By next week I should have enough money to buy a GST, but I'm becoming weary on wether to buy it or not. Im affraid that it might break within the first week I have it. But Im not a crazy basher, I just like to drive around the neighborhood, nothing serious, so I doubt it would break from that. But if it ever did, I dont know if I would have money to fix it.( Im only 16 with no job lol) What do you guys think?

Hey Darkfire, the gst is definitely NOT an entry level truck, so if you are that worried about it, then maybe you should consider something else,,,Wait,, did I say that?? Tell you what darkifre, I'm gonna out on a limb here, if you break something on your first run out I will help you fix it ok?? BUT, you have to take the time to break in the motor properly, you have to go completely thru the truck and check out everything carefully. You do that, and I will help you fix your truck if you break it on the first run. But if you do break it I will want many pictures to see exactly what is broke, so we can get you up and running...Deal???

Sure, why not I doubt it will break anyway. I'm really not worried because it isnt an entry level truck. I've ran and raced nitro cars for 3 years now (I know its not alot) But My dad has been dealing with nitro engines with cars and planes for awhile now, he definently knows what to do when it comes to breaking in motors. So I will be extremly careful when breaking it in.

Edit: What kind of fuel should I run it with. I usually have Top Fuel, or Odonells around my house. Also what percent nitro for break in and actually running it.

Use 20% it is what is recommended by CEN...

Let me know when you make your final purchase, ok??

Good luck and have fun... and have great 4th of july!!

I've been running 30% without a problem...only thing to go wrong with the truck is the front breaks are locking up when i let off the gas now...think it's from the air i was getting might of knocked something lose...it's been almost 2 weeks and i haven't looked at the truck yet...time is running short around here the past few weeks...

BUY THE TRUCK!!!

I don't beat on mine...all but the one tank i was jumping and hill climbing...was adjusting the breaks so i never locked the setscreew in...it's done more than i thought it would with the center unlocked...just need to get her compleatly covered in mud so i can do a full teardown and lock the center and thinking of going with 40wt oil in the shocks...

burningpoo,

if your front brakes are locking up, check the little black metal plates that touch the brake discs. Usually I have seen that in some hard crashes, it's these little plates that bend and cause the brakes to bind.

As dogman said, the GST is not an entry level truck. It does take a little bit of rc know how to maintain the truck. But that's not to say it's a bad truck, or a difficult truck to work on. The GST features much more parts than other trucks in its class.

I have a GST and a Nemesis and I wouldn't trade'em for any other monster truck on the market.

I notice the same binding or locking on my GST, I think it's just simple physics.. It's not horrible or anything but it's not liquid smooth, if you think about the nature of the brakes, metal to metal wouldn't necessarily be the smoothest material that comes to mind but it's more durable then those crappy Savage brakes that last a month =)

Correct me if I'm wrong as I haven't done this myself, but I would think you could just remove the metal brake discs and sand them smooth after a while and that would help un-groove them a little? I would ask around first though cause I could be full of it, sounds like a good idea to me though.

Matt,

From my experience it's not necessarily the metal discs becoming very rough that causes the binding. More it's related to the metal calipers (black ones) getting bent or the little metal black bracket that holds the calipers getting worn that causes the binding.

In extreme cases I have seen people that drive alot cause some wear into the ball shaped diff output shaft in the center diff to form two grooves where the brake dics ride, but from my experience and seeing the ones that had this, it didn't bind the brakes, rather it just reduced the effective strength of the brakes.

On my own trucks I found it more beneficial to have the two silver discs get a rougher finish to them as this allowed for increased stopping power. The calipers themselves don't get too much wear, rather the discs see a majority of the wear. Also I have dialed out a lot of the rear brake on my Nemesis as this makes it much easier to control the truck in the air. In the past I ran without the front brake, but when jumping I found that I could have really used the front brake to get the nose of the truck down. For a little more braking power, you can also change the springs on the brake linkage and replace them with fuel tubing. I like the more positive feel the fuel tubing offers when you brake over the springs.

If anyone else on this thread has brake questions or setup tips regarding this, feel free to post your experiences or questions.

