Wore out Gold Pan Bronco Buggy

[66sprint6]

Just wanted to update the ole BroncoBuggy thread. I dont have any pics at the moment which makes me a little mad but I will get some soon, promise!!! I bombed this thing around a little a couple weeks ago, JUST after gettin the new wheels and tires and just wasnt feelin it. It was slow, flipped over way too easily on asphalt (too much traction) and just wasnt overly fun. The weight bias was WAY too far forward and even on the smalled jump, full throttle it would nose over. If I hit a big enough jump and hit reverse I could do an full front flip and often land it LOL. I also kept poppin the rear turnbuckles loose from the actual rod ends and was tossin the rear dogbones. I tossed it in the hobby room and tried to forget about it till this past weekend. A buddy up the road put together a small, tight, backyard track and wanted to to some try it out. I packed up the short arm RC10 and the BroncoBuggy and headed over. After the unknown motor caught fire in the short arm while tryin to give his B3 hell I tossed the BroncoBuggy out there...and had so much fun I cant even describe it!!! Since the track was so tight, no jumps and the straight wasnt very long at all, it rocked and rolled and put a HUGE smile on my face. On a real track this sucker woulda prolly died but it was in its element out in the backyard. It relit the flame for me and Im now moving weight around, lookin at motor and esc options (XL5-12t titan I had layin around is in it as of last night, but I have a 17.5 brushless and could get an ESC pretty easy as well) and also lookin to add a little more realism to it by tossin some RC4WD 1.55 tires on it that are about 3" tall and look like all terrains. They mounted up to the stock wheels perfect but I need to figure out somethin for the rear. ANYways, Ill toss some pics up shortly.

Matt

[vintage AE]

Cool build Matt! Glad you found the right track for it. Looking forward to seeing the latest pics.

[slotcarrod]

X2 we want pics!

[66sprint6]

Yeah sorry guys, I swore I had pics of it on my phone but could only find where I was tryin to get a shot of the smoke pouring outta the back of the short arm buggy. Ill snag some soon tho! Its a trip to watch bouncin around the track tho, would love to see what its like on a real track sometime just for laughs. I will say that it owned the sharper/tighter turns thanks to its wheelbase which was actually a surprise.

Matt

[biff85ta]

Yeah sorry guys, I swore I had pics of it on my phone but could only find where I was tryin to get a shot of the smoke pouring outta the back of the short arm buggy. Ill snag some soon tho! Its a trip to watch bouncin around the track tho, would love to see what its like on a real track sometime just for laughs. I will say that it owned the sharper/tighter turns thanks to its wheelbase which was actually a surprise.

Matt

I have an odd question for you. Have you ever heard of a forum called Tennesspeed? If so do you still have the SVO?

[66sprint6]

I used to be a part of Tennesspeed (under the same screen name) and unfortunately I dont have the SVO anymore. I loved the car but didnt (at the time) have the means to keep it goin. I miss it very much but dont miss its quirks and bad habits LOL. I sold it, took some of the cash and finished gettin my turbo 66 runnin which I do still have (screen name has to do with that car).

Finally took the BroncoBuggy out to a bigger "track" in Columbia TN. Its an 1/8 scale outdoor track thats less than ideal for racing due to its condition but MORE than ideal for havin a TON of fun. I only was able to get 1 pic tho before I broke a front wheel and had to call it a day



I actually had alot of fun despite the fact that the XL5/12t Titan combo was BORINGLY slow down low. I got the weight all to the back and can finally hit jumps nearly flat. I could clear some of the doubles but that was about it. Im gonna try to fix the wheel and toss my 17.5SS brushless in and see what she's made of then! I also need to figure out a little stronger way to mount the front of the body but otherwise she's pretty solid and took a HELL of a beating!

Matt

[Diggley]

Those stock RC10 wheels look just sooo right-on on this.

It kinda has a retro feel to it. (As if Associated was into scalers back in the mid 80's..)

I think it looks great!

[Premo]

GoldPan #2 just came in...and, like I was suprised how clean and well oiled the other one was when it showed up, Im equally surprised at how tired, broken and dirty this one is. I didnt pay much for it and knew the arm was broken, so Im not worried. Regardless, Im thinkin this will be the perfect donor for a WOIN build or even a Sand Buggy build. Here she is when how I got her.
Lucky you....three gold pans. Every time I bid on one in ebay I ge busted. Where are u finding yours? I need another gold pan. Not that interested in a rollingchassic but if yagotta extra one let mee know. Three of them, wow.







Well worn tub and nose



Missing dogbone



Old School Electronics





In pieces



Dirty white parts lookin for some Simple Green



Broken parts. Not many, Broken front a-arm, broken steering piece and the rear shock tower is warped.



Any way to fix this or is it trash?



