Crius

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ov_X-vzUI1o

shenlonco

My Feedback: (2)

Looks great!

Crius

One of my youtube viewers cleared something up for me, and it's the Leo tracks that arrive unassembled and have to have the pads glued on. I'm still waiting to hear from anyone that has these Abrams tracks from Mato and what they can tell me about durability. I figure I'll have to brace the hull of the tank with angle aluminum or something to keep flex down to avoid throwing tracks, and I'm thinking a Henntec is a good idea. I'll get one of those ordered soon, if the budget allows. I estimate it will be after the first of the year before I start this project, and it will have to ride backseat to the Sd.Kfz 250. In the meantime, if anyone knows of any good build logs with ideas for bracing the lower hull of the Abrams I'd really like to see them. I can use all the ideas I can get, and I ain't scared to flagrantly copy the work of those that have trod this path before me.

superrod

My Feedback: (16)

Gary look at the thread I did on the ZTZ99 adjustable idlers. Down near the end is a picture of the bracing. I did it with G10 and put it in with west systems. Came out really stiff and did not ad a ton of weight.
Jimmy
http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/rc-t...-ztz-99-a.html

Crius

That looks very good, and I'm planning to use epoxy, but with angle aluminum. I've never worked with G10, and I'd have to order it. To me that's kind of an exotic material and I want to keep it simple. Stuff that's readily available. I like the two part, five minute epoxy for this kind of stuff. But your cross braces have given me some ideas.

superrod

My Feedback: (16)

I get my G10 from a local rocket guy after he cuts his parts out with a cnc router. If you give me some rough sizes I'll cut some parts for you. I use my tile saw to cut the stuff and it works good.
Jimmy

Crius

Thanks for the offer, Jimmy, but like I said, I want to use easily available materials. G10 is easily obtainable for you, but then there's shipping costs to me and the lead time, I really want to use stuff they have at any local hobby shop.

Sky_HawK

I have the Leo tracks and have not found any glue that will hold the pads to the tracks yet.

Old MSgt

Have you tried that JB Weld Quickweld epoxy? I've tried a lot of stuff and the tires kept coming off the metal rims. So I'd take ALL of the rubber off and redo'em.

Then I tried that Quickweld epoxy and it HOLDS 1/6 rubber on rims SOLID. It's a two part epoxy and the only drawback is it's 5 minute, so just mix up enough to do a few at a time. Works for me.

Mike

TheBennyB

Looks decent Gary, Let us know how they stand up to some operating down the road.

pcsguy88

Received, painted and installed my wheels from Mato after waiting 2wks from China. Thought they were fairly good quality (though they are much lighter than Taigen's Leo wheels) until I installed them. What a wobbly mess on the original plastic axles. The bearing and wheel hole is too large a diameter for the axle. *** Mato? I mean, you don't even have metal swingarms on your site.

Another thing I was worried about and looks to be true is that the sprockets won't fit on the Taigen V2 gear axle since it's a hair thicker with a larger bolt. Hopefully I can remove enough material to fit them like I did the plastic sprockets.

Anyone know if metal swingarms are out there in Internet land for their roadwheels?

Cruiser133

This is why I went with the offering from Tank Army. Their kit comes with everything you need and with the Aus dollar at a favorable exchange rate, I felt I could wait on the slow boat. Even with the outrageous shipping, it was still less than piecing together the same items from Mato and then going on the hunt to locate metal swing arms. Erik at Imex has them, but they are not cheap...

pcsguy88

The $55 AUS shipping was almost as much as the kit, but yeah, I kinda wish I had just gone ahead and did it. I wasn't worried about the swingarms since the plastic is strong enough, but I never would have guessed Mato of all places would make their RW's to fit on an axle that is 2mm larger diameter than stock and then not sell the fitting arms.

Thankfully you can't tell when it's running, but boy are they wonky if you pick it up off the ground. Googly eyes wonky. I swear they were meant to come with bushings to go over the axles. My desert Abrams will never be allowed in the sand in it's current condition. :'(

Crius

Here's the roadwheels with bearings from matomart.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_S9T7Ki_Ho I guess if I could do it again I probably wouldn't go with the bearings. The wheels that come with swing arms seem to fit real well and I think they would perform well also. I really don't think the bearings will make all that much difference. At least not enough to cover the extra cost. Cruiser I hope you'll post photos and video of the Tank Army kit.

