Better late than never Highlander RC, March 26, 2024 Quick note, I probably should have taken more pics of the broken stuff, but seeing as my hands were covered in grease and allsorts, it wasn’t really an option. Sorry. Therefore, pics are ones taken on Saturday & Sunday. Hello again, bet you thought I had forgotten about this little blog hadn’t you? Yeah, things have been a bit hectic this week. I only get a few hours an evening at home to try and write new stuff. In that time, I’ve also got to try and fit everything else in too. I tend to get writers block around about this time, and all the ideas I had in my head through the day, seem to vanish into thin air… This week things are a little quieter on the RC front. Why is that I hear you ask? Well… I have somehow managed to break the Hi-Rock. Although nothing serious, it does mean it will be out of action until at least the middle of next week. Unfortunate timing means any parts I order on payday will be delayed until next week due to the Easter weekend. Luckily, I have a week off work starting this Friday, meaning I will have plenty of time to tinker with, and repair the Hi-Rock. Well, between birthdays, visiting family and helping out at my local airsoft site, I might not get as much done as I would have liked too. Technical difficulties It all started on Sunday morning, not long after we went back to our new spot. I say new, I should probably say regular now. Anywho, the age old problem of the driveshaft grub screws working loose was back. For those that don’t know, I had the misfortune of almost losing one of the main driveshafts on my very first outing. This then happened again with the front one, and again a day later with the gearbox to transfer box driveshaft. So, over the course of a weekend, all three driveshafts came loose. Not what you would expect from a new toy. Worse still, the exact same thing happened to a friends Fury 2.0 on its first outing. If I were to hazard a guess, these may have been missed in quality control checks. But hey ho, such is life. Right, so back to Sunday. When I got home that day I decided to have a little look to see what might be causing the grub screws to come loose. I don’t know if this is related to that issue, but it I found out the Hi-Rock likes to eat bearings. And by eat, I mean devoured two of them. I had noticed a lot of play in the shaft (ooo’er, kinky!) in the front diff housing. With that, I decided to remove the front axle and see what the issue was…and in doing so, also discovered I have a broken link bar mount… The curious case of the missing bearings Upon closer inspection, the external bearing for the drive pinion gear had been obliterated. The outer and inner rings of the bearing were all that remained. The seals were long gone and the ball bearings and cage now scattered across the Scottish countryside. Great. Luckily though, I had spare bearings at home. Or so I thought. You see, the ones I have at home were 5x11x4mm bearings. I have bucket loads of them as my Traxxas Slash also likes to go through wheel bearings like nobody’s business. It wasn’t until I had a wee peek at the manual that I learned they wouldn’t fit. The FTX ones are 5x10x4mm. One millimetre difference. One F**KING millimetre! That means the myriad of bearings I had wouldn’t fit, and judging by what I’ve seen online, they aren’t a very common size. So yeah, roll on payday… With the axle now well and truly off the Hi-Rock, it was time to open up the front diff cover. Inside, the grease was a really strange colour, and full of crap. It had turned into some weird brown, bearing filled excrement. I removed the drive housing and crown gear, and surprisingly, the drive pinion still had all it’s teeth. I removed that and popped that to one side, and that’s when it became apparent that the inner bearing had shat itself. Thankfully, the sludge that remained had captured the escapee ball bearings, and prevented them from destroying the pinion and crown gear. I think I dodged a bullet there. Stay stock or upgrade? It was at this point that I started to think about upgrading the whole axle and diff system. FTX have two different axle upgrades. I could go all out and replace them with portal axles, or, if I wanted to keep it simple, I could just buy alloy axles, and swap out the currently fitted plastic ones. In my opinion, this is the far cheaper option, and would add a little bit of unsprung weight, which I think it sorely needs. The more I looked into this, the bigger the shopping list got. With the link mount being broken, the option of alloy replacement links is a no brainer. The current ones are plastic. I could probably just glue the broken bit back on, but then again I could buy the link kit for the price of a tube of superglue. Seeing as the axle was now in bits, why not replace the diff housing with an alloy one as well? It would eliminate the plastic diff housing which I’ve heard can be prone to failing, and again, seeing as it’s a part, save me time later down the line. I then thought about replacing the caster blocks, rear axle covers and steering arms, again, all are available as an alloy upgrade. Where would it end? At the time of writing this, I am still undecided as to what I will eventually settle on. And that’s if any of them are in stock anywhere. Looking sorry for itself I had hoped to do a wee review on the Hi-Rock this week, but because it’s sitting in bits, I can’t take the photos I would need to do so. Half of it is lying in a tool box somewhere, waiting for me to order the parts. I could and probably will just order what I need to get it running again next week, and leave the upgrades for a later date. In stock form, it do’s what I need it to do. It could use a little more low down weight. I also need to change the inserts in the tyres as they are way to soft, making side hilling a nightmare. There’s a lot I could do. And I mean a lot… The week ahead Payday is coming up at the end of the week, so hopefully all going well I’ll order what I need to get the ol’ girl back up and running. We are also hoping to get out for a day and have a proper look around locally. There are bound to be loads of spots we’ve missed or walked by many moons ago while out with the dogs. And with that, thank you once again for taking the time to read this drivel. As always, please feel free to leave a comment below. What are your plans this week? Have you got any new toys planned? Post Views: 34 General