Step-by-step building the X-Ray (E) 808 Buggy!..

[TDC57]

I’ve got some questions for the team / family (hope you don’t mind)??

1. What is Drooop?? And what setting do I / have you used with any success?
2. Isn’t there supposes to be some kind of dust boot covering up the ball joints?? They are totally exposed and I can see the front tires kicking up everything on my rears every time when driven?? What am I missing here??
3. What is going to be braking on here, I hate beaning down (much like you) and feel the need to order extra parts, got any suggestions??.
4. Does anyone have a SETUP sheet they can send me?? This buggy has sooooo many different options I don’t even know where to begin other than what the instruction recommend..
5. Not that she’s running yet, but how do I judge service on a buggy and to what length is involved??, a complete teardown or just regular maintenance??, what is regular maintenance on a buggy anyway??
6. What is the recommended shock rebound setting for buggys?? The instructions give me three options (low, 50% and 100%) what are your thoughts / suggestions..

I'm SSSssoooo sorry for the newbie questions!! andThanks SOOOooo much for your time and have a great one!!!


Shaun.

[MetalMan]

Originally Posted by TDC57

I’ve got some questions for the team / family (hope you don’t mind)??

1. What is Drooop?? And what setting do I / have you used with any success?
2. Isn’t there supposes to be some kind of dust boot covering up the ball joints?? They are totally exposed and I can see the front tires kicking up everything on my rears every time when driven?? What am I missing here??
3. What is going to be braking on here, I hate beaning down (much like you) and feel the need to order extra parts, got any suggestions??.
4. Does anyone have a SETUP sheet they can send me?? This buggy has sooooo many different options I don’t even know where to begin other than what the instruction recommend..
5. Not that she’s running yet, but how do I judge service on a buggy and to what length is involved??, a complete teardown or just regular maintenance??, what is regular maintenance on a buggy anyway??
6. What is the recommended shock rebound setting for buggys?? The instructions give me three options (low, 50% and 100%) what are your thoughts / suggestions..

I'm SSSssoooo sorry for the newbie questions!! andThanks SOOOooo much for your time and have a great one!!!


Shaun.

1) Droop is commonly referred to as the amount of down-travel that the suspension is limited to. The setting you use often will depend on the track/surface. For example, on a track with HUGE jumps you will want to unscrew those little set screws to increase down-travel, as this will allow your suspension to work more. However, too much can be a bad thing because it will allow more body roll which decreases handling capability (sway bars are a fix for this, though).

2) Which ball joints are you referring to? Typically 1/8 buggies/truggies don't use dust shields anywhere except on the shock shafts. I never really thought about it it, but I suppose it might be because these vehicles are able to withstand such punishment. (Are you comparing the dust shields on the Revo?)

3) Obviously I can't answer this question 100% accurately, but in general you might want to stock up on front and rear arms (upper and lower) and if there are plastic arm mounts (or hinge pin plates, or whatever you want to call them) those could also be good candidates.

4) Do the instructions have a reccommended setup? That's always a good place to start. Aside from that, I am of no help here.

5) Things that often wear out the fastest are hinged suspension components, such as the suspension arms, arm mounts, rear axle carriers, and front c-hubs (if the front suspension uses a c-hub). This will be different from buggy to buggy based on the design (for example, my new SH buggy uses rubber bushings between the hinge pins and the suspension arms to reduce wear). Shock seals also wear out, and you can buy shock rebuild kits which include o-rings, shock pistons, etc.
I am not a big fan of doing maintenance on these buggies, so I just like to wait until I notice an unacceptable (by my standards) amount of slop in various parts to replace them.

6) I don't yet have enough racing experience to thoroughly answer this. That said, I tend to build my shocks with between 25-50% rebound, and make sure that all the shocks (or at least the fronts and the rears) rebound the same.

Any more pics of your awesome buildup?

[jhautz]

Awesome build pics!! Love it. Great choice on the 808. I absolutely love mine. I had the EC and upgraded to the 808. Its amazing how much better the 808 handles. I cant even believe it.

With reference to your questions Ive got some recommendations based on what I have learned on my 808. See my notes in red.

Originally Posted by TDC57

I’ve got some questions for the team / family (hope you don’t mind)??

