Dnano steering not balanced

[nndrf]

Hello,
im testing my dNano on my home track, a mix of rubber (very sticky)
and my livingroom floor (very polished ___, very slippery).

When the surface is sticky the grip is great and the steering needs to be applied with care, or the car will roll..
When I drive on the floor, the balance of the car, due to poor grip, becomes amplified in behaviour.
The car spins easily and its great fun to drive, I can almost drift- i dont have a gyro so its hard to control- but great fun.

However, I found that the car has a problem. The steering seems to be more effective on one side, ie when I turn left the front wheels grip enough to cause the car to skid. From still, if I accelerate to max with full left steering the car will just spin on the spot.

When I steer right instead, I get more understeering, the car doesnt enter in a spin, even when I accelerate to max from still with full right steering.

Here my issues- can someone confirm/help/elaborate?

1)I'm playing with the ball diff, i suspect its a problem to get the same traction on both wheels due to the non symmetrical design of it.
Is it possible to get an equal traction on the wheels?

2) My car suspenctions dont seem to behave the same.
The front wheels susp. travel and resistance seem to differ, the car itself doesnt seem to be perfectly horizontal.
How do you guys tweak these things?

3) Silly point, but due to hight cost of dNanos, this upsets me a little....
I have 2 bodies, F40 and Murcielago, the F40 is perfect, the Lambo when mounted, is obviously not levelled!

Thanks for reading and happy dnanoing to everyone.

[MrNanoTrax]

you DO know that dNaNo bodies are not interchangeable right? if you change the body, you have to actually change the car itself by installing the fitting parts set for the body in question.

2nd, i'm sure you're having fun playing with your $300 car on the floor but this model was built specifically for use on a track. your traction issues have a lot to do with the surfaces you're running on. no r/c model is PERFECTLY balanced... anything from the way your tires are put on to their age can affect traction.

3rd, front & rear suspension are handled by different mechanisms so they're hardly comparable. if you're looking to "tweak" things in the front, pick up the option springs and in the back, try the carbon suspension plates, those might help your cars performance.

[arch2b]

perhaps you could post some pictures to illustrate your problems as well?

[lornecherry]

I replicated your exact problems while testing different surfaces. Here's what to do:

1) Never run the d'NaNo unless on a track. The sticky tires, very low ride height and a flaw that seems to let stuff get wrapped around the inside of the front axle, make these cars a touch finicky to maintain. With two dogs and two cats and a dusty basement, I'm cleaning my car's wheels and bearings a lot more than I'd like. The issue is serious enough for me to try to find solutions with either raising the ride height ever-so-slightly and/or different wheel and tire combinations, in addition to keeping the track squeaky clean. (I think there is a static electricity issue in my house or generated by the cars also)

2) Spin the front tires with your fingers while the car is upside down down to see if both wheels turn very freely. If one, or both are gummed up, you'll need to disassemble the front knuckles and clean out the inside axle. If even a small hair or impurity is wrapped on the axle, it will cause the car to pull to one side. The natural torque steer of the engine will also be exaggerated.

Remember, one hair to the d'NaNo' scale is like a rope being tossed into the axle of my Durango. This is why you need to run only on clean surface. I'm sure your problem will go away once you clean out the front end.

3) Some chassis and body styles do turn slightly better to one side I find, but it is minor and can somewhat be corrected by choosing the correct grip of tire and a good surface. If you are traction rolling on rubber, then I suspect the problem is mostly a gummed up front end or a differential that's improperly setup (see 4 below)

4) The differential needs to be lubricated -- the out-of-the-box stock unit is tighter than a recessionary budget. It will loosen up over time, but all my cars performed much better with the upgraded Kyosho ball diff. and that upgrade alone will definitely help your problem. Yes, the stock unit is actually quicker, but the upgraded bearing unit is much smoother.

[lornecherry]

question for you Nano ...you are running on a raised surface in a new (clean) environment with lots of different cars Have you had to clean out your front knuckles/axles very often? Any particular car worse/better than others?

[nndrf]

ok found some answers, also thanks to all your replies.

First,
my flat has a floor made of a highly polished resin, which I keep clean as yes I know any small hair or dust has a big impact on these cars.
Yes I know bodies need different fitting parts it would have been a bit hard to fit a lambo body on a chassy with the F40's wheel base... man I hate these fitting parts!

The issues with my car seems to come from the front springs, which are even so slightly different but the effect on slippery resin floor is very apparent.
The lambo body is a bit wonky (the side holders have been glued not perfectly leveled- but man, looks great). But the car tendency to under-steer on one side is apparent even without body so it's not the body.

