ASK Cub Reporter- You Send Us Mail, I Mash My Keyboard With My Face- Version 04.07.2011

Do you guys have team drivers? Because I would love to sport the name of BigSquidRC! I am 15 years old and race at the local track here in Washington. My classes of choice are pro short course 2wd and 4wd. Last year I finished 3rd in points in the 2wd and 4th in points in 4wd. I am planning on racing at the local tracks and a coupple of bigger events such as the northwest short course nationals. It would be great to sport the name!!!
Thanks,
Nick V.

Cubby– Hey ya Nick, thanks for the email.

We’ve been getting a couple of “sponsorship request” emails a week lately, so I’m posting one for all to see. BSRC is a site about bashing, not about the much smaller racing scene, so as such, we don’t “sponsor” racers. Although, Nicks email got me to thinking…

So what if BSRC decided to start sponsoring bashers? Like way-super-dope-uber-bashers? I mean like the guys that huck it off 5 stories buildings for lunch, and 10 story buildings for supper? We hook up our “factory bashers” with trucks/stickers/etc and they make the mainstream news because they hucked a Savage over the Luxor? Lets say bashers look’n to make the squad submit us videos of their biggest jumps etc?

I think I’m on to something here… Nick, ever jumped over a school before? Ever hit a low flying full scale plane? Ever get your truck stuck in the top of a tree? If so, let us know, we might be able to hook ya up.

Hello nice build review.

I have one question in the Article you said “But, if you race on a small track, or one with lots of tight 180′s, the SC10 will be turning under you. There are two reasons the Blitz can’t/won’t cut the tightest corners- 1. it’s limited in steering travel, and 2. the Ackerman isn’t optimal for tight corners. You can fix #1 fairly easily by removing some material on the steering blocks for more throw, we did this mod and have a couple pictures to show you what material to remove.”

I did not see the pictures of this mod in the article could you please send a link to these pics or email me the pics? I am very interested in this mod.
Thanks so much..
Dan

Cubby– Yo thanks for the email Dan. Hope you are dig’n your Blitz as much as we dig ours.

The pics referred to were included in the article. They are THIS ONE and THIS ONE. And yes I must admit I was the one who shot those pics, definitely not the best, but I’ve been working on get’n my photo skills up past “blind man during an epileptic seizure”.

The first pic (ese15.jpg) shows the stock part on bottom and the part with material removed at the top. The second pic (ese16.jpg) shows an unmodified c-hub on top and after modification on the bottom. In reality you really don’t need to see the pics, just turn your Blitz to full travel and see where it is hitting at, then remove a small amount of material to allow a greater range of motion.

Since posting the Blitz ESE review we’ve learned a lot about more about the truck. The Blitz is right there with the Traxxas Slash as the “always ready to grab and go” truck sitting around the office. I dare say we’ve put more miles on our test Blitz than any other truck in the office the last 12 months. With all that trigger time we’ve learned a lot about how to give it more steering, so…

Right now our favorite steering mods are-
1. Use the included in-line steering blocks instead of the stock trailing blocks. Instantly gives more aggressive steering.

2. Remove material for greater range of motion, this aids in a tighter turning radius.

3. Sometime we run the ballstuds in the front of the steering rack instead of the stock location at the rear. I recommend this only for very high bite surfaces. The rear of the truck will become crazy loose if you aren’t running on a high traction surface with this set-up. Sometimes when we run this set-up we run all the foam battery blocks to the front of the battery tray, sometimes one in the rear, two in the front.

4. Use tires that provide more side-bite up front, and tires with less side-bite in the rear. This gets the front to plant better in corners while allowing the rear to rotate.

Try all those out one at a time, then in combinations to see what steering set-up works best for you and your driving style.

Peace and love, peace and love…

Bigsquid,

Guys I am going to be honest and state up front that I’m an rc noobie. The one thing I’m having the biggest problem with right now is how to solder, what do you think is the best way to learn?

Bradley

Cubby– Thanks for taking the time to shoot us an email Bradley.

What’s the best way to learn how to solder? First I’ll tell you how I learned- I grabbed a soldering iron, some solder, and two pieces of wire and just played with’em for a few hours. I would solder’em one way, then another, with a a good solid yank determining if the work I had done was good or bad.

I’ll admit that being self taught was not the “best” method, so with that in mind this is what I recommend for you- to seek out advice (in person) from someone at your LHS or track. Any decent hobby shop employee will take the 10 minutes to show you how to solder, and the same can be said for any decent racer at your local track. If you have neither close to you, there are a million videos on-line that you can watch to get an idea, although being able to ask questions first hand is highly preferred.

The biggest single problem I see at the track with solder noobs is they are trying to use a $5 soldering iron that just doesn’t have enough oomff to get the job done. So if I was going to give you a couple quick pointers-

1. Cut the check for a decent soldering iron. It’s hard to put a dollar value on cursing, but trust me on this one, spend a bit more up front on a iron with adequate output to save yourself from hours of swearing in the future.

2. Use good solder. I use Novak Lead Free Silver Rosin Core, so do a lot of racer types. Don’t use the stuff that’s as thick as your thumb from the hardware store.

That’s it for this week ya bunch of crazed rc lunatics. Submit your questions, death threats, and unopened bottles of Glenlivet to- Cubby at BigSquidRC dot com!

YOUR Cub Reporter