Force 1 Torsion Build

SMR4Runner

Force 1 Torsion Build

March 25, 08

Video

Torry Hadley is the brians behide this idea.

The idea of the forced articulation torsion is that when weight from the one side of the wire (or wheel) is applied, it will force the opposing side downward applying contact to the ground.

2 1/8 inch piano or music wire used.

Making tight bends on piano or music wire cleanly is pretty difficult. Torry was pretty creative at bending his wires.

He had me use a steel hollow tube to bend the wire while in the vice. This created a nice clean bend while keeping the rest of the wire straight and clean.

Next was to create the arc in the middle of the wire.

We placed the wire vertically in the vice with sizable nut to create the hollow side. Then we placed a scrap piece of wire crossed width over the vertical wire. Example below.

Once all was aligned I applied pressure on the vice slowly to created the arc in the wire.

Torry had pre-made a skid plate out of 3/8inh cutting board. This acts as a base plate that the wires will sit in.

He started by using the dremel to carve out the grooves the wires will sit in. Then taking a ** bit to hollow out the center of the skidplate to allow the bends in the wires to move freely in.

I placed the first wire in the skid plate and bent the wires ever so slightly so that it would lay flat in the grooves. This takes quite awhile to do as you don't want to create a bow in the middle portion of the wire that sits in the skid plate. So all of my bends were done right at the end of each side of the arc. I also had to increase the depth of the grooves in some sections of the skid plate so that it would lay flat. This takes awhile to get done so patience is the key.

I followed the same procedure for the upper wire.

Once the middle of the wires are flush with the skid plate, massage the links so they lay as even as possible without creating any bows in the wires. Again little bends at a time and alot of patience is the key here.

After the wires were all straight and even it was time to move on to the axles.

The upper suspension stays from the TLT kit used to hold the wires. Tapped the upper holes on the axles and mounted the stays.

Next was to measure the length of wires to meet the legal wheelbase. During the initial build the axles were placed in a frame measuring 12 1/2 inches of wheel base. All I needed to do was place the wires within the stays, measure, then cut.

After the wires were cut I tapped the ends of the wires.

To decrease any resistance on the rocks I used Teflon tubing to sheath the wires. The tubing is slightly larger than the 1/8inch wire allowing it to roll loosely and because its Teflon, it is also very slick on the rocks.

Finally, end links were screwed into the ends of the wires to attach to the suspension stays.

Now to create the chassis.

One of the WARCRC members picked a some aluminum C channel rails from a job site he works at. This alum is so dang rigid making it difficult to bend and cut. The cool thing about this aluminum C channel rail is that it is about the same width as the TLT chassis so I could use the cross members from the kit.

We drew the design, cut and shaped the chassis. In the last pic you can see the cutout where the arc of the wires will be peeking out of.

Next was to mount the chassis to the skid plate, and connect the end links to the suspension stays.

A third link was add to reduce any axle wrap.

Axle mounting plates were fabbed up.

The front axle plate will hold the servo, motor and GD600. For the rear I wanted to mount the dig servo and MM. I wanted to make sure all was kept nice and low.

Tranny time!

In order for the 2gen XXX Losi tranny to sit solid, I used a couple of the spacers found in the TLT kit. Only two 3mm screws hold the tranny to the chassis. In the last 6 months of comping this rig, over a year for Torry, we have yet to have any issues with it.