NB's Vaterra ascender build (yeah in 2020!)

[Ninetiesbeard]

This truck is the only rc that ive ever personally bought brand new. I bought it because everywhere was out of stock of the scx10ii which at the time, was what i really wanted. Also the axial worked out to be a lot more expensive, so i took the plunge and went for the little blue bronco instead. It was well built, sturdy, and bigger than i expected it to be with its 120mm tyres and scale body.

 

Back in 2017 when i got the truck, next to my recently painted savage at that time.

 

I soon started to play with the idea of running different bodies, and different wheels/tyres on it. Those wheels were CNC custom wheels from instagram, really hard to get a hold of but at 1.3 inches wide they were just too large for the truck, even with my cutting 6mm off of each side of the axles. The axles finished at stock yota 2 width, which is nice. That body was mounted with 3d printed items from my friend, and it fit very well but i never ended up using it, still have it brand new.

 

The truck did get used a lot, this is at my local spot which is about 3 minutes walk from my door. Convenient. Theres some pretty serious terrain there, these china RC4WD dick cepek copies are harder than the legit ones but still do quite well there. I also made a metal bumper, for a better approach angle.

 

It ended up getting a sensorless brushless system for a while, which was a real stress to the transmission and everything on the truck. Ive not broken anything though, and i used to do small jumps like this too. The stock servo was replaced, as it was just sooo weak. And the rc4wd tough armor sliders were added as the bronco doesnt get any stock.

 

Then the truck sat unused, for about a year. It was quite sad, but i wanted to turn it into a leaf sprung rig. I got a bit further than this and then gave up.

 

I ordered more locked up rc parts and a bunch of stuff to braze a cage, but it turned out to be a lot harder than i had imagined so the project sat. It looked great like this, and i painted the body with some rusting iron filing paint to look authentic. Still have this body too.

 

This is how it looked before it sat for ages. I added some 85mm rc4wd shocks and the fancy wheels/tyres i traded for my cnc wheels. The leafs worked reasonably well, and the stock transmission was moved to the front under the body.  The whole thing was really badly built by me. I rushed it, trying to finish it with no motivation. Again it sat for around 6 months like this before i dug it out recently to do some work on it.
 

 

Dug out all the parts and rebuilt it as a coiled ascender. I didnt realise just how hard it is to find parts for these now. Ive ordered a bunch of stuff from america which i now dont need, but there we go. I went to GCM for their motor relocation kit, and then back to them for the bronco bumpers. Excellent machining on everything gcm. I bought the suggested driveshaft to connect the divorced transfer case to the transmission and it was the wrong length, even though it stated a part number and length on their website! A bit of filing (to the 67mm, £32 driveshaft) and it fits and will work well. It is also not hardened steel. I have the MIP centre driveshafts at work when i go back, so those will be added. Im now deciding which 1.55 wheels to buy, ive contacted a few known machinists with no response, so i guess ill have to wait and see. Think im going to throw a set of 98mm bf goodrich on there for a more scale look and tread pattern. I have also made an attempt at weathering the body with some of that fancy rusting paint. 

 

 

This is how it sits currently, ready for its new wheels and a light system. The bumpers are coming from canada, and i havent decided on wheels yet. I do love the KC lights on there.

Thanks for reading my thread, i will be updating as the truck gets built, i suspect a few of you lot on here will see parts that youve sold me on there.

Cheers, NB.

 

[.AJ.]

Looking good mate 👍 

[Lone-wolf]

the ascender is looking good but loving that green savage, v-e-r-y nice

[Ninetiesbeard]

Just now, Jack Reacher said:

the ascender is looking good but loving that green savage, v-e-r-y nice

Haha she doesnt look like that anymore, that body got wheelied to death many moons ago 😂

[Lone-wolf]

5 minutes ago, Ninetiesbeard said:

Haha she doesnt look like that anymore, that body got wheelied to death many moons ago 😂

shame, out of interest how did you rate the savage, sorry of topic now

[Ninetiesbeard]

Just now, Jack Reacher said:

shame, out of interest how did you rate the savage, sorry of topic now

 

Shameless build thread plug;
 

I love them. Once you accept the fact that working on them means taking half the chassis off pretty much every time, theyre great. Super tough and can look great with the right parts

[Lone-wolf]

I think i had the same shell at one point just not suh a good paint job

[Andy-Roo]

The Ascender is looking good, I like the weathering you’ve done to it. Those KC lighters look great 👍
 

[Ninetiesbeard]

Thanks Andy, ive still got to hook up some lights to them, and finish the body with the rusting paint topcoat

[Ninetiesbeard]

Hi again all. Ive just ordered wheels for this project from motoworx. Nice 1.55 beadlocks, true beadlocks with full length bolts the whole way around for a good tyre pull. Considerably cheaper than most alternatives, as i ordered rings and everything at the same time. Lets see how badly i get import taxed on that lot then lol.