Simon

Hey Simon,

Thanks for the response, so you cut a 1/4" long piece of fuel tubing and put them where the brake linkage springs are? I currently have my linkage in the default spot on the servo horn and my brakes trimmed to the rear, which I can lock up, but I have noticed it's hard to lock the front and the rear at the same time not matter where I set things.

Any thoughts on that?

Matt,

You can go ahead and try the fuel tubing if you find that the springs are not providing enough stopping power. I cut about a 1/4" piece or 1/3" piece. There's term in the engineering world, I just TLAR'ed it. (That Looks About Right) Also you can readjust the little collars that hold the springs in place. Sometimes as time goes by the collars may slide a little bit and cause a little loss in the brake throw (servo throw). Let me know if you are not sure about what I am talking about. I know trying to describe these sort of things on the net can be like the guiding someone in the dark. It's always easier with pics.

Also are you now using a rechargeable RX pack? I don't remember if you had one or not.

Thank Simon,

Yeah some things call for the micrometer, other things TLAR =)

As for the brake "collars" or arms if you will, I loosened the set screws up and extended them fully so they're as long as they could be to give the servo more leverage on the calipers. I'll try your fuel tubing method and see how that works.

And yes I run an [link=http://www.hobbypeople.net/gallery/145801.asp]XTM 1000mah RX pack[/link].

Hey are you the same Simon that works for Cen, or someone else?

Thanks!

I don't directly work for CEN. But yes, this is the same simon that was helping you out with your truck.

I work for the government. But I help out at CEN when I can.

Oops, I just re-read your post, the setscrew I was talking about wasn't the one with the arm, the one I was talking about was the little collar closer to the servo arm. But you are correct, that by lengthening that arm you will get more torque.

Oh ok,

Well cool, thanks for the info it's very much appreciated. As for my GST it's running strong now thanks to you and the guys at CEN.

Hey one more question for ya, on the throttle there's already a little piece of fuel tubing on it to work just as you described on the brake side. But sometimes it binds up at idle and causes the idle to be a little higher then normal, any ideas on that. The little plastic piece that has the screw through it to hold the linkage to the horn seems too low, maybe a washer or two? Either that or I could try and carefully trim the edge on the fuel tubing and taper it thinner?

Thanks!

Hey dStruct,

check out my gallery for reference on the linkages I have the brake setup Simon was talikng about except I only run the front disk brakes since my center diff is locked, but the mtm brakes work so well I only need to front and the truck will still do an endo of I'm not careful.

Better yet here is a pic of my setup:
What the?? I did not mean to make it that big....

Hey guys, I got enough money to buy a GST. Im planing on buying one from ebay tomorrow in the 400 dollar range(hopefully no one snipes it). If not I'll just get another one, someone is selling it for buy it now for 500. Im so excited!

Thanks for posting the pic Dogman. I am still digging that bracket that you made to hold the brake arm. Very trick indeed!!

And Matt if you decide to lock the diff, as Dogman said, you can eliminate one of the brakes, as when the center diff is locked, you can't set the brake bias. The pic Dogman posted is of the fuel tubing replacement I was talking about. Thanks to his picture I hope everything is much clearer to you about what I was trying to say.

Let me know how it goes Matt.

Darkfire,

Get the truck and burn some nitro! There are quite a few excellent CEN supporters here that would be more than willing to help you out if run into some bumps while running your GST.

Thanks Dogman for the high-res pic,

I will definitely be doing that with my brake linkage, although I think I'll make the tubing shorter by about 50% and hopefully stiffer, as for the throttle linkage it looks like you're running a servo horn that came with your Hitec? Which eliminates the issue I'm having with the stock horn and the fuel tubing spacer catching on the bottom of the horn.

It's not a real big deal but it does change the way the truck responds and I could see it being an issue if I were to go to the track where more exact control is a requirement. Just bashing around I can deal with it.

Anyone else have any solutions and/or ideas on the throttle linkage?

Thanks guys [8D]

Well I won the auction this morning for 455 plus shipping. WOOOT. Hopefully it should be here by the end of the week. I sniped the auction because I wanted it so bad.

