"Desperado" for a less ugly body! (Pics)
 

Picked up the "American Truck" body kit so I could get the Ram to put on a base ZZ chassis for my g/f as part of her b-day present since her dad has a Dodge Ram 1500 that she's driving most of the time now.

So, I had a Silverado body left over. (ick a Chebby, gotta be SOME way to make this look better!) It had a little lower CG than my Hummer body so I slapped it on my 49 mhz chassis, full suspension travel mod, softer springs, did a 71.98:1 gearbox. Climbs good, looks bad. Time for more mods!

Ripped off the ugly front bumper cover, made a Winch Bumper, it looked naked so it got a full brush guard. Rockers looked a little naked too, so they got Rock Sliders. I got to wondering who offroads with a tonnau cover, so I ripped that off too and scratch built a bed. Bed looked naked, it got a 4 point Rollbar. Decided that to show off my truck bed it should be done in white Rhino Liner.

Now I've just got to build a tiny little winch (show only), detail on some more Trail Rash and some mud. And maybe make some junk to have live in the bed like a Hi-Lift Jack or a Cooler or something... Any suggestions?

Ok, enough teasing, my truck

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4...ilverado_1.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4...ilverado_2.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4...ilverado_3.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4...ilverado_5.jpg

* * * PLEASE COMMENT * * *

Oh yeah, body still sports full LED's, though the rear ones had to flop sides and be rerouted down the sides (fenders) of the bed instead of crossing under the tonnau. And I mounted a lead tape Skidplate on the nose (2nd pic in first post) Installed some lead-free solder wheel weights too, it really climbs like a mofo now!

Body no longer fits on car chassis due to bed install, but that's because I built the bed as deep as it could *possibly* go on a ZZ-M chassis and didn't plan on running it on some other chassis. (had to file antenna hump off PCB Cover and bed's still a bit shallower than I'd like)

And I do know that most of the body mods are rather useless on a Monster Truck with this kinda lift, but if you're gonna off-road instead of playing in a stadium, it ought to look like it can sustain itself out there. Plus it looks more like a Truck now.

I'm trying to talk myself out of working KC off-road lights mounted on top of the rollbar. Also considering adding a lower bar in the brushguard, but won't decide that until I have a winch built, or unless I get some feedback.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4...TrailAbuse.jpg

Took this much work to make it look half as agressive as the Jeep. I wish RadioHack made a Toyota Taco or a Land Rover or something, even a Suzuki Samuri would be nice. Then again, I wish they hadn't killed off the Jeep before I was able to get a ZZ-M.

Ok, questions, comments, insults?

Got bored at work, and drove this little beast over to the micro scale, uh I mean truck scale, yeah that's it.

I don't have stock numbers since both my trucks are modded some, but I'll try to get them on the next truck I buy before I make that one fully articulate.

This ZZ-M chassis weighs 64.6 g

The modded Body weighs 10.7 g

Chassis + Body 75.4 g

2 Poorly made Wheelweights 5.3 g for both
_______________________

Total weight for this rig 80.8 g



Oh and if one of the Moderators sees this, can you bump this thread to the Mods/Projects section, so *somebody* might actually reply :rolleyes:

It looks awesome. I hate chevy's though so if it was something else it be totally awesome.

Good job. Keep working on it!

BTW What exactly is lead tape?

Nice to hear some feedback! :)

Yeah, I'm more of a Ford guy and not so much into chevy, so this was going to be a practice body to mod and try to screw up with trail rash and mud and all that. Original plan was to make this like a 70's vintage truck that was beat all to heIl, mismached doors and fenders, huge dents, maybe break some glass or etch a "star" into the windshield where somebody cracked their head, skew the bumpers a bit, though about bobbing the bed or going flatbed, making it a single cab... but then it was so clean and shiney so I decided to go a little easier on it, so this is where it is now. Might ditch the bowtie, and probably should have stripped and painted body. If you've got any suggestions let me know!

Lead tape is a kinda weird thing we use at work to balance gyros and some other stuff if we don't have a small enough weight. Think of something along the lines of double-stick tape with around 0.005" of lead on one sticky side. It's not really all that much weight, but it's more of a psychological thing, but it makes a killer looking skidplate that perfectly molds to my "front differential".

