Great job on the conversion, but I share Perry's concern about those gears. It is not a question of, if they will fail, only a question of when. With metal tracks and the weight of that Resin conversion I have a feeling you will be coming back with a "how to" feature on adding metal stug gear boxes to this tank.

I wish you all the luck in the world making those gears last, but my experience with the metal replacement gears is one of disappointment. At first they seem like a good fix and then the plastic housing will start flexing and finally crack, and its slipper gear time again.

Maybe bulking up that gear box by gluing styrene sheet to it would help. That little plastic shround that goes over the final drive gear leaving the box is a weak link, do something strengthen that as well. Maybe some epoxy to strengthen it before it breaks is a preventative action a guy could try.

I am not all that rough with my tanks. I have never broken a suspension arm or anything like that, and these gears failed me in my T-34. My SU-100 still still has stock gears, but I am scared to put the metal tracks on it for fear of destroying this gear box as well.

YHR,
Thanks for the post, a couple of things though.

I have removed a lot of plastic and thinned the resin wherever possible to save weight. At this point I am only running the stock WSN plastic track, not metal, and although I have "beefed up" the suspension arms with styrene, epoxy, and CA none of those have added any significant weight.

I do have plans to re-enforce the stock plastic gear box housing with .080 styrene plating, as well as internal ribs, which I hope will gain sufficient structural strength to avoid having to post a "how to" retro-fit HL gears a later date. And like I said in an earlier post, the only reason I'm even willing to attempt this conversion using the Tank Toko gears, is that we have three running tanks in my club, and none of them have experienced any problems what so ever using this set up.

I really do appreciate all of the comments, encouragement, words of caution and advice as I trudge through this conversion.

Attached are two photos showing the difference in detail between the Trumpeter and WSN idler wheels. The Trumpeter wheel is on the left (more of an olive green) and you can see the locking nuts with cotter pin detail as opposed to the WSN flat detail on the right. The front half of the Trumpeter wheel aligns perfectly with the WSN back half, simply screw them together.

My SU 100 with plastic tracks is still going with the Toko metal gears. How about those others that are still running. All using plastic tracks????. Maybe that is the secret, Stick with the plastic tracks.

I am of the mindset, that fixing these things is half the fun. So the great thing is, even if this gear set fails you, there are lots of parts around to repair it, and fixing is fun.

YHR,
I think that may just be the secret, everyone is running plastic tracks

I have a T-34/85 converted to HL S&S&airsoft, and run it using the plastic tracks, and metal gears.

I have changed the stock motors with Graupner 300 6V motors after burning one stock motor (don't know how, I was running inside at home). After that the tank became fast at top speed (faster than all my other HL tanks).

I had some time ago a problem on the 2nd metal gear, where 1/3 of the theet did break all of a sudden. Don't know why.
Now I have rebuilt it using a mix of nylon (the first gear after the motor) and metal gears, and I will test it for some time.

If you keep the gearbox well lubricated , it will last enough, and after that you can always rework the box and put bushes inside the worn plastic.

I suggest you to go with plastic tracks, though. There's no need for metal ones.

One part that you should worry about is the idler: due to its shape (the working tension adjuster) it will bend and possibily break, especially if you hit ground obstacles with front wheels. I have replaced both the idler and tensioner with metal parts, and I am happy with it.

Plastic gears, plastic tracks, 280 Speed Motors, D.T.'s aluminum suspension, ball bearings and 5 battles ... still going strong!

Borealis,
Thanks I'll keep an eye on the front idler, I suspected if anything would give me a problem that would be it. The design of the part makes it the weak link. I like to run my tracks pretty loose, it adds a realistic sag to the tracks and seems to reduce the tension. I'm not suggesting everyone do that, but so far it's worked well with the way that I drive my tanks, and the terrain I run them on.

Panther,
Daryl's suspension was the one upgrade I seriously considered when I first started this project, but then chose not to do. I chose not to just because I wanted to stretch myself a little bit and see if I could modify and strengthen the stock suspension well enough not to need after market parts.

I guess only time will tell, but I wanted something I could toot my horn about if I ever met another T-34, or conversion based on the WSN T-34 on the battlefield. Whether or not this will work remains to be seen, but either way it's uniquely mine, all mine to take credit for in complete failure, or total success. Yikes!

I chose to use the WSN barrel, it's smaller in diameter and fit better than the Trumpeter one.

After stripping all of the other electronics, I bored out the mantlet, found the center pivot point of the gun then removed the flash unit. Here the gun is only mocked up in place, but I have an idea that will give me both elevation (probably not depression though) and side to side movement of about 15 degrees. If all goes as planned I will be able to use the stock recoil as well. I initially thought I could only get two movements, either traverse and elevation or elevation and recoil, but not all three. I'll post more as the engineering portion moves forward.

Our CO did the same with his stock arms, but back filled them with JB Weld. If I do R/C my SU project I might do the same, since he went ahead and sleeved the wheels and arms with brass on mine at the same time.