Edit: What percent should I use for break in? Because I already know to use 30 after breaking.

FWIW, I broke mine in with 30%, I heard some guys at my LHS (Hobby People) saying I should use 20% or special break in fuel with high oil content, but I had no issue with Werks Racing 30% just make sure you don't lean it out and overheat it and you should be fine. But then again those guys also said I can't run 30% at all and also tried to sell me 80wt shock oil and still won't believe me 20wt. is stock on a truck.

Also you're going to want a 1amp (1000mah) or higher battery pack for your receiver with a "JST" 2-pin red connector, and I wouldn't recommend running the stock "AA" batteries for your receiver longer then you have to.

Good luck!

Hey Simon can you fit a 6-cell in there? And what's a good brand that fits in the GST?

Darkfire,

Generally, from my experience, it's recommended that you break in the engine with the fuel you intend to run. Though some companies market a break in fuel, it really isn't necessary.

If you want to run 30%, just start with 30% and run it from there. Though the fuel blend CEN recommends is 20%, you can run 30% safely in the stock .46 and 7.7 engines.


Matt,

any standard 5 cell (hump pack configuration) will fit, but it you're asking about a 6 cell (7.2volt) I would not recommend it. Some servos can take the increased voltage, (alot of hitecs are, esp the ones meant for robot wars/battlebots use, but most rc car duty servos, you could ruin the pots in the servo. In addition, depending on if the voltage regulator in the receiver, some can handle the extra voltage, some won't. As far as I know, the Skyion RX is not meant to handle over a 5 cell RX pack.

For servos, in my Nemesis I have a Hitec 5955TG and it came a nice looking blue anodized servo horn(over 300 oz of torque!). In my GST I have one of the ACE DS1015. The Ace is a beefy looking servo, but it comes with a crappy servo arm that strips out all the time. Had to replace that arm with a aluminum servo arm from Racer's Edge.

For throttle, I still use the stock servos on both trucks.

For a reciever i was thinking about this [link]http://www2.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/wti0001p?&I=LXHUJ3&P=SM[/link]
But wouldnt I need a charger for it, or would possibly the charger the revo uses on its reciever pack would work?

That's what I would have bought if my LHS stocked it, but that should work nicely as long as it comes with the JST 2-pin red connector. As for a charger you will need one, typically if you have a 1000mah or milliamp (1 amp) battery, you want to charge it at 1 amp, 2000mah at 2 amp, etc. I bought a generic trickle charger that had a few options for .5 amp, 1 amp, and 2 amp, and multiple connectors. As soon as I track down a rechargable pack for my transmitter I should be able to charge both RX Pack and TX radio on the same charger (not at the same time though).

Dynamite has a peak charger that can charge your glow igniter, tx/rx battery packs all at the same time. About $40-50. The only problem with this model is that it is DC only. So you'll need to find a power supply. So the damage to my wallet was about $80 (50 for charger and 30 for power supply) not too bad for the convience it offers.

http://www.horizonhobby.com/Products...ProdID=DYN4059 , the bad thing is, I don't know if they offer an AC/DC version yet...

I bought one of the TX/RX trickle chargers( actually came with my JR Airplane Radio) and it just takes too long, I can't always remember to throw my TX/RX packs on the trickle charger the night before, so the relatively cheap cost was not enough to sway me from getting a peak charger.

Thanx Simon,
I wanted to get the tension of the return spring off of the Brake Cam to relieve a binding issue when the steel cam was rubbing on the steel OEM Bracket. A Flanged Ball Bearing seemed the logical answer. So I drew this bracket on AutoCAD and had a friend Machine a few for me. Now the brakes are as smooth a butter and they can be very touchy. It takes alot less servo torque to engage the brakes and if I'm not careful I can endo the truck. pretty cool when showing off for the crowd that always forms at the park..

dogman...nice pic...wow man...

to get to my break problem...well...I've have about 5 days off of work...but can't really work on my truck because my hand and arm keep going numb and swelling...sucks to have the time I need to play and can't...hope the doc's can get to the bottem of this pain...