3 gear tranny in squared?

[hottuna]

Is it possible to mount the old tranny in my squared? I find no good pictures of the first version.
I see i have to drill holes for the motor plate support. Anything more?

[Spoolio]

Let me have the honour of being the first to ask "Why would you want to?"

I've no idea if it's possible, so I appreciate I'm not contributing to your thread but I am intrigued where you are going with this, it seems a massively backward step.

[hottuna]

Let me have the honour of being the first to ask "Why would you want to?"

Somehow i knew that question would pop up... :lol: And the answer is, don't ask :p

The reason is simple. I want to try with the motor rotating mass spinning the other way. We are 3 X6 drivers in sweden, and have problems with to much rear grip on carpet.

[blue_pinky]

I'm fairly sure it's just the motor mount holes...that was the only thing you needed change to go from 3 gear to 4 gear.

The other geometry differences from squared to original were in the wishbones and shock tower.

[YoungChazz]

Almost that simple, but not quite.

When we made the 4-Gear, we also converted from the original one-piece molded shock tower to the bulkhead & CF tower. The only real problem with the molded tower is that it is weak where the tranny bolts go, so the bulkhead is .030" thicker there.

On the 3-gear, the four tranny mounting tabs are level but on the 4-Gear the two rear tabs are .030" higher than the front tabs. With the 4-Gear and the bulkhead, you therefore use the same amount of tranny shims under all four tabs.

However, if you will use the 3-gear with the bulkhead, or the 4-Gear with the original molded tower, you must shim differently under the front and rear tabs by .030" to compensate. If 3-gear w/ bulkhead, extra under the front tabs. If 4-Gear w/molded tower, extra under rear tabs.

Otherwise, yes, you can use all the mentioned parts interchangeably. We have a template for drilling the two holes in the original chassis to convert it from 3-gear to 4, and I think it will work in the Squared chassis to convert it to 3-gear. The template was part of the old 4-Gear Upgrade Kits, and we will be happy to mail you one free. Why you want to give up traction is a mystery to me. Keep the traction and do some set-up work...

B.T.W., the arms & towers are NOT interchangeable. The Squared arms, #3012, must be used with the Squared tower, #3313. Original arms, #3010 must be used either with the original molded tower, #3310, or with the original CF tower, #3311. The original CF tower, #3311, fits with the bulkhead, #1310, which is used now in all X-Cars. We have all the old parts in stock, and I think D.M.S. does as well.

I hope that is not nearly as confusing as I think it is...

[hottuna]

Wow, that was an answer Chazz!

Believe me, we have tried all kinds of set ups, the car ain't bad, but the rotating mass keeps the rear down and genarating grip. We have talked alot about this on races. One guy is racing his home made RB5 Mid, (can be seen in the "I made this" section), his motor is the other way around, and have blistering speed exiting corners. Of course it's not right to compare 2 different cars, but one reason could be the motor pushes the front down more on on power.
It would just be an interesting thing to try. Outdoors i would not run a 3 gear tranny.

[mark christopher]

other option may be to mount the motor plate on the other side of the 4 gear, gear box and reverse your speedo?

would that work or have i drunk too much?

[YoungChazz]

Fastest/best thing Tuna is to check with DMS to see if he's got the parts. We have no more 3-gear motor plates.

[Paul_Sinclair]

Wow, that was an answer Chazz!

Believe me, we have tried all kinds of set ups, the car ain't bad, but the rotating mass keeps the rear down and genarating grip. We have talked alot about this on races. One guy is racing his home made RB5 Mid, (can be seen in the "I made this" section), his motor is the other way around, and have blistering speed exiting corners. Of course it's not right to compare 2 different cars, but one reason could be the motor pushes the front down more on on power.
It would just be an interesting thing to try. Outdoors i would not run a 3 gear tranny.

Hey Hottuna,
Have you thought about trying to make/find/run a heavy slipper plate? I've thought quite a bit about how much weight transfer is going on with a 4-gear X - 6, and discussed with BK how to reduce or tune it for some tracks. The best thing we've come up with is to add some kind of 'flywheel' effect on the slipper shaft - weight rotating counter to the motor would reduce the overall net transfer. Part of my thinking is, the 3-gear transmission cases were pretty bad overall - good for what we could do at the time, but the 4-gear one is just so much better all around. Back on the 3-gear I was replacing the idler gear once a month or so because it wore out so fast, and the car was always loud. With the 4-gear, by adding/taking away mass you could essentially dial in how big the effect is while still having a beautifully smooth transmission.

Paul

[hottuna]

That's not a bad idea at all Paul. A faster and easier way of playing around with the weight.
And as Chazz says, finding the old parts can be tricky.

[Darren Boyle]

That's not a bad idea at all Paul. A faster and easier way of playing around with the weight.
And as Chazz says, finding the old parts can be tricky.
We do have ALL the old "3 gear" spares still in stock here in the UK "if" they are needed....

[hottuna]

We do have ALL the old "3 gear" spares still in stock here in the UK "if" they are needed....
That's good to know :)

[mark christopher]

wont a heavy slipper take longer to spool up an a motor would< would give you hell of a gyroscope effect too!

