Traxxas TRX6 to Unimog conversion using Axial UMG10 body

[Cuiken]

It's been done a few times before but there's rarely much method covered in any of the posts I've seen so thought I'd cover it here.

 

Firstly, why? The TRX6 is great fun but the body is very more 'mall crawler' than 'crawler'. It's just not my thing. Okay, why not buy the actual Axial Unimog 6 wheeled crawler? Two reasons, it's not as good at the TRX6 and it's not nearly as good looking as the 4 wheeled UMG10. Okay, nothing too subjective there then 🙂 Let's move on.

 

I bought a used TRX6 last summer. It's good crack but, like I say, I reckon it's pretty ugly. I did a ton of cosmetic mods to mine but I still don't love it. The 'finished' result is shown below, forgive the dust. I've not been out with it for a couple of months:

 

 

Summary of mods: Trimmed the mudguards, trimmed/removed the bogging front and rear bumpers before a rock did it for me, added vanquish bumpers front and rear, lowered the body mounts, added sheet aluminium in the rear 'bed', added a cheap interior and stuck on a few bits of scale trim.

 

It works much better (doesn't get hung up constantly) but I still don't love how it looks.

 

After a bit of 'youTubing' though I found these and decided a more utilitarian Unimog styled design really appealed to me:

 

 

 

 

Both of these appear to have been built around the Axial UMG10 body so I gradually accumulated all the parts needed. Getting parts was a challenge, Axial only seem to release one of the four body parts at a time (cab, rear cage, rear sides, interior). I actually haven't been able to get an interior but I'll either use a cheap generic one or just smoke the windows. Either way, I have enough parts to kick off the build.

 

Basic proof of concept:

 

Literally balanced the cab on the chassis. Immediately liked how it looks:

 

 

 

 

Started assembling the cab (I'm planning to use the hidden body mounts) and trimmed off some of the rear cage to get it to fit:

 

 

 

Test mounted the cab, rear and sides onto the chassis:

 

 

 

Finally added the 'visor' from the original Merc shell. This does give it a slightly less 'scale' look but also gives a bit of protection to the front of the cab. I'm 50/50 on it for now but I've drilled the holes so it's already a keeper 🙂 

 

 

 

I think it will look a bit more 'balanced' once the cab is painted.

 

It all fits together surprisingly easily. The front body mounts should screw onto the chassis rails with a small amount of modification and I think I should be able to get the rear cage to mount to the chassis mudguards without too much fuss. The front of the cage sits neatly on the chassis so it's all pretty robust.

 

That's it for now. I'll add updates as I have them. 

Edited January 11, 2022 by Cuiken

[ColosTommy]

I have to agree with you, imo the unimog looks a million times better. Nice work.

[Cuiken]

Okay, bit of an update:

 

Got the body assembled, disassembled, masked and sprayed.

 

For the cab I went with Tamiya orange backed with black with the wheel arches and bonnet highlight masked during the orange coats. I then cut and peeled away the overspray film and added a coat of matt lacquer over the black areas on the outside of the shell. 

 

For the rear I went mainly black with the diesel tanks sprayed on the inside with Tamiya red and then backed in black.

 

As usual I failed to apply enough coats of colour before spraying the black backing. If I'd wanted the orange and red to really 'pop' I should have done a couple more coats (I did 5 think coats) or backed in silver and then black. The result is that the orange and red look darker and murkier than I'd anticipated.

 

That said though, I think I accidentally got a better result than I was planning for. The slightly dowdy orange colour looks spot on for a Unimog and the darker/shadowed areas serve to pick out the body shell detail and give it a slightly grimy appearance. The fuel tanks look fantastic, almost like they are coated in a film of dirty diesel. So, got lucky basically.

 

I then cut a sheet of scale checker plate for the rear bed which I think looks properly good.

 

Here's a few shots:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Obvs the spare wheel is not yet mounted but there's an easy spot to run a bolt so that should be pretty trivial.

 

Only bit that required any thought was how to mount the body. Here's a couple of photos to help explain:

 

The Axial UMG10 uses these downward pointing body mounts that fit through a couple of mounts screwed to the rails at the front of the truck:

 

 

Unfortunately, the rails sit a fraction lower on the TRX chassis so I needed to figure out a DIY mount. Ultimately, dead simple, just an aluminium plate bolted to the front bumper with a couple of holes drilled to accept the body posts:

 

 

So, the body posts (shown below with clips inserted) just pop through those holes and the front is sorted:

 

 

 

The rear was A little fiddlier as the UMG10 body actually hinges off the back of the chassis. This is not possible on the TRX . So, instead, I trimmed the cag down (as shown previously) and added a pair of downward pointing body posts (these are the incredibly useful Traxxas 3727A mounts).

 

 

 

 

These body mounts then pass through a couple of holes that I drilled in the TRX chassis' built in mudguards and clip from below:

 

 

Not a lot to it frankly but a bit fiddly getting everything lined up.

 

Looking again at the photo below I think the rear bumper is too wide and sits to far back. As a general comment, even with most of the TRX6 shell's bumper trimmed off and the original chassis bumper replaced with the Vanquish one, it still got hung up all the time.

 

 

So, I'm going to remove about 1.5cm of the chassis rails at the back and pull the bumper further in. I'll then trim the width down to better suit the Unimog design (I think the UMG10 actually tapers to a very narrow bumper).

 

Not sure what is next with it after that. Possible ideas:

 

1. Mount the rear wheel. Do I want a matching wheel to the rest of the truck or is it better having a mismatched spare? I'm undecided.

2. Throw a bit of scale luggage at it.

3. Add a longer rear bed over the back of the chassis?  Again, I'm not sure. the exposed chassis looks pretty good already.

4. Do I want to add a sound box to emulate engine noise? I have always thought they are pretty cheesy but I think it might work on this rig.

 

Any thoughts/ideas welcomed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 21, 2022 by Cuiken

[Stormbringer]

Thats really looking ace mate 

[Cuiken]

Thanks. Really pleased with it. I've trimmed the rear bumper down now so it tapers with the mudguards and it looks spot on.

 

I've also bought a matching spare wheel (really just so I'm not tying up one of my enduro wheels as a decorative spare).

 

Last job is to find some lights but the TRX6 has this weird light box thing with a non standard connector that I need to figure out first.

[Cuiken]

Couple of pics showing the finished bumper. 

 

Only thing now would be lights.....

 

With work/covid/dark evening etc though I'm yet to even drive the darned thing 😞

 

 

 

 

[Stormbringer]

Lights will make it look awesome mate 👌