ASK Cubby- You Ask the Questions, I Make Up the Answers

“Build yourself 1/8 scale truggy

Good evening sir,

Been in the hobby with my 12yo son now for just over 2 yrs. Went with a rustler that had been extremely good. Now I want to go bigger and am wondering if you had any opinion on a build it yourself 8th scale truggy. Don’t need a remote or batteries, esc and motor will probably be castle. I’ve read some of big squids reviews but can’t find anything about what I am looking for.

Any info would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you,

Nik H.”

Cubby- Hey Nik, guess what? I have picked your letter as “Email of the Month”. Now if you just shoot us your snail mail and shirt size we’ll ship you out an official BSRC t-shirt.

And… do I have an opinion on a “build it yourself” 1/8th scale truggy? Of course I do, I have an opinion on everything. I mean, that is basically all my job is- shoveling out opinions and stirring the pot.

So… if I had to plunk down some of my hard earned cash on a new truggy kit it would go to a… wait for it… new Durango DEX8T. Ok, so why do I pick the Durango? Two big reasons really. The first being I really like how they drive. Their suspension is pretty dialed out of the box, they turn well, and they soak up big landings like a sponge. The second and bigger reason to go with the DEX8T would be how it is organized as a kit. Each build step is made super easy by they way they have organized all the parts in the bags, and some parts, like the shocks and diffs, came pre-assembled, saving a bunch of time. To boil it down, I like how it drives and love the way the kit goes together. Cut the check and thank me later.

“Should i or shouldn’t i?

Up to this point all I have run in my 2wd brushless Torment is a 2 cell lithium battery. With your infinite wisdom cubby do you think i should be running 3 cell? I would like to try one but don’t want to tear up my truck.

Your faithful reader,

Bob K.”

Cubby- Yo hey Bobby, thanks for the email.

Like most letters you didn’t include a whole lot of information, leaving me to just make stuff up, which I am an expert at so here it goes…

I’m going to guess that you bought the ECX Brushless Torment 2wd and did not add a BL system to one of the brushed versions. I’m going to guess that you are a basher and not doing any racing. I’m also going to guess that you prefer chocolate over vanilla ice cream. I mean, while I’m guessing I might as well guess about everything, right?

So… here are a couple (actually 5) of my quick thoughts-

1. We’ve never reviewed the BL version of the Torment, so I can’t say first hand how well its drivetrain will hold up to 3S brushless power.

2. I would go 3S anyways, just because it will make your truck a whole new beast. A 3S LiPo will “feel” about twice as fast as a 2S pack, so if you think your truck has a lot of power now, imagine it feeling twice that fast.

3. The drivetrain may live, which would be awesome, or it might not, but if it doesn’t, don’t worry about it. Wrenching is part of the hobby and a little wrenching will be well worth the new found insane power.

4. When you buy a 3S pack for your Torment, pay special attention to its form factor. For the easiest fit, you will want to buy a 3S pack that is pretty close to the same size as your 2S pack. Sure, you could buy a huge 3S 8000 pack, but then you would have to rig a way of securing it to the battery tray. If you go with a pack that is close to a standard sized 2S pack it will make mounting a lot easier. Now, a 3S pack that will fit in the stock tray won’t be as high of a capacity as most standard 2S packs, but you’ll still have good runtime because you won’t be able to pound the throttle all the time.

5. Send us pictures after you wrap it around a pole at 60 mph. Thanks in advance! Yo seriously, big power is hard to control so give yourself plenty of time to get used to it. And PLEASE try to run in a big open area until you get the hang of putting down crazy power. I can assure you that curbs come up awfully fast at 50 mph+…

So there ya go, that’s it for this week. Get crazy and shoot me an email, Cubby at BigSquidRC dot com. I will probably never read it, but if I do it might just show up on our front page and you’ll win a sticker pack or maybe even a t-shirt!

YOUR Cub Reporter