1. What is Drooop?? And what setting do I / have you used with any success? I found the instruction manual setting of 4mm exposed on the rear droop screws to be too little droop. I am running it with great success at around 2.5mm exposed. Of course this will depend on the track and surface you run on. In general I find a low grip track needs more droop (arms hang lower) and a high grip track needs less droop (arms dont hang down as far).
2. Isn’t there supposes to be some kind of dust boot covering up the ball joints?? They are totally exposed and I can see the front tires kicking up everything on my rears every time when driven?? What am I missing here?? I'm assuming by ball joints you mean the joints on the CVD drive shafts. In your pictures it looks like you used a ton of grease on them. Much more than you need. I actually prefer to use a dry lubricant of some sort rather than grease. Grease makes dirt stick. I would check out mcmaster.com and search for a product called dri-slide in a 4 oz. squeeze bottle. That stuff dries to a gray film that lubricates better than grease and actually repels dirt rather than attracting it. Thats what I like to use anyway. You can break the CVDs back down, clean the grease off and use the dri-slide and you wont have to worry about boots or dirt sticking to the cvd joint.
3. What is going to be braking on here, I hate beaning down (much like you) and feel the need to order extra parts, got any suggestions??. I've been running mine pretty hard and had some pretty rough crashes, cartwheels, lawn-darts and other vehicle high speed collisions and its still tickin without a single broken part yet. I'm not buying any spares until something actually breaks. Xray built a seriously stout yet very lightweight buggy here I think. I have a bucket full of spares for the EC that never got used either.
4. Does anyone have a SETUP sheet they can send me?? This buggy has sooooo many different options I don’t even know where to begin other than what the instruction recommend. Just use the instruction manual setup to start with. Xray is recommending it as a very easy to drive setup that will work well on most tracks. I can confirm that it is a very easy to drive forgiving setup. (exactly what I need) The only thing I changed so far and didn't change back was the top position on the rear shock mounting. I'm considering going up in the center dif fluid a touch. I am unloading a bit more than I like on the straights and I think it is contributing to some slightly higher motor temps due to the over reving when the tires unload, but if it means giving up some of the great steering this thing has I don't know if I will keep it or go back. Anyway, thats the next change I'm gonna try. If you want more set up sheets go to the forums at teamxray.com and go to the setup sheets area. All the pro team drivers and everyone posts their setups for us mere mortals to use. The team drivers are on there very regularly to answer setup questions and give tips as well. Excellent support there, I highly recommend you check out the teamxray.com forum if you haven't yet.
5. Not that she’s running yet, but how do I judge service on a buggy and to what length is involved??, a complete teardown or just regular maintenance??, what is regular maintenance on a buggy anyway?? Regular maintenance is cleaning, checking for worn or broken parts, tightening loose screws, proper function of all of the parts of the buggy, changing old/dirty fluids. I like to change the fluid in the shocks and difs every few hours of actual run time to keep them consistent if its a track vehicle. Not sure what "normal" is, but thats what I do. Every few weeks of racing/practice. I hear there are some fanatics that do it after every race day, but that just seems crazy to me. If the stuff isnt looking dirty(brown or grey tint), then its still good IMO.
6. What is the recommended shock rebound setting for buggys?? The instructions give me three options (low, 50% and 100%) what are your thoughts / suggestions.. Go with a low rebound setting. Having a high rebound setting is almost like having slightly stiffer springs. If you need stiffer spring, just get the stiffer springs. I find the rebound really hard to set consistently. But that might just be me. I cant ever get it to set at exactly 0% rebound, I just get it as low as I can without it being negative (shock rod actually pulls back in when you extend the shock all the way)

I'm SSSssoooo sorry for the newbie questions!! andThanks SOOOooo much for your time and have a great one!!!

If you want to learn how different settings effect the cars performance and handling read the Xray setup guide that came with the buggy kit. It is a awesome reference guide and will tell you how to adjust everything on the car and what its effect should be on the handling and performance. I never go to the track without it. The kit also comes with the standard setup sheet that has all of the settings the manual tells you to set and a blank so you can keep notes on what you changed and what works for you.

Shaun.