 

 

Now its over to tyres, and im not 100% sure. I know i want something around 100mm or not too far under, as my china dick cepek tyres fit so perfectly with the bronco body. They look like scale, large tyres that a truck of this size would run. Nice. So using those dimensions, ive found these;

 

Pitbull rock beasts in 1.55. They are 98 ish mm by 34mm and have a good compound. Ive heard a lot of people ranting about how good these tyres are, and a lot of people run them but i would have to import them to the uk which will cost a fair bit.

 

Then we have the RC4WD bf goodrich mud terrain t/a km2. These were released fairly recently, and feature the sticky compound that my patagonias have, which i really like. I can also get these from rcbits quickly as well as a few other bits i need. These are 98mm by 36mm. The only thing that weirds me out about these is the depth of the tread. They look as if the carcass of the tyre needs to be 3-4mm smaller the whole way around and add that to the tread. I can imagine in the loamy, muddy areas i run in that these would get filled up really quickly. I wonder how they clear. Hmm. I wont have the wheel speed to fling mud from the treads with the 35t motor, so i will then be relying on compound to get me going. I think out of the two sets of tyres, the pitbulls would perform better, but the t/a's look more scale. Its a tough call. The t/a's are also cheaper, and theres less delay in me getting them. Food for thought.

Which would you choose? and why? Im stuck really. I probably prefer the t/as very slightly because the sidewalls look more scale lol.

[Andy-Roo]

I really like the Pitbull’s, got the Growlers on my VS, but I’d go with BF Goodrich.
Why?  Because you like the compound and they are available from RCBitz, so no ransom note from HRC after a three week wait.  Sounds like win win to me 👍
 

[Ninetiesbeard]

Happy Wednesday evening all! Just realized its been a few months since i added to this thread. A few things have happened, but ive mostly been just enjoying the truck. It handles well, although i feel like the shocks arent correct;  they also leak a lot. The tyres although sticky when clean tend to feel slick when driving but i have ordered some pitbull growlers from ebay to see if those are any better. Nothing wrong with the rc4wd ones as in they still work, but i feel like im losing grip which could be had with a different tread pattern or compound.  I fabricated some steel bumper mounts to attach the GCM bronco bumpers, which work well. Out of the same sheet material i also made some sliders which hold the sides of the body. Im pretty happy with the metalwork, its all real steel so as the paint gets scratched off it will rust nicely. I ordered the motoworx wheels with blue rings, and they are gorgeous. I strongly suggest giving tiny tyres a try! I miscalculated the SSD SLW/break rotor hubs, meaning that they wouldnt clear the inside of the wheel barrel. After turning my drill press into a lathe on a saturday afternoon that problem was sorted. 

 

This weekend gone, i installed a two speed transmission in the truck. I fabricated a mount to hold a standard size servo, which works. I made a linkage to actuate the gear shift, but im not 100% happy with it yet. I melted the servo that the dude sent with the transmission somehow, and the new one i installed this evening was also getting warm after i had tried to set the end points. I think im going to spring load the transmission shift fork, then use a cable to "pull" it into gear when i need it if that makes sense. It about doubles the ratio, so it will be useful. Ive got some trx-4 shocks in the mail to help with the handling, as well as tyres and parts for a servo winch which i want to use. It will be frightening cutting a slot in that beautiful gcm bumper, but i have the fairlead to cover and slips and mess. 

Thats it for now, i will try to be more regular with the updates. Next is to figure out the 2 speed properly, and start thinking about an interior/wheel wells/ light kit

Thanks for reading!
 

[PraetoR]

Great work! What a lovely little truck.

[DartmoorTrails]

I know those rotors!

I've had to change out from SSD hubs to Ali express specials which I have to say are brilliant!

 

The rig looks great; how do you find the weight bias now the motor is up front? Much difference?

[Ninetiesbeard]

On 03/12/2020 at 08:43, DartmoorTrails said:

I know those rotors!

I've had to change out from SSD hubs to Ali express specials which I have to say are brilliant!

 

The rig looks great; how do you find the weight bias now the motor is up front? Much difference?

Haha i bet you do! Yeah the motor relocation has had an effect in a big way. Positively and negatively; it gives great front traction and stability but on decents the rear can pop up and become skittish, i need to weight the wheels but im also going to make some beef tubes to combat this. Its probably 70-30 front to rear now as i use light lipos

[Ninetiesbeard]

So today i spent a few hours working on the two speed system to see if i could get it working the way i wanted it to, and im actually pretty happy with the results. It looks pretty janky, but it works well. The first hurdle i wanted had was the transmission shifting shaft hitting the top link of the front suspension system, this limited down travel. After taking apart the transmission i realized that the shaft could be flipped 180 degrees if i drilled a hole in the other side of the transmission case; which horizon had piloted by factory. Theres a lot of room for movement with the ascender in its design like that. After drilling that hole and confirming fitment, i removed the grease that the previous owner of the transmission had put in there in favor of a lite oil to allow better shifting. This gave me a very smooth shifting transmission but a new problem emerged. The newly positioned shaft now hit the driveshaft (ARGH). So i flipped the gcm transfer case around and swapped the input and output shaft, which fixed that problem. Now i needed an adaptor to allow straight pull of the shifting shaft. After trying to make a piece out of aluminium and then  delrin, i settled on brazing a lock nut to a piece of mild steel. I was dubious as im pretty terrible at brazing but it worked! The servo bent it a little in testing though. Then i used a piece of steel cable from the newly acquired winch drum as an actuator. It works, and now it shifts gears without laboring the servo to a smoky death.

