2011 Vonats Pro SE (added setup list 9/24)

[bearrickster]

That car looks even better in person. and ran circles around mine. that car Rocked. its a shame you got wrecked in the last lap like that. Well done Brandon. and I want Thank you again for all the help with getting my car dialed in, so it would go around the track. I will be taking your advice and puting the front end back to stock. and we will see if I can get it run even better.

[Brandon G]

This car was a nice surprise on the track! Incredibly smooth and very forgiving. It pushed just a little on power, but not as bad as my '91 worlds RC10. You could dive into the corners, blip the brake, and it simply rotated around the inside and immediately get back on throttle. It was like it the rear end was designed to slide exactly 180 degrees and stop. Very cool to take the inside line on a dime.


Setup for this buggy:

Front end:
Losi hard coated .6" stroke shocks
Losi 2" orange springs
Losi 30 wt oil
Losi red pistons
Losi "a" spacer above the lower spring keeper to limit uptravel. No spacers under the piston.
Associated steel turnbuckles
Shocks mounted in the top middle hole, bottom outside hole on the arm.
1 degree toe out
1 degree negative camber
No washers under any of the ball studs. All camber and steering links assembled as per the Losi Pro SE assembly addendum with exception of the LXT front spindles and C hubs. Otherwise known as the Losi steering inprovement kit.
Stock buggy front axles
B4 front wheels
Proline M3 Scrubs front tires, foam cut to the width of the tire.
Ride height set so that looking from the side the chassis is slightly higher than the rear
Losi bearing steering bellcranks

Rear end:
Losi 1.2" hard coated shocks
Losi 2.5" yellow springs
Losi 30wt oil
Losi red pistons
Losi "b" spacer under the piston to limit down travel
Shock mounted in middle hole on the tower, top outside hole on the H arm.
Losi #1 rear toe/squat block
Ride height set at bones level.
Associated turnbuckles
Losi XXX plastic rear hubs with the ball stud on the inside hole. I ran the H arm outer hinge pins with the special clip in the rear to hold the hinge pin in. I added enough clear plastic washers in front of the hub to take up the slop.
Inner ball stud located on inner hole as per addendum isstructions.
B4 rear wheels with Hot Bodies Beams pink compound, HB foams. No spacers between wheel and stock drive pin. Standard spacer between drive pin and bearing.
Chassis set up for short wheelbase.

Drivetrain:
Losi 2.19:1 Retrofit transmission
Losi Gen II diff hardware
Modified Losi input shaft to accept a B4 slipper assembly
81 Tooth B4 spurgear, 28 Tooth pinion
Losi steel dogbones
Trinity Duo 2 17.5 motor

Other:
Futaba BLS351 steering servo
Novak GTB ESC
Orion 3600 Lipo
I slotted the chassis to use velcro battery strap, deleted the factory battery holddown, no additional cutting required to fit battery in the chassis.
RPM esc tray cut back to allow removal of battery pack.

This is a lot of info, but actually if you have a Pro SE and assemble it as per the instruction manual, it is the best setup for the car. The only thing I modified was the front hubs and spindles, the slipper, and the rear hubs (simply beacause those hubs were all that I had available).

The retrofit tranny is something that I would probably do different if I had to do it all over again. I would probably use the LRM tranny w/o a slipper. The slipper on this track simply was not necessary. Also I believe the LRM trannies are faster. I would have used the stock sliders as well. With the retrofit tranny and Gen II diff hardware, I had to grind the inside of the RH dogbone ball a little bit to give clearance for full suspension articulation. It may have had to do with the rear hubs I used as well, but I remember having to do thesame thing with my 2008 Vonats Pro I built also. It had the standard Jr 2 hubs on it.

[Brandon G]

Rick, it was a pleasure to help you out with your buggy! I believe that with the
proper front end parts on your buggy, it would do just as well as mine.

Also I noticed the tires did not like the zip kicker application. Next time don't use it! May have explained the problems you had with the tires coming off the rim.

[Brandon G]

I've had a number of people ask me what color silver I used on this shell. It is Tamiya gunmetal, PS-23. Out of stock everywhere. Figures, I really like how it looks.

[losiXXXman]

Thanks for all this great info Brandon. I building up a modern runner X2, using the 2.19 retrofit myself. I thought that I remembered you making similar comments on your '08 Vonats Pro, so I scoured the forum to verify. One of my concerns with the LRM was parts availability, but as I guess you can always pick up parts cars and such.. With the Retrofit, you could fairly easily build one from NIP parts, yielding a "new" tranny. Mabe I should give the LRM more consideration than I have.

As far as helping Rick out with setup, he says he's going bacl to stock. Is this in regards to the swept arms, and LXT blocks/carriers/axles? I understand the NEED for the swept arms, as the wheelbase is too long in the Pro configuration for ANY steering response. My Pro(XT conversion) BITD was eextremely pushy...until I put swept arms on it. If Rick had specific issues with the blocks/carriers, I'd love to hear more about it, as I was going to put RB5 ones on my car (to run 12mm hex, 5 spoke wheels). This will probably haves a similar (if not more dramatic) type of effect due to the steering pivot axis (kingpin) being significantly inboard from the wheel centerline. (I've noticed a little bit of side jacking on my Ultima Pro using this setup, although I'm using a greater offset wheel.)

Basically, I'm now questioning some major components of the build I'm working on... care to weigh in?

[bearrickster]

yes the XX blocks through off the geomerty of the front and it didnt turn correctly. I am going to put the Jammin Jay Pro SE Steering Enhancement Kit on it, and take off the xx front wheels. the kit is the same as the LX-T spindle set up that Brandon ran. I may put the stock arms back on, I am going to look at the swept RPM arms I have comeing, and compaire them with the stock ones.

[Brandon G]

I believe Rick was running RPM front arms for the XX, may have been the extended length JRX ones, I'm not sure. But he was definetely running the XX front spindles and blocks. His car pushed a lot. Easy to drive, but very pushy. I think the RPM extended arms do not sweep back as far as the Losi swept arms, so that might have had something to do with it. The shock holes on the arms are in a slightly different location as well. If I was him, I would just go with the Losi arms, LXT spindles and hubs, and buggy axles. Other than that, our cars were setup pretty much the same.

One other thing I noticed about the RPM plastics is the amount of flex they had. Great for bashing, but not so good for racing. The flex that they allow screws with the geometry of everything. Toe, camber, caster..... On the rear of the car as well. The RPM H arms I had mounted on last year's JRXT would allow -3 degrees toe in fully extended and go to +3 degrees fully compressed! I quickly swapped them out with the rigid Losi H arms and had no problems. I was running RPM hubs on the front of my YZ-10 and I think that was part of the reason why it was so inconsistent with steering.

I also swapped out my Ultima front hubs/spindles with the later Ultima RB5 parts. For the sole reason of being able to use the newer wheels on the front. I did this after the race, so I couldn't tell you if it had a marked effect on handling. I think the short rear arms and short camber links in the rear had a drastic effect on the rear traction on that car. I was running the extended RPM arms on the front to widen it, but now that I look back on it, that may have contributed to the car not being happy on the track.

[bearrickster]

I was running RPM jrxT front arms to widein the front back up I am going back to stock arms and the Jammin front end steering kit.