Proline Tuber Chassis

I just purchased the Proline Tuber chassis from tcscrawler.com. First, let me begin by saying that I was thoroughly impressed with TCS. Not only were they the least expensive, but they also delivered the chassis too me freaky fast (they make the Jimmie John's drivers look slow). As far as the chassis goes, I have the following to report:

The chassis is a bolt-on style body, which means that you cannot remove it by merely pulling some cotter pins. This could be good or bad. If you want to make adjustments to you motor, transmission, drive shafts, and/or shocks, the body is in the way. Most likely, you will have to unbolt the entire body in order to get to these areas to upgrade or work on them. However, if you don't make adjustments, repairs, or upgrades very often, this is a great body as it remains secure to the stock Axial chassis.

Putting the tuber onto the Axial chassis was not too difficult. The instructions were not the clearest that I have seen (they could have done a much better job), but I was able to figure it out on my own - 4 small screws screw through the tuber and into the top holes on the Axial chassis (the holes near where the shocks screw in).

Trying to find out how to put the electronics in was a pain in the rear end. First of all, the battery cover was just big enough to fit my Duratrax 6-pack battery bar; there was no additional room for any wires. I guess this is good because it does not allow the battery pack to move around during crawling. However, I think I would have rather had a Velcro strap secure the battery pack and have a little more room under the cover. There are 2 wells under the cover. I assume that these are for the electronic speed control (ESC) and the radio receiver. The problem was that the front well was not large enough for both the ESC and the receiver, and the rear well was too far away from the steering servo. In fact, if you want to use the rear well, you will have to get (or make) some sort of extension for the wires.

After some frustration, and multiple attempts, I was finally able to use the font well for my ESC and a side trough (a low point on both sides of the battery compartment) to hold my receiver (I used a piece of 2-sided tape to keep it attached). I then used the other trough, and another piece of 2-sided tape to mount my on/off switch.

As for the drive, so far I am impressed. I have not had any more issues with my tires rubbing on my crawler's body during articulation (like they did not my stock Axial body). I also really enjoy the look of the tuber, and one additional perk--it comes with two styles of front bumpers, which can be switched out by simply removing two cotter pins.

The only issue I have had with the tuber (other than the setup) is that it is too heavy for the super soft Axial springs (red) that I have on my shocks. Because of its weight, and because of torque twist, the tuber always leans to the left.

As I have more time to run the tuber, I will be able to report on its durability later.

Juice

Front Axle Battery Pack

One of the other changes that I recently made is moving my battery from the center of my crawler to the front axle. This is one of those "hard" decisions to make and to stick with. As you all know weight to the front end is a MUST for climbing rocks that are at a significant slope. When you are operating on a track or a flatter drive terrain, the weight in the front is not as important.

I pondered over this decision for a long time. I did not mind the battery in the center at all, however when I started getting ready for some local competition I found it necessary to lighten up the center and add some more weight to the front end. I had maxed out the amount of weight I could but in my front tires and on my front wheels and still needed more weight in the front. This is why I decided to go with the front axle battery mount.

By doing this I cut down my runtime drastically and even lost a little "torque" power. I am currently troubleshooting why I lost some torque as I should not have lost any. I think I have it narrowed down to some of the wire I used for the battery setup. Because my Tekin ESC is in the rear of my Proline tuber chassis and the battery is on the front axle it was necessary for me to "rig" an extension. The extension that I made so that the ESC connection would reach the battery connection is using a smaller gauge wire (its all I had on a Sunday). I think the power distribution is being "cut" down because of this. *shrug* who knows... Any Ideas? If this does not work I will go through and check all my solder points. I put Dean Plug’s ends on all the way through, so I had done a lot of soldering that day:(

The downfall to switching - I lost a tremendous amount of runtime. The front axle mount is made for competition, However if you can get two battery back the charge time is faster then the end of the "run" time so you will always have a battery ready. But who like to go out playing and have to babysit a battery all day? To resolve this I made a simple connection that I can use to run my regular "bar" style battery. It was as simple as making a connection that went from Dean (esc connection type) to the stock battery type connection (I think this is called Tamaya or something).

