my mugen mbx5t build
 

So i was supposed to get my mbx5t today but fedex decided not to deliver it until next Tuesday!

I plan on using the RCM mugen mount but I need some help figuring out the battery tray situation .. I have zippy 5000mah 40c 5s and 6s battery's and they are pretty big. Can i use the mbx6 trays?

Got my truggy today at last! I tore it down, pulled all the nitro bits off, made a list of little things i need; screws, bearings and such. I didn't do much today other than tear it down and clean it.

Anyone have some diff fluid recommendations? just some general starting guidelines to help me play with.

I also need to rebuild the shocks they seem to weep a little bit

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I really like the bull dog body. I will keep it in mind after I destroy my body.

As far as fluids go, in mine I run 20-100-10. I only bash and I run it w/a 1520 on 5s and it's a beast. Make sure to check diffs for shimming....my stock 5T needed shims to make sure that there was NO play in the diffs

What I do for batts trays is have Mike custom make them to my batteries dimensions so that they are snug and do not move. I do this on all my rigs and it has worked out well.

Here is a pic of mine from a yr ago....since this pic, I have switched radios so no big antenna, blacked out all my wires

http://i271.photobucket.com/albums/j...e/DSC02945.jpg

Sweet ill make sure i go grab some fluids from the local hobby shop tomorrow and get started! So for track use would those fluids be a good starting point? A far as shims do they use 8x10xwhat ever thickness? I think i have some various sizes left over from shimming my monster GT diffs.

I have never been a fan of the forward cab design, but it's kinda grown on me. That body fits nice and snug up against the stock side guards. I was almost thinking of doing no body post and running Velcro on the sides of the body and guards.

Can't remember the exact shim size...that sounds right though. For track use try something like 15-30-5 in your diffs.

here are some updated pics...its a little dirty.

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Thanks for the help, What is your esc sitting on? i cant quite tell...Also what boots are you using for your cvd's?

Well i made some progress over the weekend! got the shocks and all the differentials rebuilt and ready to go. Also used some 3M dirt bike graphics that i picked up from work and made a chassis sticker to protect the bottom.

Ive made a list of all the pesky button head allen's that i can replace with capheads and gonna stop by the local Fastenal and order that up. almost 50% of the screws on my mbx5t where stripped from the previous owner!

Also will be ordering bearings from AVID shortly then after the chassis is all done and in tip top shape i'll be ordering my RCM mount!

Well I've gotten some progress done lately!

My 46T delrin spur came in to replace the 65t steel that was on it, I also received my RCM Mugen mount! Thanks Mike for the super fast shipping! it got here in 2 days!!! I installed the new gaskets and filled with 30k fluid and installed my slipperential.

While i was at it i used some 3m vinyl sheets of dirt bike graphics and made a custom chassis guard and added a DE skid plate and DE bump-skid

I added some foam and zip tied my battery in just to give her a quick maiden test run. temps seem ok @ 14/46 on 5s right now, but i'll wait to test it some more when my battery tray shows up and i can properly mount my battery


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I'd be wary with the ESC mounted that high. In case of a hard hit on the lid the ESC might get physically damaged.

I initially had my ESC mounted higher like that too. But I continued to revise it until it was nearly as low as the batteries. Now it would take a very hard hit to damage the ESC from landing on its lid.

+1 to that as well. My esc is mounted on an AL mount from Axial I believe. If you bought Mike's batt tray I hope you purchased one with an integrated esc tray...if you did no more worries!!

The boots for the cvd's are dynamite ones. They work, but don't seem to last that long. Still cheap enough to replace when they do rip. The ones on the wheels, axles are the wost for tearing.

Judging by the pics I'd say there is enough room to mount the ESC aft of the tray even if he doesn't have the tray with the integrated shelf.

That's just what I did! :yes:

something like this would work

http://www3.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin...?&I=LXWJK9&P=7

Well I bought a Losi 8e tray, but I just cut the esc shelf part off..
Which I'm now regretting lol..hmm

Well you can still use it...the cut off piece. Pick up some spacers to place under cut off piece. Mark spacer holes on chassis, drill through chassis, countersink screws and drill through plastic and bolt together and done. Most hardware stores sell thick nylon spacers which would work perfectly. Just a thought

Well I got everything together today, I ended up using a piece of lexan and cut it the length of the chassis. I then drilled and tapped holes in locations that where already on the nitro chassis so i didn't have to drill my nice aluminum :great:

I still used the Losi 8e Tray, but ground down the bottom to make it sit flush. Drilled and countersunk holes in the top to mount to my new piece of lexan. I then reused the esc shelf i had initially cut off and used some nylon spacers i had and made a nice little shelf for it.

I tried to tidy up my wires and routing a little bit, It still needs a little work but it should do for now. I added a foam block in my battery tray so i could play with the weight placement a little bit, idk if I'll ever really need to but its nice to have it there just in case!

It's kinda hard to see all that i did but it came out really well, i do feel with the 5s 5k-mah battery it favors that side a lot...Maybe if i get a bigger motor it will help balance it out a bit.

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Looks good! The motor you are using looks to be a 1515? You may have to wind your motor wires together like I did to help with interference. It made a difference for me when the truck was quite far away from me.

I braided mine.

http://gallery.me.com/thirdgen89gta#...&bgcolor=black

I did as well as can been seen in post #5

Hmm, I've never heard of any thing like that? I haven't really driven it a whole lot sense it has been raining. I did take it out on my covered patio and did a little driving. I'm hoping Monday will be a bit nicer so I can take I out to the track and try it out.