I've got to remount my winch bumper, oops. I'm working on building up a winch (which will retract), then I'm gonna mount some recovery points on the body. Having 2 trucks on a winch line together working to get one up an obsticle is pretty wicked to see at this scale. I'll post pics when I've got some notible progress.

Just a question.. are these things fun at all?? like can the actually run in dirt? and can they wheelie? Ive been debating to buy one for a while now. They look cooler and cooler everytime i see them.

Winch bumper back on though it straightened out slightly from sitting in my car, now have 4 recovery ponts mounted to body, winch is about 1/3 finished. I just need the retraction system, and a spool mounted to the bumper.
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Skyline7,

Stock with green motor and green gears they can pull a wheelie if there's enough traction. You can also do reverse to forward move which will bring the nose up very nicely even with less traction, but usually onto the back bumper since you don't have Propo throttle. If you put in a higher RPM motor, the nose comes up a bit easier though less torque so you do hit a limit; and you can even do a forward to reverse move which brings the tail up and drops it on the nose.

They can run in dirt, fairly small gravel, carpet, grass, clothes... These are 4wd, and pretty torquey, they can tackle pretty steep slopes, but lack of suspension travel is going to be your limit for crawling, and they don't articulate any stock. They come with Chevron tires, so they do pretty well on loose surfaces as long as you have them oriented self clearing. Gear ratios are pretty limited stock (4 sets total), but you can gear down pretty easily and go just about as low as you'd ever want. Fastest motor with fastest gearing is enough to slightly bog the truck from a stop so it takes a few seconds to wind up. These are setup more like Monster Trucks you'd see at a stadium this sunday...Sunday...SUNDAY, than something you'd see on a trail but that can be fixed if you want. There are pretty well documented modifications to make to improve those points. Definately get one, they're only $25 and can go more places than a ZZ or Bit, and they only get better with mods; if you don't like it you can just repackage it, and you've got a birthday present for somebody, and chances are once they start playing they'll love it!

I mean, I don't even like trucks and I've gotten into these things! They can't go everywhere, but they do open up many more possibilities to drive on than a Bit or ZZ ever could.

+1, but it still looks awesome.

ok thats it frizzo, im going to radiohack to pick one of these baddies up cause i cant stand the jelousy and toment any longer...

Nasphere,

Then my job here is done. :) It's taken this many weeks of torment, but I've made you buy one. Now when you drool over pics in my next post, you'll want a second...

I like the bed and the stuff you added. That body is one ugly mother though.

Who wants to see some Recovery points?

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4.../RearHooks.jpg

Ok, but what's the point without a winch hook?

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4...FrontHooks.jpg

Pfft, like that'll ever work!

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4...C/TeamWork.jpg

Recovery points are real, the winch cable isn't mounted in truck yet, and I don't have winch drum installed either. The cable attachment to the Jeep is totally fake, though you can see the hook going through recovery point on Silverado, but it shows how it'll work on bodies with recovery points. And yes, you can do roll assisted winches to get up taller things than you can tackle alone.

(Jeep body too rare now to mod, plus jeep is badass stock. Jeep doesn't need body mods to be cool.)

There are Lego Winches with drums and all. Spraying one of them chrome would fit perfectly.

Got a pic of your Lego winch?

Though this is a truck, the only chrome they're supposed to have is lugnuts. I'll do Argent but no Chrome on a truck.

Nah, sorry, I'm not home. Just look for the lego trucks with little winches and you'll see it.

Thanks man! I'm a bit of a modeler, though my skills have a ways to go still. Anyway, I went as a total "Budget Beater" for the body, needed to prove you can do a little bit of magic for nothing more than time. (So far my cost beyond the body kit for this is $0.00)

Body mods to "Desperado" used: Paperclips, sheet styrene, necklace chain, jump ring from end of necklace chain, thread, little Epoxy, little CA... There's going to be a thread wrapped drum, a coil spring out of a clock, and a plastic rim off a McToy pullback to finish off the winch. If you've got any questions about doing anything shown on this truck, please ask!