[Paul_Sinclair]

wont a heavy slipper take longer to spool up an a motor would< would give you hell of a gyroscope effect too!

A heavy slipper would take a while to spool up... if we were running 12 turns and 3300's lol. With brushless motors, drivetrain weight just doesn't matter as much any more IMO. Further, a heavy slipper would actually give you less gyroscope effect than a light one, as the slipper is rotating counter to the wheels/motor. That's why I'm suggesting it to hottuna as a way to 'tune' the amount of weight transfer the motor gives.

[hottuna]

I'll try to find some brass, or other heavy material to fabricate slipper plates of. I'm curious of this idea, as if the X6 didn't have enough setup possibilities already :thumbsup:

[Paul_Sinclair]

...as if the X6 didn't have enough setup possibilities already :thumbsup:

That's why BK and I have only talked about it to this point lol! I keep having other stuff I want to try that doesn't take fabricating something. I'll be really interested to see what you come up with, keep us updated on how it goes!

[hottuna]

So, some update. I did not do anything with the slipper plates, i went the whole way and bought the tranny. Today i had the first test. It's an indoor carpet track. I had the same setup as usual, and Schumacher Mini Pin (slicks) front and rear, and CS Electronics additive.

As i said before, i've always had some problems with understeer, mainly out of mid fast/fast corners, when i want to accelerate. All traction moves backwards, leaving the front tires not enough grip. Different setups, playing with weights etc helped, but not satisfying.

So, what did the old outjudged 3 gear tranny do? One word: Wonder!
I could throttle harder and earlier in corners, and out of corners. The guy i was training with today looked at my car and said, "i can almost see the rear suspension raising out of corners", transfering much weight on the front. I noticed just slightly less rear grip, but the X6 got lots of it anyway on high grip tracks.

The tranny is easy to mount, fits perfect, runs silent and smothly.
I definitely recommend trying this on high grip tracks :thumbsup:

[Cooper]

with 3° toe-in I suppose ?

[hottuna]

with 3° toe-in I suppose ?
No, 4°

[janus_77]

Sorry but aren't there WAY more easy solutions to this ?

I mean just put an extra gear on the motorplate like so:

http://www.oople.com/rc/photos/euros2009/day3/otto/OOP_9121.jpg
(Blatant copy from Jimmy's Euro's report)


Now you can change the rotation of the motor without changing a whole transmission. Just put on the extra idler and change the ESC setting to reverse rotation. That is less than 5 minutes work even when youre trackside. That way you can change it very fast when it starts raining you before your heat / main.


Dont worry about the drag of the extra idler gear, current motors and batteries have power to spare. And you'd be able to run LESS weight in the front.

[hottuna]

That is one way to do it, if you can change the rotation of the motor, you don't want to race backwards :lol:

Changing the tranny is also done in 5 minutes

[Darren Boyle]

If I had the choice I would rather my extra idler be inside the gearbox out of harms way, all inside a purpose built case designed for the job.

As has been said, changing an X6 transmission over is only a matter of a few minutes.

[Cooper]

No, 4°

eurgh? why ?

[janus_77]

Tried using the extra external idler, worked well. But using a slipper weight is easier. This 1st one is 5 mm thick stainless steel (28 grams), works really nice on high grip tracks so far. But a heavier model is in the making (should become 40 / 45 grams)

[Paul_Sinclair]

Hottuna - glad to hear the 3-gear did what you want. How many runs have you put on it, and did you do any work to the trans cases or just assemble and throw it in?

Tried using the extra external idler, worked well. But using a slipper weight is easier. This 1st one is 5 mm thick stainless steel (28 grams), works really nice on high grip tracks so far. But a heavier model is in the making (should become 40 / 45 grams)

Hey Janus - awesome stuff. That's exactly what I was talking about, I'm glad to hear my theory worked! Having tried the reverse-motor-direction and the slipper weights, did they seem about the same effect on the track? Or was it more a different feel to achieve the same performance?

[hottuna]

Hottuna - glad to hear the 3-gear did what you want. How many runs have you put on it, and did you do any work to the trans cases or just assemble and throw it in?
I've been using it now for 4 training days, and a race today.
I just mounted it, as i wrote before, it fits perfect, no work needed. It's a bit louder now then in the beginning, surely caused of the old gears i reused, that were worn in one direction.

The tranny shaved of 2/10th on our local track (approx. 14 sec rounds), tested by a race friend who also run 3 gear now.
We will try it outdoor on turf too in the summer, but some kind of sealing in the bottom would be needed i think. If it sucks in dust the gears will not last long.

[janus_77]

Hey Janus - awesome stuff. That's exactly what I was talking about, I'm glad to hear my theory worked! Having tried the reverse-motor-direction and the slipper weights, did they seem about the same effect on the track? Or was it more a different feel to achieve the same performance?

Since the slipper only turns at about a quarter of the speed as the rotor of the motor, it takes higher revs to really notice. Thats why I want to try a heavier one. Not sure what it will do on a slippery dirt track yet though.