Steve’s UC

[Steve Norris]

Received my UC and motion packs recently and look forward to starting the assembly.
Lots of very nice looking parts so should be a interesting build.
Question for those that have already started- In the bag with the certificate is a small bag with 4 bushes/spacers in it, can someone tell me where these live as I they are not labelled.
Regards
Steve

[Derek Attree]

Hi Steve
They are bushes for the Front Bogie Assembly the swing arm pivot in ER0231 for ER020M hole is 6mm dia, whereas the pin is 5mm x 48mm
They make the 2 items fit.

Hope this helps

Derek

[Steve Norris]

Hi Derek
Thanks for the info.
Regards
Steve

[Dennis Jones]

Speaking of bogies, I found that the rear bogie set none of the bushes that fit in to the springs would go in to the springs as they were too big, whether the springs were too small or bushes too big I am not sure but in the end I had to turn all 12 of them down in the lathe to get them to fit. The front bogie set were ok.

Dennis.

[Steve Norris]

I have been following Peter Withers twin motor drive posts with interest and thought I would have a go myself.
What I have come up with is shown below but until I get the second motor I do not know how successful this will be.

I have cut the supplied drive shafts down and drilled the centre 5mm, once drilled I slotted the shaft 2mm

I bought a Como drills 540 motor with 16 to 1 reduction gear box and attached part ER0227 to the gearbox.

The 2 parts shown together. Note that I have drilled the gearbox output shaft 2mm and fitted a drive pin, this pin will engage with the previously cut 2mm slot in the axle.

The assembled parts

The motor and gearbox can be installed in the hull with no further modifications required

1 set of tracks installed

When I get the second motor I will see if this set is robust enough and has the correct gear reduction. I am reasonably confident that it should be powerful enough as I am replacing a single 540 motor with 2.

Regards

Steve

[Peter Withers]

Steve, that looks pretty neat. I'm surprised the motors fit in the width but it looks like they ought to. What speed controller arrangement are you planning on using? Keep us posted and glad I acted as inspiration

Pete

[Graham P Hough]

Interesting that others are investigating alternative drive systems. Worries me a bit is that you and Peter have shortened the axle, my method keeps the axles with some machining to suit bearings. Details to follow.

[Dennis Jones]

Hi Steve,

I assume that you will be using 12 volts as a power source as a 9 or 10 amp gel battery would fir in the space under the engine cover without the motor being in there also I think the speed controller provided would handle one motor. I wish I had waited now as I did contemplate using 2 motors.

Dennis.

[Steve Norris]

Hi Dennis
I will initially be using a Tamiya 1/16 tank speed controller just for trials.
I intend to use a 12 volt set up but need to confirm that the supplied speed controller can handle that voltage before I get a second one. As you said there is plenty of space to fit a battery withe the motors mounted across the back.
If this set up does not work I will have to look at using a chain drive.
Regards
Steve

[Derek Attree]

Hi Steve
Watching this with interest and some of the other ideas for twin drive .
Mine is still boxed up as finishing the Ferdinand first.
Having issues with the recoil spring not pulling the gun back to the cut out in the cam
despite shortening it 30mm

Still playing around with things on that.

Regards

Derek

[Steve Norris]

After a bit of fine tuning I with the drive and also the tracks I have got Carrier driving reasonably nicely although I am still throwing tracks occasionally. I went on line and bought two of the esc that are supplied in the motion pack to control the individual motors, by using the eleven mixing function on the Spectrum radio I am able to drive using a single stick. I will be using the sound card supplied with the audio pack so at least I will have used some of the supplied components of the motion and audio pack.

The motors etc have now been put to one side and the main build has started.

The first thing I have done is to take the edges off the swing arms and give them a more rounded look, whilst doing this I also slotted the holes that the suspension spring rods pass through to give more articulation.

Another modification was to braze the centre spring carrier to the spring rod to prevent the rod being forced fully either way when the suspension articulates.

The modified spring rods, when the suspension articulates the rod should now be displace equally in both directions

4FBAAE98-D230-4254-9AC9-E50F135A634C.jpeg (140.26 KiB) Viewed 4282 times

Regards

Steve

[David Merritt]

Hi Steve, I am going down the two motor route and am impressed with the way you have done it so may copy your solution to the problem.
I have found that Mtroniks make a device that is designed to marry two signals from two channels on the receiver and then produce two separate output signals that adds and subtracts the incoming signals so a single joystick can control the forward and back and left and right operation of carrier. The device is designed to be used to control twin motor tracked vehicles.

David

[Steve Norris]

Hi David
Glad you like the mod I cam up with.
It may be worth waiting a while before ordering the motors as Denis Jones is going to try a different ratio motor set up.
I am not sure if he is running the 16 to 1 ratio motors on 7.2 volts or 12 volts, will just have to wait a bit and see what he comes up with.
Regards
Steve

[David Merritt]

Hi Steve,
I am looking at a 27:1 motor and gearbox which has the same motor but a planetry gearbox that appears to be able to handle a higher maximum level of torque 12,000 rather than 3,000 g.cm. and comes with different gear ratios. So if it requires a higher torgue motor to improve the off road capability then it should be able to handle one. I will probably start with a 2s LiPo as I have the battery and if needed run it with a 3s LiPo battery later. The gearbox has an output speed of around 300rpm at 7.4V under load which is a scale speed of around 18mph which should be fast enough and was about the maximum speed the carrier achieved off road.

David

[Steve Norris]

Hi David
That motor/ gearbox option sounds very good. Where did you get it from?
Regards
Steve