,
jag

That's what I'm going to do. :nod: :nod:

With all this information I will have the car setup in no time :D

Thanks guys,
jag

Harder bar less front grip. Softer bar more front grip.
If rear on throttle grip is your problem diff settings are the thing to look at first. You'll be amazed by how much you can change the balance. It is very easy too as you can change the setting so easily during practice sessions. It is one reason why I like the ball diff over an oil diff.

When i drove the 705 (For a short time, in the begining...) i used to use way-less toe, about 1 deg of at max 2 deg... With the 710 i notice that toe in realy is handy to get out of the corners easy, you do lose speed, so i think poalo's tip on decreasing it slowly when there's more grip is really good....