Bainji

Hey, I'm fairly new to the rc hobby, Ive had a Tamiya TL01 for a little more than a year and a half now. Ive just finished doing my first upgrades which included the RS-540 Sport Tuned Motor and the second really wasn't an upgrade but more of a necessity, see I broke my steering servo one night during a collision with the wall and a I bought a Traxxas Steering Servo for 18.99 at the local hobby shop. I forget what model it is right now but its in my profile which I plan on getting pictures up soon. The new motor has proven to be lots of fun but I don't think i'm anywhere near done. I want to turn my car into something of a rally geared car. I wanted to know what you guys recommend and i'll tell you what I have been looking into.

I think I most likely need to get the sport tuned gear set as i've read that not doing so may cause problems soon enough, more shredding of gears and what not. I also want to find out what type of tires I should get as well as if shocks are really needed because the stock shocks seem to have held up nicely when ive run it in the field im intending to be playing in most of the time. Ive even ran it down the dirt ridden roads of the Dominican Republic whenever I go down and it truly is built like a tank as ive seen in other posts. If you guys know what exactly I would need to make it more "dirt ready" or basically turn it into a rally set up please do say.
Thankyou for taking the time to read my nubbish ranting :P

running_gag

bearings, definetly shocks, better batteries.

Bainji

I bought the Venom 1800 NiCd batteries, and with these i get run times that im happy with. I don't know if u meant better batteries than these though.
And im not sure which shocks would be best for my TL01. I looked at bearing quickly and found some on tower hobbies. http://www2.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin...&I=LXTR73&P=ML

running_gag

by the gods, you need a different battery. you will be amazed at how fast your car is if you get some nimh at 3000 mah. not sure what your cash situation is but decent battery packs can be had for around 30 bucks. what kind of charger do you have? those bearings should work well in your car.

Yub, yub, cmdr!

Get some IB4200s, it will dramatically increase your performance.

Bainji

I saw Venom 3300 at my local hobby shop for around 30 dollars so ill save up for those, pity I quit work a week ago to cope with school (its gettin hardcore now lol)
My charger is Super Brain quick charger Ive seen that chargers can get expensive but ill check more if i need to, not planning on gettin new charger though.

running_gag

Good on you for putting school first. I would check at radio shack for batteries. they have 3300 but they ar GP cells, not whatever junk venom digs up. what super brain is that? does it have numbers like 959 or 918?

Bainji

Ya it has numbers, mine says 819

Bainji

http://www.radioshack.com/product/in...ductId=2147160 is this the battery you recommend?

running_gag

Those are the batteries. good cells at a good price. and your charger is perfectly adequate for those cells. I would save for more batteries before I worried about a charger.

running_gag

What i said about the charger, I was wrong. that charger can't charge nimh. You'll need to upgrade your charger first. look at this.

http://www2.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin...&I=LXD548&P=ML

Bainji

How about if I bought a battery thats 3300 mah or more that was NiCd, would having it NiCd mean less performance than NiMh or is NiMh the only thing that gives a high boost of power at the higher mah?
And also wanted to inquire about shocks, I see that on tamiyausa the TRF Flourine Coated Dampers are around 80 dollars, too expensive for me and not even sure if this is what you would recommend, I was thinking of gettin oil filled shocks are those more recommendable?

poe

NiMh has a higher amp draw so yes it will give more of a "boost". NiMh is just waaayyy better.. no discharging...more mah...

If your TL-01 is a road car then yes the TRF dampers will be very nice.. you can get them for around $40-50 at rcmart.com or ebay..

The TRF dampers are pretty much the best.

Bainji

Well I want to make it more of a rally car, Ive seen people do it and it looks very fun and considering where I want to drive it with my friend a rally setup will be perfect.(Big field with hills and mostly grass/dirt surface) So I'm not sure if I should get some different types of shocks made specifically for what I plan on doing.
I also found this at radio shack which if you guys say so im actually already eager to get http://www.radioshack.com/product/in...entPage=search
running_gag said to worry about charger first now so the fact that the battery it comes with isn't the mah you have told me to get at least ill have a higher mah battery to begin with and a charger that accepts both nicd and nimh. Seems like a great deal to me.

mud patrol

Hello, i`m almost new in the forum but not in the hoby. I have a tamiya tl01 since 2 years and I have carried out some modifications. To begin with, I have changed the shochs for oil shocks made by Carson (I don`t know if somebody sells them in America because I am from Europe). Some time later I changed the motor to a 21T Tiger Force with great results on every terrain and the necessary ball bearings. and finally I have changed the wheels and tyres for the Super Street 4WD by Carson, but you will need something to separate the wheels from the chassis so that they don`t hit the tyres. The batteries I am using are 2 1600mah and 1 3000mah, the 3 made by LRP. The sender is a Futaba High Tech,and the servo and the receiver are also made by Futaba. The groung clearance is now of about 5 cm, so I had to change the direction stick for adjustable ones. Almost forgot to mention that I have also made a costum skid plate made with wood for rough terrain. The truck is now quite fast (40km/h, which is like 28mph) and it has a very good handling. I mainly use it for dirt and streets but with some crawling two. Look my review for more information.

Here you have some fotos of the chassis and the overall look.