Hooben T-55 Rebuild

[B_Man]

Many moons ago, I purchased one of the original versions of the Hooben T-55 kit. We all know the shortcomings of that kit so I won't rehash the issues but it was the first RC tank kit I ever built and needless to say, it wasn't great. Cosmetically it looked pretty good but it ran like a three legged dog with sloppy road wheels, constant thrown tracks, a berrel recoil that was never quite right and main gun elevation that only worked sometimes. It's been sitting on a shelf for longer than I care to remember and over the years I collected a few upgraded parts with a plan to one-day strip it down and get it running right. With a bit of spare time on my hands over summer and my Jagdpanther build on hold waiting for Axel's to cast me some parts, that time has finally come.

I forgot to take any photo's before I started pulling it apart but here's the very sad and sorry looking hull when I stripped it back.



I removed everything, gave all a good de-grease and wash and repainted everything in undercoat. I also installed a hull stiffening plate I picked up from Stian a few years ago. It makes a huge difference.

[B_Man]

I sprayed the interior an off-white just to make it look a bit tidier and gave the exterior a couple of coats of Mr Color Flat Russian Green (2). Installing one of Guido Henn's fantastic track tensioning systems was the next job and with that and the plate, there is no more flex in the hull.



The road wheels and idlers had bearings installed to take out the slop and also had a respray.

[B_Man]

Next job was the suspension. All the swing arms were tidied up with a file and everything was installed with some Tamiya grease. The Hooben pot metal suspension damper arms from the front and rear wheels are notoriously rubbish and a couple of mine were broken so I ordered some nice CNC replacement parts from Christian Ludwig.



Up until now everything had come together relatively smoothly with no major issues until I came to the gearbox installation. I ordered a few replacement bits and pieces from Hooben (including the omega clips I was looking for in another post which they gave me for free) and decided to get a new gearbox. The original was a weird mix of plastic and metal gears and was always a bit noisy. After cleaning the horrible black grease off the new set and re-greasing them with some Tamiya stuff, I installed a very nice gearbox mount I picked up from Stian and put them in. One runs like a charm, the other has been hit with the Hooben curse (aka piss-poor quality control) and has a slightly bent drive shaft. Just bent enough to rub on the output bearing in the final drive and make the side of the hull wobble. Much cursing, fiddling, tapping with hammers and trying in vain to find where it's out and I've given up until I can get a replacement. I sent an email to Hooben a couple of days ago requesting a replacement shaft but I'm yet to hear back. I'll give them the benefit of the doubt due to the time of year that it is but hopefully they will make good and I can get this project back on track. I was really hoping to have a running hull before I go back to work in a week but that's not looking likely now.

[HERMAN BIX]

Im paying full attention to this Mr B, errrm, just in case I might , um, magic up another one

[Herr Dr. Professor]

Thank you, B_man, for naming your sources as you wave the magic rebuild wand. I am familiar with them, but it's helpful nonetheless in case someday the tariffs go away. I'm watching, even if I remain silently in awe.

[B_Man]

Thanks gents. Just a quick update to keep this thread rolling. It's been a tad warm in the garage of late and the fish are biting so I haven't been too productive.
The road wheels have gone on and I pulled the very dusty upper hull of the shelf for a test fit. This time I even remembered to take a couple of photos before I pulled too many parts off it.





As anyone who's built one of these things knows, space in the hull is at a premium so I am going to have to put some thought into the tidying up the rats nest of wiring it currently has. That has always caused issues with this tank. I also put a Visaton speaker into the speaker box that came with the parts I acquired from Stian and put together a styrene box for the old TK-22.



Battery tech has moved on since I built this model and the much smaller pack I made out of 1860 batteries will help with the space issue.