Pcsguy, if you want I could probably make some bushings for the plastic swing arms. I'm thinking about doing that for my 2nd Abrams, so it wouldn't be much trouble to make another set. I might even be able to come up with the brass stock, but if I can't scrounge it brass can get rather pricey.

And this is the paint scheme I like. If anyone can give me names and numbers for these paints in Testors Model Master Enamels (or the FSN) that would be great and would save me a bunch of time.

Crius

All ya have to do is ask.

These would run about $28 for all of them, but if you email these guys they might work with you. I've used Heng Long's Store on Aliexpress many times with no trouble, so maybe they can hook you up with a full set of 14, instead of having to buy 7 sets of two.

https://www.aliexpress.com/store/pro...608.0.0.m85Yf2

pcsguy88

Thanks Crius!

So the Mato wheels fit the HL metal swingarms, but not the plastic ones... I'll have to play around with mine next week when I'll have more time and see just how much gap there is and see if I can find a metal tube at the hobby store that will fit. It runs perfectly well indoors, but I tell dirt and sand would have a party in there and wreak havoc. Maybe I'll go ahead and buy the metal arms just for the ease of it.

pcsguy88

You could have just bought one in woodland although the colors seem off. Too bad Costway only had desert.




Here are your Testor's colors for Nato:

http://www.testors.com/product-catal...ar-nato-russia

Crius

They're not quite a perfect fit, so I may wrap a little bare metal foil or something around one and see if it helps. My cheap Harbor freight calipers say the arm has a taper so it's about .270 at the base and about .260 at the outside end, and the ID of the bearings is about .272 (I'll probably take them to work and check them in our inspection department to get some accurate sizes). I'd like to get a friction fit so if I can finagle it through work I might be able to take care of it. Every once in a while someone will grind a part just a hair too small, and to fix it we'll have it chromed and then regrind. Those chrome guys can easily add .005 per side on an OD so maybe I'll have them chrome it and then we have this tiny 4-jaw chuck for the ID grinder (the ID grinder can actually grind both OD and ID so I have no idea why they call it an ID grinder) and I can not only get a perfect fit, I'll get rid of the taper at the same time. With the wheel riding on just that bearing surface I'm not sure how much good it will do until I try it. Wobble may be an issue. I may have to adjust the length of each shaft so it rides as close as possible to the retaining screw without binding. Hmmm. Maybe I should just keep buggin' Imex to get off the pot with the metal hull Abrams with torsion bar suspension, eh?

Thanks for the link to the colors. Interesting that they're semi-gloss. I'll have to check out what they use on the real thing and maybe flat coat over it. The testors doesn't seem to match any FSN or NSN that I can find (like 14052 or 14062), but it appears vallejo carries those colors. Hmmm. I'll still go with the Testors. I'll have to see if they have it at the LHS.

Crius

I just checked the sprockets I got from ebay.

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

pcsguy88

That's great news! I can handle only having to enlarging the bolt hole. I had to really work the inside of the plastic sprockets' ID to get them to fit.

Hopefully you'll find a cheap and easy solution for the roadwheels before I get a chance to mess with mine next week.

Ron

Crius

Turns out the order for the henntec didn't go through, but fortunately I sent bob a PM and it's now in the works.

Ordered ball bearing gearboxes for the Abrams. Went with three shaft high/low because the Abrams is a very fast tank, and I want to keep the speed. I may even use the waterpump 360 motors in it. Those gave me a scale 45 mph in the ZTZ-99A.

shenlonco

My Feedback: (2)

Hey Man what the heck are waterpump 360 motors?
I also have a ? I seen a video of yours and I think it was a taigen stock speaker you said sounded better than the stock heng long speaker was it the smaller new type HL speaker you compared it to?
Thinking of maybe getting one to drop in the new HL leo I recently purchased.
Thanks

Asmodeuss

Very interesting thread! Thanks for sharing mate Yes indeed: What are those waterpump 360?

pcsguy88

That Gary Hoff guy has waaaaaaaaay too much time...

360 motor tests:

http://youtu.be/gzW9U5pkMiA

http://youtu.be/_3paZjFARMA

Asmodeuss

Just ordered some of them...I'll keep you posted on the Abrams result with them.