Tiger chassis upgrade begins

[mickyb]

Hi guys,

After a really bad start yesterday, today has gone well. I posted my frustrations for your views, and in return got a few ideas and lots of encouragement.

Having slept on it, I started again this evening and fitted the metal suspension rails and the idler tensioners with no problem.

SUSPENSION RAILS:
The suspension rails went in easy with one observation. If wish to retain the original HL circuit boards you need to take care on one point.
Looking down onto the chassis, with the front away from you, and the rear nearest you, installation of the left hand suspension rail is hampered by one of the mouldings that support the front circuit board. This is easily remedied. Remove the front two brass axle posts, slide in the chassis rail and fix it in position with the two nuts and bolts provided. Then, slide the two brass axle posts through the holes in the chassis side and re fit to the chassis rail. No fotos for this one as it is easy peasy.

IDLER MOUNT/TENSIONER
Fitting the idler tensioner was not straight forward. I attach lots of fotos for you to follow:

1    First remove the rear chassis pannel. (no foto)
2    Next remove the two moulded pillars, one each side of the battery box right at the rear of the chassis,(foto showing removed)
3    From the outside, saw off the protruding part of the original idler mount.(foto showing removed)
4    I used a Dremmel tool to remove the moulding supports inside the idler mount moulding.(foto showing removed)
5    Now you are left with the raised circular idler mount moulding.(foto)
6    Drill a pilot hole in the centre of this moulding and use a larger drill to open it out completely.(foto)
7    Fit metal template over moulding and mark the two small fixing screw positions. Drill 3mm holes.(foto)
8    Now study the two idler adjusters you are about to fit. They have 1 chamfered edge, this fits against the sloping rear edge of the chassis as you can see from the fotos. I could not fit the adjusters unless I used a small allen key and removed the angled part that fits through the chassis side. Be careful and you can remove this part, fit the adjuster to the chassis side with the two screws provided, and re fit the angled part through the chassis side and into the adjuster body without it all falling apart. Fit one at a time so that if the one you are fitting falls apart, you have one complete  adjuster as a guide for rebuilding the other. I hope that is clear.....pm me if not.
9     Fit the other one in short time cos now you know what to do!

You can see from the fotos, that adjustment of the idler and track must be done with the rear chasis panel removed, unless you cut a hole in the rear panel to access the adjuster screw.

WHEEL AXLES:
The plastic wheels are fitted to the plastic suspension arms with a purpose made fixing screw. The thread is suitable for plastic only, and is not suitable for the new metal suspension arms. I have been offered a few ideas but have come up with this one that I am going to use.

If you study the foto attached, I have lined up the original fixing screw, wheel and plastic suspension arm. Below it I have lined up a stainless steel bolt, brass tube cut to size and the metal suspension arm.  I have drilled out the wheel centres to accept the brass tube and fitted the stainless bolt through the tube. The metal suspension arm will be drilled out with a 3.3mm drill and tapped with an M4 tap to accept the stainless bolt. If you dont fit the brass tube through the wheel centre, the thread of the bolt will rapidly wear away the wheel centre. (See the foto for dimensions and components.)

I want to do the basecoat for the paint job next, so I need to do a few body mods that I see you guys have done.

This may be of interest. I cut off the plastic tow cable ends, drilled into the ends 1/4 inch and glued in suitable lengths of handbrake cable (multi strand wire).
You can get this from yacht chandlers....or a breakers yard.

I hope you find this of use, if not let me know and I will desist my ramblings......

Have fun............Mike 

 

[971wright]

Should be running like a tamiya when you finish these upgrades

  regards pete

[adin]

Looking really good matey, all stuff like this is useful to others. Especially with the lack of instructions with these mods

[Wight]

Absolutely,this is a great thread.
Very interesting,gets me thinking about my heng long tiger 1 thats been in pieces in a copboard for the last two years or so.

[BREL]

how ar you going to re-attach the upper hull to the lower hull at the back end now that you have removed the original mounting where they screw the two halves together

[[ICE]monkey]

hi mike ,looking good , see what a good nights sleep can do !!
as always , all the best, cliff

[mickyb]

Hi Brel,   the useless notes that came with the idler adjuster showed the pillars removed. They certainly seemed to interrupt with the installation of the idler, so I removed them.

Looking down into the chassis, I now see that you might get away with leaving them in but you would have a hell of a job.

See attached foto taken from above.

However, there is a support moulding that goes from the plastic chassis side panel to the pillar in order to support it. This would have to be cut out or it will stop the adjuster working properly......it gets in the way of the screw thread.

I dont think you can leave the pillars in to be honest.

I will get around the missing pillars by elongating the moulding under the top so that it reaches the chassis, or manufacture replacement pillars and glue them on to the chassis slightly to one side of the original position. I should still be able to use the same fixing hole and screws.