1/24 Taigen Tiger IR Battle Tank 2s lipo- IR compatible with Heng Long

[modler]

Got it done last night. 6 electronic components added to the transmitter main board ad the switchable low speed F\R cruise with low power steering . This greatly extends the runtime of the Tiger. Hands off F\R allows running the main gun and MG, turret traverse, it like having a driver control movement of the tank after you give the direction commands and allow more focus on the main gun towards your IR opponent. So all you have to do as the commander is give some steering commands now and then while the tank goes in the direction you want as long as the RED switch is in the on position.

I have this switchable on\off Forward\Reverse cruise function in all my 1/35 scale tanks that use my Spektrum smart transmitter. It can be programmed in using the Spektrum TX of course and that is what I require in all my tanks so that is why I developed this mod for the Taigen Tiger tank.

[modler]

I did a full disassembly of the Tiger and documented the receiver pinouts and connections. I may try the receiver in other tank chassis and even swap the stock voltage motors and see how that affects the tank mixing algorithm. Could be that just swapping in a different voltage rage motors have a desired effect.

This is the cleanest, smartest design of any rc tank I have seen yet. They have come a long way since I first started doing this

This Tiger tank would have been near perfect if it had poly ITL tracks. Come to think of it,I have a set of poly ITL tracks that may fit this tank

[modler]

I tried some different voltage motors and discovered that the tracks are too tight. I did a mod to give the tracks more slack and its a big improvement. There is no track adjustment available but I heated the rear idler axle a but with a soldering iron to get some slack in the idler wheel axle. This is not the optimal way to do this as now the idler wheels wobble a bit to to overheating the idler wheel hubs. I know I said this thing is great and it is but it has a serious flaw with the track tension. I am looking for a way to increase slack by moving the idler axle forward about ~3/16 or 3-4 mm.

[Herr Dr. Professor]

I would guess that the hubs are so firmly affixed to the axles that the hubs cannot be pulled off without serious breakage. Otherwise I would be tempted to pull them off and use small metal washers to reinforce the hubs and the melted part of the hull. That way the slack would stay but there would be reinforcement for rolling more smoothly.

[modler]

I would guess that the hubs are so firmly affixed to the axles that the hubs cannot be pulled off without serious breakage. Otherwise I would be tempted to pull them off and use small metal washers to reinforce the hubs and the melted part of the hull. That way the slack would stay but there would be reinforcement for rolling more smoothly.

Yes I tried pulling the idler wheels and things start deforming pretty quick. There is no way to get mechanical advantage that I have found yet with major breakage. The fatal flaw has been revealed,no idler wheel adjustment and no clean way of removing the idler wheels found so far. Meanwhile the one that I modified works good but one side has a slight wobble. It may wear in as it seems better every time I run it.

That is why these are so cheap. The excessive track tension causes short run time

After relieving some of the track tension,the tank works good. Still a bit fast and low speed operation is hard to do with throttle and turning on the same stick. I revised the switable cruise function with less parts. The transistor has been eliminated so it is more straightforward. I will post the revised schematic asap. I may cut the hub cover off the idler wheel to see what is holding it on. My guess is a press on bearing but we will soon see

[modler]

I was in a hurry to get some track slack as I had to know if this was the problem and it was Anywho, The quick method I used with a soldering iron actually worked pretty good. Next time I would not heat the axles but just use the soldering iron tip to push relief holes in front of the axle. In the picture below you can see that worked pretty well despite what it looks like inside the hull which will clean up with a micro grinder tool so it was not a "butcher job" as it first appears I was able to remove the wobble from the idler wheel by applying some pressure in the opposite plane of the wobble and fixed that too.

How I removed the idler wheel. I cut the inner axle shaft 1/2 its length so I could get a special set of narrow pliers in there to force the wheel off without damaging anything else.

After the idler wheel was off, I notice now that it will not stay on if pushed back on the axle. So that means the part that was holding in on is inside the idler hub area. Next step I set up a precision cutting station to remove the idler hub cover so that it is reusable with some special glue ( UHU POR). After cutting off the idler wheel hub, I heard a faint sound of somethings small fall to the floor. So I looked around and saw it, a small c clip

[modler]

The 1|24 Taigen tank now runs well and with this tension mod, outperforms the Hen Long 1/24 tanks. The 1/24 HL tank does have a few advantages but in terms of track mobility the Taigen wins.

The transmitter mod is not required if the track tension is modified as shown here. However, with the transmitter mod it is even better

I just measure the amount the idler axle was moved forward... 3mm

[Herr Dr. Professor]

Yeesh! The manufacturer put on a tiny C-clip and then glued the inner and outer idler halves together. Now that's a formula for foiling repairs! I'd bet the sprocket and road wheels are attached the same way. As you describe UHU POR, it seems much the same as E6000, a favorite. If I spot some UHU POR I will get some, too.

Your axle fixture seems a great deal better than my idea of using washers.

axle fixture.jpg (67.43 KiB) Viewed 792 times

[modler]

The tank in this video is 1 of 3 that I have. I used this one to develop the fix to make this a great running battle tank. I like the muzzle flash feature that works in conjunction with the IR LED. I really only need one of these Tigers but I have two more for parts for better IR battle Tanks. I will be using the the radio gear from these spare Tigers in a set of VsTanks because I want muzzle flash in those tanks. The Taigens have a special muzzle flash LED plus a special Machine gun LED and a 2 LED tail light scoring system and the Taigen 2.4g receiver that all can be used in Tanks 1/24 that you want to keep more stock looking on the outside.

Here is a 11 minute demo video showing lots of good stuff and at the end some bad news for the scoring system

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=er0Y4jomg5g

[modler]

I remembered today that I have a new in the package set of VsTank Individual Track link Tiger tracks I opened that package and inspected them for fit and it looks like a go I threaded them through the road wheels and realized they will fit as is! Just snapped the links together and it's on. Did both sides and it is ready to go. These are super high-Q tracks and wish they were still available


This video shows the Taigen Tiger running with ITL VsTank tracks. The floor is a anti slip textured surface so it it not slip and fall smooth

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7Cz9Ok5lD4