 

[Ninetiesbeard]

Hi again. I did some more work on the two speed as i bent my gear selector rod on the last trip out, which sucked. Ive just added more brazing filler material to the same piece of steel to stiffen it up. I also used the pitbull growlers on that trip out with weight, and they worked really well. More grip than the bf goodrich for sure, but i just wasnt happy with the look so i went back to the others. I wired up the kc daylighters, but left the ends bare for now as i want to do a proper job of the light kit eventually. Its a job im avoiding to be honest. I also mocked up some aluminium inner wheel arches but the look was wrong and my friend has offered to print me some anyway so that will be sweet. Other than that the truck has been cleaned, ran twice since the last modifications and has run really well both times. The 18650s will give me around 3 hours of run time which is insane, and the setup as it runs currently only pulled 10 amps maximum in around an hour and a half of mixed driving; well below the maximum rating of the cells. Not much left to do on this truck, but fairly soon a new project thread will be started on here as soon as things start turning up in the mail and i have things to show.

[hamradioguy]

Wow awesome battery box dude!

 

😉

[Andy20xe]

Inner wheel arches are my next task on my ascender blazer, last time I made some with some Tupperware boxes and they worked ok. 

[Ninetiesbeard]

9 hours ago, hamradioguy said:

Wow awesome battery box dude!

 

😉

Lol, i need to send you those inner fender stls! 

 

9 hours ago, Andy20xe said:

Inner wheel arches are my next task on my ascender blazer, last time I made some with some Tupperware boxes and they worked ok. 

Yeah i went through that idea. I even considered raiding the local shops for a bottle with the correct profile, but theres a company that sells the files for ones that fit exactly correct and are printed so im gonna go that way

[Andy20xe]

1 hour ago, Ninetiesbeard said:

Lol, i need to send you those inner fender stls! 

 

Yeah i went through that idea. I even considered raiding the local shops for a bottle with the correct profile, but theres a company that sells the files for ones that fit exactly correct and are printed so im gonna go that way

Oh they could be interesting. Just need to find someone to print them! 

[Ninetiesbeard]

Hi again,

The inner fenders are finished and the stl files from spare time hobbies are decent. I made a filler plate/slider to go between them as my old ones dont fit anymore. I will also need to relocate some of the electronics but that was expected. The bf goodrich tires went back on as i prefer the look of them even though the growlers were the supreme performers. I need to finish the slider for the other side, and then possibly do a little more fine tuning on control systems. Im going to fabricate some more steel components to hold the bumpers better as well as cover the small gaps at the front and rear; to do the inner fenders justice. Thanks for reading

 

[Andy20xe]

7 hours ago, Ninetiesbeard said:

Hi again,

The inner fenders are finished and the stl files from spare time hobbies are decent. I made a filler plate/slider to go between them as my old ones dont fit anymore. I will also need to relocate some of the electronics but that was expected. The bf goodrich tires went back on as i prefer the look of them even though the growlers were the supreme performers. I need to finish the slider for the other side, and then possibly do a little more fine tuning on control systems. Im going to fabricate some more steel components to hold the bumpers better as well as cover the small gaps at the front and rear; to do the inner fenders justice. Thanks for reading

 

They look brilliant, definitely need some for my blazer . 

[Ninetiesbeard]

Time for a little update then i guess 🙂

Truck is still running and being used but has recently had a few changes. I removed the two speed transmission and went back to the single speed original unit because getting the two speed to work correctly in this truck was a complete nightmare, it also gets in the way of many things i want to do going forward (such as an interior). I also found that jsscale had the five lug slot mags in stock in 1.55 so i quickly jumped on those before they disappear again. I love slot mags and this truck has always needed them. Then i grabbed some pitbull rock beasts because of the increased tread depth of the bf goodrich. I feel like these will deal with winter weather better than the bf goodrich. Next comes the roll cage. I saw that new axial bronco and immediately loved the look of it. Ive wanted to do a cage for a long while for this but lacked the confidence, brazing definitely isnt my strongest skill, but i can solder. So i bought some copper fridge repair tubing from amazon and made it work. Its not bad, will be painted when the warmer weather comes. I managed to score and snap the bodyshell in a way that i think suits the cage, and will be making an interior for the truck too soon. Thanks for reading, will post updates when i have them, NB.

[Shergar]

That looks superb 👍