Rusty metal parts. Any good way to revive these screws or do I need to look elsewhere. Is there a good, complete screw kit available?



After cleaning it all up Im gonna look into what the next move is. Again, Ide LOVE to put together an old school, new tech buggy to run around the track for fun and Im also eyeballing a Sand Buggy build. I have one last goldpan coming which I believe will be in better condition than this so Ill have 3 buggies to mess with. Im still gettin to know these things but Im enjoyin em so far! Thanks for any help guys, Ill keep this thread updated!

UPDATE: After seeing that this was the roughest of the 3 GoldPans I received I decided to make this one a Baja style, Sand Scorcher-esk build. The entire reason I got into Vintage RC10s came about after seeing people convert old GoldPans to SandScorcher bodies and I thought it was cool. Now Im enjoying restoring one of my new Rc10s, building the other up with more modern parts and recycling this one so it will live again, even if it is in a slower, less agile form Ive started posting pics towards the end of this thread so keep an eye out and lemme know what you think!!!
Matt

[66sprint6]

I agree on the wheels, now if I could only figure out what to do on the rears to fit the other RC4WD tires. On the other hand...it really runs awesome with the oldschool pins so maybe I wont change em out!

Premo...I found all of mine all over the place. Check here, ebay, other RC forums and even local hobby shops. I actually have a good friend of mine my WOIN build pan and all the stock parts with it so he could build a buggy like this one. I kept the short arm and the Bronco. Good luck!

Matt

[pastimesteve]

This has been a fun thread to follow -- thanks! I love that picture you posted of the Bronco in the mud. Very fitting.

Steve

[66sprint6]

Thanks!!! It was alot of fun hittin the end of the straight with a small left bend and that was where the mud was so you could kick up a rooster tail and slide through it

I pulled the XL5-12t Titan combo out last night and tossed in a Mamba Max Pro and 17t SS brushless motor and now she's stupid quick. I only had a 3s battery charged and its amazingly fun, itll prolly be just right on 2s. Im gonna have to move the weight back forward a bit tho, this thing is a wheelie monster now!

Matt

[66sprint6]

Finally an update for the ole BroncoBuggy! I havnt messed around with it for a while but the 17.5 Brushless motor has really ignited the fun so I picked up a couple items to help make it a more reliable buggy. First I tossed some new balljoints on and retired the originals.





A little bit of tweakin front and rear got this sucker runnin better, cornering amazingly well for what it is and made it even more fun to drive!!! In the spirit of this being a "budget/spare parts" build I took the Mamba Max Pro out and tossed in a $30 knockoff 60a sensored/sensorless brushless ESC off ebay. This ESC is wonderful so far and works awesome on 3s Lipo with the 17.5 motor and stock gearing. Motor stays cold to the touch, buggy is already faster than it needs to be so I may not mess with the gearing...not sure. I clocked it at 27mph down my relatively short driveway so Im pretty good with that.



Tranny bearings are shot I believe, Ive got a ton of play in both outdrives at the moment so Its gonna come apart shortly then I wanna mess a few small issues. Dog bones in the rear are limiting the suspension movement a bit so I wanna see about gettin some CVDs and shortening them maybe. I also need to put together a more secure front body mount setup. Its works as it is until you have a nasty roll. Anyways, here are a couple pics of how she sits now after a good bashing in the yard.





Ugly motor cover from the nice GoldPan actually worth keepin around, its taking some nasty licks so Ill keep it on this thing.



Im also workin on the rear wheel/tire setup. I LOVE the old knobbies on this sucker but I wear em out and they dont exactly look right on there so Im either gonna cut up some other RC4WD tires I have and make em fit the wide rear wheels or I may try some SandScorcher wheels...not sure.

Matt

[66sprint6]

FINALLY!!! I got to take this sucker out on the beach where it was built to play...and fun was had!



You can see by the body that Ive been beating on this sucker pretty hard...and the 17.5 setup likes wheelies if your not careful LOL. Ive clocked her at 25mph recently with the combo which is MORE than enough to get spooky! Speakin of wheelies!



Rooster tails are fun







All in all it was a blast. I ran one battery pack down then had an issue with the second that ended the day. The ESC battery lead either broke or melted the solder off the deans and she was done. Tons of fun tho and handled the sand like a champ, even the deep loose stuff so long as I didnt stop lol. Now Im back in landlocked TN but I had a good time and look forward to blastin sand again soon!

Matt

[Diggley]

There is something just so freakin'cool about this build...

I love this truck!

It's one of my all-time favorite beater-to-beauty projects!


I'm I gonna start diggin' in my parts stash.....

[66sprint6]

I appreciate it! It was built for one purpose...fun and theres plenty of it to be had with it thats for sure. Im currently gettin all the sand out of it and soldering the ESC back together, patch up the body a bit and itll be back for more!

Matt