tank weight

[LongGoneJohn]

Hi guys, after reading a thread on rcu I was wondering whats the heaviest tank you run regularly? I'd like to make my hl tiger a bit better at towing weight aswell, so thoughts on running gear would be good too.
Cheers !

[cannedheat]

hi old chap wot wot
each to is own on this, one thinks old chap , heavy tanks /metal tracks ete in MY OPINION are good on shall we term it good surface area ,plastic tracks ete are good on grass and the like ,low gears for realism and will handle weight issues better ?
but I think if you have the right gears they will cope with most things, one thinks .....wot wot......

[tomhugill]

What ever you put on a tank and its total weight it's only as good as its engineering. I have a 9kg sturm tiger that will drive through anything, even the foot high grass at Hyde didn't slow it down. I also have a hooben elefant that in its stock plastic form was good for nothing but smooth surfaces.

My point is that if you merely looking at running a tank it can be any weight (within reason) and as long as the running gear is suitable it'll be fine. Problems come when you try and run big heavy tanks with those pot metal gearboxes or overtaxing the stock idler mounts on a Henglong with metal tracks/wheels etc.

Now battling is a whole different kettle of fish. Because of the way battling has evolved tanks need Be able to be agile (far more so than in real life). This I why the serious battlers go down the light weight route with plastic tracks etc.

Hope that makes some kind of sense!

[ALPHA]

Ditto on what has been said... My tanks weigh anywhere from 6 to 8 lbs ..I've also found the black steel gears usually work best.... I have seen stainless gears by impact and brass by waltersons...those are nice too...but I haven't found the need to upgrade to those yet...I run my tanks in a torture test course before and after I do any mods on them.... I also do like the metal tracks...But on a Tiger.. the tread is wide...so you really don't need them...they just look and feel nice lol

If you plan on Towing something... it again depends on the Load... a model Pak 40 no big deal....but another Tank... that's another story... you would definitely need lower ratio gears... more in the realm of 3:1 or 4:1

Good luck

Happy Tanking

ALPHA

[Woz]

If you want realism then your tank needs to quite heavy and you'll need to upgrade your tank to take the load.

If you want to battle or just run around for fun then keep it light. It'll be more reliable and run longer.

Also you need to take into account what you're going to be running your tank on, snow and wet sand can be tank killers.

I build my tanks heavy to make them as real as I can, and I rebuild them to take the strain. I like watching it run through grass and not run on the grass.

Some years ago I'd had a bit of fun driving my heavy (modified) Tiger on a wet beach. Every now and then it'd start to struggle and I'd have to kick the sound out of the tracks but other then that there were no problems. My mate snapped the plastic tracks stock Panther (PanTiger). When I got home I took my tank apart to clean it and I noticed this had happened to the track pins-



The tank managed to bend them without stalling or breaking the tracks, even more surprising was that this was with the old HL electronics that were notorious for blowing transistors (though it did have a huge heatsink and fan on it).

[LongGoneJohn]

Tom, is this the sturm tiger from your build? Foot high grass sounds impressive, its exactly that sort of weight and power im after. Ive been towing a lot of random stuff, and the tiger works great, but I tried to be clever and built a small scarifier for it to tow and it struggles, so I thought id look into beefing it up.

[LongGoneJohn]

Woz, sounds like how I use mine, I managed to split the plastic tracks in the snow. I know I probably run it too hard, but its a tank dammit! Any advice on re-engineering? And I bet you had fun bending those pins

[tomhugill]

Tom, is this the sturm tiger from your build? Foot high grass sounds impressive, its exactly that sort of weight and power im after. Ive been towing a lot of random stuff, and the tiger works great, but I tried to be clever and built a small scarifier for it to tow and it struggles, so I thought id look into beefing it up.

It is indeed John! I would have taken a video but you struggled to see it!

[Woz]

Woz, sounds like how I use mine, I managed to split the plastic tracks in the snow. I know I probably run it too hard, but its a tank dammit! Any advice on re-engineering? And I bet you had fun bending those pins

Always having fun when I'm out for a drive-

Here's the original build thread-

viewtopic.php?f=22&t=378&p=3572#p3572

I bent the pins before this rebuild but this thread shows the suspension gearbox better -

viewtopic.php?f=22&t=826&p=8731#p8731

This is how my tracks looked after their run on the beach-

[ALPHA]

Woz, sounds like how I use mine, I managed to split the plastic tracks in the snow. I know I probably run it too hard, but its a tank dammit! Any advice on re-engineering? And I bet you had fun bending those pins

Always having when I'm out for a drive-

Here's the original build thread-

viewtopic.php?f=22&t=378&p=3572#p3572

I bent the pins before this rebuild but this thread shows the suspension gearbox better -

viewtopic.php?f=22&t=826&p=8731#p8731

This is how my tracks looked after their run on the beach-

.............................How realistic is that??????????????............ I actually like when things like that happen...though at times it might cause damage...it still makes me grin thinking how a tank could be mired down... and turned into a sitting duck

ALPHA