The motor I'm using is a 1512 1.5y. I'm still looking for a new motor for this seems OK for now. Ill braid up the wires tonight and give it a shot!

The braiding helps with minimal interference that's all. I would definitely look for another motor..If you can find a 1520 it would be perfect as that's what I am using on 5s. I was one of the luck ones to buy a bunch of the 1520's when castle had their big sale. I have 2 spares just in case I lose one.

Too bad they stopped making the 1520...best motor IMO for truggies and many MT. Most of us running or racing truggies use 5 or 6s so this motor is ideal...runs cool and has sooooo much torque it's unbelieveable

I wonder if enough of us kept bugging Patrick if they would consider making them again

Well i braided my wires last night, or shall i say i enlisted the help of my lovely gf to do it it for me lol. Ive been looking for a 1520 but haven't really found on that I'm willing to buy. At this point i'm not willing to shell out $150 for one

On another note, i was able to go out and drive my mugen for a little bit, but now i need a new spur gear :no: a little rock got in the gear mesh and chunked a few teeth and now its really noisy. guess i should have gone with the RCM steel spur for my slipperential instead....

Sorry to hear that you chewed up your gear. As much as I like the plastic ones to reduce noise, I am sticking with the steel one for just your reason. If you could find a Tekin truggy motor that would work as well...such as a TT2353 which is a 1700kv or a TT2352 1900kv. Both motors are bigger than the 1512 you are using and will surely run cooler as well due to longer and larger rotor. Many used ones can be found on RCTech for sale. I buy a lot of my gear used there

Well we finally had a break in the weather so i set out on a early morning voyage before heading off to work. I was able to run a 5s pack through it before i had to leave the track. I learned my driving skills weren't quite up to par yet and ended up destroying my Ofna hd wing (which i hear is pretty common for that wing?)

This was my 1st time running the slipperential so i didn't know what to look for in slip. noises, etc. All appeared normal, but every now and then i swear i kept hearing something...

well lunch rolled around and i set out to the track again! This time with my 6s pack, still my driving skills weren't so good and i ended up cracking the front of my body from a few nose dives. I was still leery of the slipperential at this point, but continued to run it.

Well i got home and was still uneasy so i tore it apart and found all 4 of the spider gears had turned the 30k diff fluid into a metallic gray matter.. I was a little miffed at this point so i installed the stock center diff but it seems it likes to rain a lot here in the pacific northwest...

The weather has been really weird here in the pacific north west lately and with work i haven't had much time at all to take any of my Rc's out for spin :whip:

Before i get ahead of my self here, a while back i had bought some Proline Maxx mashers for my gf's emaxx and to use on my MGT, well when i converted my MGT over with a 1717 and 6s it started to eat 14mm hexes in the rims and i had already patched them up with JB welded hexes inside... So i got bored and decided i would boil them off and boil off the half bald truggy tires i had and mount the mashers up on my 17mm hex truggy rims! While i was at it i also ran a single 1" strip in the center of the tire to keep them from ballooning
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Well while the gf was at work i decided to take my mugen back out sense the last time when I destroyed my Slipperential... I feel the stock diff with the same 30k oil felt better to drive all together. I got good traction with the mashers on there and on 6s i could get a little wheelie out of the truggy, I was only gonna run for a couple mins beacause i thought the 1512 would have a hard time with all that tire mass now.
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I ended up running half the pack before i decide i should quit while i was head and i had started to get trigger happy while playing in the snow :oh: I also have not water proofed anything :whistle: Don't mind the no wing lol, I have on on order.

I was so impressed with how this actually turned out! I really wanted to keep my truggy for strictly on the track...but after seeing what its capable of I'm very impressed and not sure what i want to do once i get a actual truggy motor for this thing!

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Those tires are great all around tires...wear like iron too. I had a set on my maxx awhile back and loved them.

Yeah they where pretty awesome in the slush and snow we had and did fairly well in my gravel driveway. I think i have decided on getting a 4 pole leopard 4082. Don't get me wrong i love castle stuff and run it in all my brushless stuff, but it's hard to find a comparable motor to the 1518 or 1520 without spending an arm and a leg for a used one!

What do u think? is the 4082 going to be overkill on 5 and 6s? or should i tone it down to a 4074?

Well I finally found a 1520 for a really good price and was able to get it in this weekend. Right now I'm geared 14/46 which I feel is really slow! Temps where 118 after about 10mins, running maxx bowties and it was about 75 outside. So i feel I can gear up a bit for some more umph!

Maybe its me or just the center diff setup but I don't feel like this motor is a huge power house like everyone says? I'm running 10/30/15 in my Diffs and other one is running the same but with a xerun 42/74 2000kv system and it will wheelie all the time and feels super smooth.

With my 1520 on 5S my diffs are 10R/100C/20F. It has so much torque...I have shredded diffs. Still having a tough time with the front. I have shimmed and re-shimmed and re-shimmed again and it still wears them out fast. The rear is perfect....just the front is a PITA.

Something with your set up is not just so if you can't see that that the 1520 is a torque monster.

How much voltage are you running?

On 4s my 2200kv mmm setup will almost wheelie. On 5 and 6 S it's all the time and too much power to handle except for speed runs.

Yeah I already shimmd my differentials right when i got it and inspected the gears.

Right now I'm running 5s, haven't tried running 6s yet. I got scared cuz my Mamba monster v3 stopped working. Found out the switch had broke so i just cut it off and soldered . Not ideal for me but oh well.