John Stranahan

iTrader: (27)

Thanks for the posts guys.

First there are no real ground rules for my threads. I like them to stay on tech rather than chat. That's about it.

I did notice the plastic in the RTR is a different color and probably cheaper as every single part of the car is stamped RTR so there is no confusion buying packaged Losi parts. My "calibrated" hands, with which I twist every car that I look at, by grasping the car around both shock towers and giving the car a twist tell me the chassis is pretty close to stifzell in torsional stiffness. Maybe not quite so tough when you hit the boards, though. Stiffer than a TC3 less stiff than a Losi JRXS. The setup may not be much different than on a Stiffzell car. We never really setup the stiffzell car any differently than the graphite plus cars. Anyway there are probably lots of these RTR's around.

I never had the type R. I wish the introduction had been delayed and they had not produced the first version. I had trouble getting enough rear weight from the get go. I got the TC5 next.

Driving the Corner
ICBeloitRacer- You asked for the whole book at once. We need to break it down into pieces. Your carpet experience with the truck will be most useful. Hardly anything will change.

I thought I would talk about Driving the corner with at least medium traction in a XXX-S. It is slightly different than driving a full size car with huge inertia around a race course corner. Firstly I tried driving the XXX-S by slowing to the apex and then powering out (this is typically how a full size car is driven; brakes are gradually reduced to the apex, power is gradually applied there after.) Well once in a while the XXX-s, driven this way, would seem to stop completely in the corner. There is really not enough inertia in an XXX-S to drive this way. Combined with some motor and belt friction this caused the stalls. Some guys would use radio setting to overcome this like adding some forward throttle trim. I found this just a pain especially at the start of the race where you have to hold brake. What I do now is I slow in a straight line. This may require a brief stint in neutral (or on slippery tracks just a drop to part throttle). Then I power through at fairly constant speed the first part and then somewhat past the apex. Then you can roll on throttle as fast as the traction will allow. It is important for best speed, not to spin the tires out of the corner. The only way you know you are spinning is the car just does not accelerate as quickly. All else is the same. If your cornerweigths are good the car is well behaved and accelerates straight even if you spin the tires a little. If you spin the tires with poor corner weights the car will tend to dart to the boards when you spin the tires. So slow to the proper cornering speed (slow is fast) power through the corner on a tight line, roll on throttle out of the corner. And there you have it.
Now a TC3 can be driven quite deep into the corner before adding the power. There is less fricition and less tendency to slow. Some drag brake can be added if the car is not slowing fast enough. Usually 10-15 % dragbrake is enough.

Kickup=Caster
I took note of the setup on the RTR and made a bunch of changes. I'll report on these If I have any luck. Turns out there is quite a bit of kickup on the car. Kickup is when the inner hinge pins on the front are angled upward as they go forward (like on an off-road buggy) This adds to the caster setting and may be why we are getting 0 degree caster blocks. This also may add on power steering with a locked diff so I removed it.