2016 - Associated SC10B
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Last year I built an Arrma Raider buggy, and it was great fun for tearing up the pavement. But once the weather got cold and the pavement got covered with salt, sand, and pebbles from busted-up blacktop, I couldn't run the Raider anymore. I'll have to wait until the weather gets warm again and the pavement gets cleaned off by wind and rain. In the meantime, I wanted another vehicle that could offer a similar driving experience, but could handle dirtier running conditions and maybe some off-road action too. I looked at 1:8-scale buggies, but they didn't have the ground clearance I wanted.
Then I found out about a class of vehicle called "short course buggies". The first one I saw was the Pro-Line Pro-2 Buggy, which looked great...and then I saw how much it cost and how big it was. So I dug around a bit and found out Associated also makes one, based on their time-tested SC10 platform. It was smaller and less expensive than the Pro-2 Buggy, so I decided to give it a try.
The first time running it, I learned three things: 1) The stock tires were awful, 2) the stock suspension links were also awful, and 3) the stock front hubs were also awful. I was nervous about spending a bunch of money on a vehicle that broke within 5 minutes of taking it out of the box, so I just bought what I thought were essential upgrades -- titanium turnbuckles, STRC front and rear hubs, and CVD axles.
The STRC hubs were a big improvement, but as luck would have it I managed to snap one of the titanium turnbuckles after two more runs. I was most displeased, though I was somewhat impressed that the RPM ball-cups were able to withstand enough force to snap a titanium rod and still be usable afterwards.
Fortunately, Lunsford makes a thicker-gauge turnbuckle kit for the SC10, so I bought that, and thus far I haven't had any more suspension-related problems. I also replaced the stock tires, first with Pro-Line Trencher SCs on ProTrac-offset rims to match the stock offset, and then with Badlands SCs and Gladiator SCs on normal-offset rims. The extra 5/8" of track width made way more difference than I ever would've expected, turning the truck from an annoying traction-roller into a fun powerslider despite the extra side-bite offered by the more aggressive tire treads. As for the mix-and-match tires, I decided to give it a try because those are the same tires Pro-Line specs for their own short-course buggy, and they seem to have hit the mark quite nicely. I plan to keep running these tires from now on.
When I was building this truck, I was also in the process of standardizing the electronics in all of my electric vehicles, so I pulled the ESC and motor and replaced them with a SkyRC Toro SC120 ESC and a Tacon 3930KV motor, the same combo that I use in all my other electric trucks now. (I just tune the gearing and ESC settings to suit each vehicle.) The steering servo was replaced with a Hitec HS-7955TG servo, which is beastly for a vehicle like this, but again it was part of standardizing the electronics, and the servo-saver protects the steering system from being broken by the super-powerful servo.
I also added a Futaba GYC430 gyro, not because the vehicle is unstable, but because I like being able to brake hard when necessary, and a gyro makes that easier to do with a RWD vehicle without worrying about fishtailing. (I often drive in parking lots, so avoiding cars is a concern.) The chassis is actually very well sorted, and except for when I'm pushing it way too hard on grass or mulch, it doesn't actually need the gyro except to make sure it can brake without swapping ends. I determined through a small amount of testing that the chassis handles better with the battery at the rear end of the tray, so the foam pad is glued in-place up at the front, with a bevel cut into the top edge so the battery can slide past the foam to fit into place more easily.
As soon as I got the truck, I pulled the transmission apart, degreased it, filled the diff with 200,000wt diff oil, and regreased everything with Grim Racer Speed Grease, which I use on all my greased gears now. I'm very impressed with that stuff; it works on nylon, brass, aluminum, steel, you name it. I have gears that have been in-service for years now, with the original application of grease, and no indication that they need any servicing at all.
I was a little dismayed to find the gears in the transmission were plastic, considering this is a pretty big truck to be running 48p transmission gears, but I haven't seen many complaints about them, so maybe they're good enough anyway. I picked up a set of aluminum gears just in case, though. They're in the spare parts bag waiting for the day I need them. I decided to replace the pinion and spur with 32p gears straightaway, though, to eliminate any chance of stripping the spur due to small changes in gear mesh from motor-mount flex or just poor adjustment on my part.
The rest of the upgrades on this truck were really just "why not?" upgrades; it didn't really need them, but I have a taste for fancy parts, so I got big-bore shocks, an STRC aluminum rear bulkhead and motor-mount plate, and a clear spur-gear cover. There *is* one thing I did to this truck that didn't involve just buying fancier parts, though:
See anything missing? The nerf bars are gone. I took one look at them and hated the way they looked -- the only thing about this truck that I didn't like the look of, actually -- so I cut them off at the front and unbolted them at the back, and installed some countersunk screws where the nerf bars used to attach to keep the body shell snug against the rollcage. I suppose hypothetically the rear wheels are more likely to get caught on something and damage the rear pivot-block, but I have lots of RCs with exposed wheels and that hasn't happened yet -- it's always the front wheels that get caught on things, at least when I'm driving, so I'm not worried about reduced durability because of this mod.
Oh, and I replaced a bunch of the decals with decals intended for the optional blue body shell; the worst offender was the Associated logo on the sides, which was black lettering and so big that the decal overlapped some complicated contours on the shell, leaving gaps under the decal where dirt was unavoidably going to get stuck. The Associated logo decal for the blue body is white lettering and is smaller, so it fits better.
So there. After 3 years of RCing, I finally bought a short course truck...sort of. It's great fun.
New tires! My SC10B finally looks like a proper RWD buggy.
Naturally the tires I wanted are discontinued -- both sets. The Caliber SCs were discontinued some time last year, I think, and the Slicer SCs were discontinued several years ago. I had to buy the Slicer SCs from Germany. But they work very well, both on pavement and on grass, which is what I hoped for but I was still surprised. The Caliber SCs give me the traction I'd been looking for on matted-down grass in near-freezing temperatures, something the harder rubber of the Badlands SC tires couldn't do. I'll probably switch back to the Badlands SCs in the summer, but it's good to have a set of winter tires that I'm happy with, finally.
Also, I got sick of the rear bumper pulling away from the motor guard and ripping divots of grass out of the ground every time the vehicle landed a jump tail-down, so I drilled three tiny holes through it and anchored it to the motor guard with screws:
Solves that problem.
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