Yeah, I figured a winch would be trick as hell on this ride. I've seen some ZZ-M's that just dangle chain with a hook, I've seen some that have it motorized but ruin it with a giant spool on front, but I've yet to see one that looks scale and works pretty close to correctly... So, gotta do it. (Plus somebody bet I couldn't when I mentioned the idea)

An Exocage huh? Alright, you're gonna make me go hit another Radiohack to get more of their truck bodies before they're all sold out aren't you? :) You bully.

I was going to go with some stainless MIG welder wire, but the paperclips I had were closer to the gauge I wanted. "Make truck strong, like bull!" Plus everybody has paperclips! Almost did an exocage for this ugly mother, but thought it might be over the top, guess I ought to start a mockup.

Yep, totally. I'm not laying cable, I'm just trying to winch myself out of here. Some people have done 3rd channel for the winches, I'm not sure how they did it, nor do I plan on doing it anytime in the near future. Mine is gonna be a little different. Low-Tech, a brass hair spring providing retract tension for cable. Can't use it to winch up stuff but you use it like a "dead rope", hook onto other truck, both of you put in gear going same direction, both trucks are able to move past obsticle. Works best when they're geared pretty close to the same, but my 'fastest gear, fastest motor truck' can pull my 'lowest gear, lowest motor, crawler gear truck' up the 2" edge of my keyboard that way, so it should be enough for the micro trails.

A tiny servo winch would be ideal, but you'd have to swap in a Propo RX board with a 3rd channel, and go to a 3 channel TX, modify your servo to act as an ESC instead of Servo... Definately possible, but a bit over the top for the amount of $$$ I'm dropping on these.

Any pics of your ride?

Definately not gonna try to weld at this scale, I was saying I was going to use the thin welding rod instead of paperclips (bend and glue).

NKOK was a tank steer, right? Man those are some guards! So you like roll up next to the cat and place one of those bumpers on it's side, up and over? What's flash? Love to see the course, I've been thinking about building one, though it'll be hard enough you'll have to buddy winch part of it. :D

Check out my other truck body customizing project. http://www.tinyrc.com/forums/showthr...threadid=21624

So, who wants to winch themselves out of here?

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4...RC/Winch_1.jpg

It 90% works.

Let's look at the naughty bits.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4...erado_Guts.jpg

Winch drum on bumper, just for scale looks. I *HAD* to have a winch on my rock crushing Winch Bumper! But I'm not enough of a poser to slap on a fake winch, so...

I have an inner winch drum which is the REAL one the line actually spools from, there's going to be a spring retract so I don't have to pop body off to wind it back in like I do now.

You can also see the bottom of my bed, the rear LED routing I had to use, even how I attached my rock sliders to the rockers. You can't see how I "lowered" the headlight LEDs so they shine through headlight under the silver bar (instead of above where they were blocked partially by my brushguard).

So, how'd I do it? The winch line itself is 3 strands of 6 strand "embrordery floss", the wrappings on the spool are the same, but twisted tightly and carefully laid. The spool was a red plastic tube off a can of "Electrosolv". The winch hook was a split jumpring off a steel necklace I got out of a $0.25 gumball machine thing, the recovery points were links of that necklace chain. The inner-drum for winch was a rim from a pullback McToy, I just cut the rubber off and it's a perfect drum with guides. Hair spring is out of a broken alarmclock.

I've still got to shave down my cable spool support bracket a bit, find a nice thin screw that'll fit up center of brass spring, some other hardware, little glue. Then I'll see you on the trail!

Just a few more random pics, some of these are probably shots I've already posted...

http://bitpimps.lixlink.com/pages/ph...lverado_13.JPG
Proof of ownership

http://bitpimps.lixlink.com/pages/ph...ilverado_9.JPG
Big rock crushing bumper and a sturdy winch.

http://bitpimps.lixlink.com/pages/ph...lverado_11.JPG
Nothing but the taillights.

One on the rocks.
http://bitpimps.lixlink.com/pages/ph...lverado_12.JPG

Always ready to help others.
http://bitpimps.lixlink.com/pages/ph...uddy_Winch.JPG

Beautiful work, as usual, Frizzen!