Another issue is the ball diff.
I always hated non symmetrical real axels designs, I know its better for track use to have the most direct engine to axle gearing but I never liked non-symmetical differentials.
I gave my (brand new) new ball diff a good service, with the right kyosho grease, no dust, still, one side of the differential seem to have a lighter mass so it spins more freely than the other.
Even when the diff is super smooth, the right wheel will cause more resistance, because of bigger mass, longer axle, 2 bearings..
This non-symmetrical design, together with the tiny proportions, seems to be the n1 reason for my car to demonstrate non-symetrical steering performance.

I glued my old useless plastic diff to have a rigid axle option to play with,
and I could see how the absence of a differential immediately gave my car an almost perfectly symmetrical performance. Drives like a kart by the way..
No differential is acceptable only in case of very slippery floor I guess, so this piece of info is totally useless for you guys who can race on proper surfaces...

I know that on a proper track this issue is not that relevant, when Im lucky to be in Tokyo I can have fun at the kyosho's track but here in London I don't think people know what a dNano is, plus, my floor is amazing fun to play on as it is totally perfectly smooth. Yes it's slippery but perfectly flat and smooth so gives a very predictable traction.
I wonder why no one races on slippery surfaces, its really technical... well, I have no choice maybe I would prefer a proper track, still the challenge of driving on my floor is great fun (my old mini-Z awd drifts so well with normal tires on this floor, amazing, so much better than carpet and plastic tires, so much more traction and speed but same drifting).

lornecherry, my floor is kept clean when I drive dNanos at least but I need to clean the dnano all the time, especially the front wheels, due to their flawed design which seems to be aimed at picking up dust.
My lamborghini and my F40 seems to be equally capable of picking up dust,
dunno about other bodies I'm afraid!
I do have to clean the dNano almost as often as my teeth which is a pain, but since my wife (bless her!) bought me a dNano the mini-Z feels like a 1/4 scale at home so I can't help but stick to the dNano.
If you find anything that could help, especially the front wheel issue, let me know, at the moment I'm experimenting with some ideas but no luck so far.
It's funny because I end up doing the 'spin the wheel with the finger' check all the time to see if they got stuck or not...

[arch2b]

i would not characterize it as a design flaw per sae. your driving a car around millimeters from the floor on rubber tires. unless you live in a clean environment, your going to collect dirt, dust, particals. at 1:43 scale, to design that out of the equation is cost prohibitive and unrealistic.

the fundamentals of the dnano have been around for nearly a decade. this stuff isn't cutting edge science. it's implementation of current technology into an improved platform developed in one form or another for the past 10 years.

most people buying these are not going to run them on tracks alone. to suggest they only be used on a track surface is also unrealistic expectation. we went through all this 9 years ago with mini-z's and people run them everywhere.

given time, development and support, these can do the same. it's a matter of working through the limitations to achieve your desired results. clearly, not every ones desires will be met.

if the body mounts are wonky, fix them. in mass production, your not going to get prefect placement 100% of the time. any mini-z owner already knows this. on occassion, adjustments must be made. take them off and reattach them is the proper position.

i have not taken my dnano apart yet so i can not comment on the intricate details of the front assembly or the rear diff. all i can say, a little bit off is well within normal for something this small, this complex, going this fast in an environment that is less than ideal.

i'm sure more experienced mini-z guys will offer suggestions. it's something they face too, even at 1:28 scale.

[nndrf]

the front wheels metal attachments are really designed to pick up hair.
Such a tiny scale amplifies any imperfection, i just wish the design would allow for tiny tweaks, at the moment I have to stick little spacers (paper) to get things perfectly leveled.
Again, people on proper surface wont notice but on problematic surfaces, micro changes have a huge impact.
It's pratically impossible to detach the side body attachment.
The glue is just too strong and the body too thin, I had to cut it to remove it.
Considering the hight price of a body and the potential wonkiness, I just wish the dNano had a few screws here and there to tweak and align things nicely without relying on mcGuyer style tricks.
Still, I love the dNano. It's far from being well designed, but the electronics work very well, I love the small scale, the speed and precision.
Fortunately my eyesight is good and I can see where the car goes... dNano makes any track feel huge, makes my mini-Z feel like too much of a waste of space!

[arch2b]

lets hope that they release unpainted versions where the body clips are not attached.

the glue used on a mini-z body clip is fairly strong as well but the plastics used are much thicker thus the force used doesn't seem to scare you as much. i tried budging the notch on my skyline and i thought i would simply break the body so i stopped. mine are fine btw, just wanted to check after reading your post. it's a shame it's not as easy a fix as it is on it's big brother.

[nndrf]

I guess everyone is already doing this...
but I didn't spend much time reading about dnano, so for me it's new..
just modified a spare pair of back wheels to fit the front of the dnano,
the steering precision and grip is so much better.
Looks like the back tires and wheels of my murcielago are perfect for the front, I wish I could find somewhere some wider tires and rims to mount on the back, i think i need wider tires with less grip to get even less understeering.

[arch2b]

email aluma-tech regarding stock aluminum wheels sets and getting larger wheels.