Monster Truck Madness – A Racing Clod

Hey everyone and Happy Thursday! It’s a bit of a slow news week and I’ve been lazy with my current monster truck projects so I’m going to answer an e-mail that I received about 2 weeks ago from reader Voldemart07.

Hey Doug I have been in the rc hobby for about 8 years and I want to build a race clod so can you help me out where to get all the part and links.

Thanks

Hello he who shall not be named (well, I know technically you have your e-mail handle spelled slightly different but humor me for the joke’s sake), and welcome to the world of Clods.

In preparing to give advice to you, I realize how long it’s been since I fielded a race Clod. Yes, I’ve talked a lot about the retro styled Clods as of late, but it’s been years since I’ve actually built a race Clod myself.

The Losi LMT and Axial SMT10 have made race Clods somewhat of an endangered species these days in my racing club, but they still exist and compete. I actually drove a friends all last summer (Havoc, seen above).  Race Clods are very unique in how they handle, as once set up properly they act as great handling cruise missiles.

Well, fragile cruise missiles too, depending on how much you want to spend. Let’s talk about building one.

You can start with standard Clod axles (make sure you use bearings) and that’s basically all you’re going to need from the stock kit. You’ll want to add some kind on axle steering, and I’d recommend you use the JConcepts behind the axle setup that comes with a rear lock out. That, along with shaving your knuckles for more clearance, will allow for much improved steering.

From there, you are going to have some choices. There are a lot of chassis kits out there, many from small builders. I’m not sure which to even recommend these days. Crawford Performance Engineering is usually a good place to grab one from though, so here is their Phoenix which is a newer kit. I’ve run several of their past race Clod chassis and they make good stuff and if you have questions, they can help.

From there it’s power. You’ll need two brushless setups as each axle houses a motor. Most guys use two identical setups with two ESCs and a Y adapter to power them from one battery. If you’ve never driven a dual brushless motor on axle truck before, you’re in for a treat. I said they were cruise missiles, remember?

Cruise missiles like to eat gears, though. If you are using brushed motors its not a huge deal. Brushless though, yeah. Be prepared to crack that gear box open on the reg.

And really this is where we should discuss the relative fragility of the stock axle parts. Clods are known to bust axle tubes and knuckles. Most guys who seriously race will run some kind of axle braces or machined axle parts. And if you wanted very high quality machined goodies, Hesse Machine is a great place to look.

This is how to build a race Clod at a very high level. If it sounds a bit complicated, well, it is. Building one can be tricky and it gets expensive fast. There is gold at the end of the rainbow, though, as a race Clod has a performance ceiling higher than most other r/c vehicles. All that power is available immediately, and they don’t deal with torque twist like a shaft truck. Since the axles house everything to make it go, there is also a good deal of weight on them which let them really dig for traction as well as having a low COG.

If you have any questions feel free to e-mail me at doug@big squid rc dot com and I’ll try and help as best I can. CPE and Hesse or whomever you buy parts from will surely point you in the right direction too. While race Clods aren’t as popular as they used to be, there are still a lot of knowledgeable people out there keepin’ them alive!

Hope that helps! Until next week, keep it on all 4’s!