The good thing - This added the weight I needed to the front end and took the weight I needed away from the center (top, side, etc). This allows me now to stand straighter up while crawling, allows me to make full use of my front tires while at an angle (very beneficial), keeps from rolling sideways and end for end as easy.

My opinion sums up to - setup for both type batteries as I did. Or:

Competition - front axle mounted battery
Play time only - Anywhere you can fit a good long lasting "bar" style battery.

Thanks,
Bish

Axle Widening

Recently I have changed a few more things on my crawler. One of them was widening the axle. As a lot of things this has its "pros and con's" but for the most part I am very happy with what the end results are. I am not sure if there is a company that makes axle widening kits and if so who it would be. This set was machined and was very simple and very cheap to do. The kit widens both axles by approx 3 inches (1.5) per tire. I decided to widen my axles for the days that we would be on bigger boulders instead of small rocks, such as Little Moab or Moab. The wider axles help TONS on rocks like this and also works well on bigger rounder rocks, however when it comes to small rocks or sharp pointy rocks the axle's being wider really hurts the overall operation of my Crawler because the ground clearance is much less.

The nice thing about the design of the kit is that it is VERY simple to take off and go back to normal. Take off the tires, take off the spacer, unscrew the axle thread extenders and put your tires back on. Takes about 5 minutes and you are back and ready to run smaller rocks!!

If anyone would like to get a set of these let me know and I can give you some contact information for the guy who makes them.

I will take some pictures of the install and finished product and I will post them soon


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In an attempt to keep up with the reviews and to get a second opinion, I have invited Bish to become an RC rock crawler reviewer. Bish has been crawling for some time now and will bring valuable insights to this blog. Welcome Bish.

Tekin Customer Service

Because of the problems I have had with my Axial AE-1 speed control, I have begun looking for an upgrade. I began by asking my friends in Utah what they suggested. They unanimously told me to go for the Tekin FX-R. I then began looking at competition drivers and noticed that, for the most part, they used the Castle Creations Mamba. Finally, I went to my local hobby shops and they suggested the Novak Rooster. In the end, I was still unsure which ESC (electronic speed control) would be best for my crawler, but it seemed that all of them had their advantages and disadvantages and all of them would probably do the job.

Since I was still unsure which ESC to purchase, I finally decided to put the manufacturers to the ultimate test - customer relations. I sent an identical email to several different manufactures requesting specific information on their ESC's. I also asked them why they believed I should choose their product over their competitor's product. Although all manufacturers responded to my email, I must say that the Tekin customer service stood head and shoulders above the others.

Two hours after I sent my email, the vice president of Tekin, Sherri Campbell, responded to my inquiry. In her email, Sherri advised me that she felt that another person (Ty) could answer my question better than she could because he was the "crawler man." However, he was out of the office working on their new dirt track and would be unable to respond to me until the following day. She then assured me that she would make sure he got back with me upon his return. She also listed 4 links to various websites, which gave helpful information on the Tekin ESC.

Sherri did not have to respond to my email; she could have mereley forwarded it to Ty and let him get back with me when he returned. She could have also told me what she did know about the ESC and left it at that. However, she took the time to make sure I had the quickest most accurate response possible. She knew that I was only going to be purchasing one ESC, but she treated me as if I were going to be Tekin's most valuable customer.

The following day (I still had not received an email from the other manufacturers), the service manager, Ty Campbell, sent me a detailed email on why he believed the Tekin ESC is the best ESC on the market. He gave me some valuable information about the product and also listed various URL's of where I could go for more information.

Both Sherri and Ty provided me with telephone numbers in case I had any more questions. However, because they were so particular in their responses, I was left satisfied and didn't have any follow-up questions.

A couple of days after Ty's email, I received another email from Sherri. It was a follow-up email. She wanted to make sure that Ty had responded to my email and to make sure all my questions were answered. In my opinion, she went above and beyond what the vice president of a company should do. Thank you Tekin Inc. for the esceptional customer service! You have certainly gained a loyal customer.

Juice