Taking the plunge for ordering this one from amazon(com) was like a sweet revenge for having to make do with RCs that used to get stuck even on door mats. So this is my first 'proper' RC anything.

About the whole amazon shopping experience, i rate it brilliant. I was reading up a lot & comparing options in my budget from a while. Finally chose the Redcat truck due to higher rating than the Exceed Maxstone. Also, Redcat was fulfilled by amazon so it qualifies for Global Shipping which is a dream come true. Placed the order on May 31st, shipped out by June 1st & delivered on June 14th by Aramex standard shipping. Not bad considering estimated delivery on June 12th & Aramex's last mile issues at my pincode.

For a 30lb package, customs didn't take up any time. It landed at Delhi & started transit to my location in under a day. Highlight of this was customs duties were not charged at all. Contrary to what i was thinking, the refund for the same got initiated a day after delivery instead of the 60 days period. I got a mail as well as sms stating the same. So essentially i paid just 14.5k(3.2k S&H incl). Waking up to this notification today was all kinds of surprising to me. So about the whole process, all i had to do was order it in INR & sit back for the 2-week delivery of the HUGE package with Zero customs hassles. Not bad at all.

About the model, there are all kinds of reviews on the internet. So i'll just post some pics if that helps anyone who is looking for one such. Mods & upgrades are planned & going on already, slow enough to not lose steam midway. Will be listed here as & when they are done. To the pics!

























Parts for the lipo upgrade from robu.in . Stock batt is 1800mAh Nimh.


Four wheel steering modes:


Some simple obstacle climbs:

Do you have a low voltage alarm for the battery? The brushed ESC probably doesn't have a built in low voltage cutoff.

Yea the stock ESC doesn't have a LV cutoff. I'll be using an adjustable LV alarm, as shown in the last pic above.

EDIT: Seems the stock ESC is indeed programmable with LV cutoff option as per http://www.rccrawler.com/forum/redcat-rs10/532527-rs10xt-has-programmable-esc.html

I'll have to try it out when it comes to it.

I missed that since I thought it was just a cell checker.

Are you planning on a brushless upgrade anytime soon?

Actually i'm pretty new to the scene so going into BL will have to wait. First need to upgrade to steel gears & metal servos. They are on the way now. Then lower it a bit, new tyres, BTA steering, blackening beadlocks & chassis, lights etc. Will be a slow job. I'm looking at a go-anywhere FPV rig.

Started with the mod since most of the spares have arrived. The following will go in for now.

Steel gears for both axles with hardened drive pins (One axle completed, moly lubed)
Metal gear servo for front axle (Towerpro 18kg)
Metal servo horn
Metal steering knuckles
BTA steering
Cut frame & drill new link holes for lowering
Matte black frame & beadlocks
Bend links
Lipo
Tx antenna mod

Hoping it comes out alright.

The truck taking shape, slow & steady. Rear differential shaft is yet to be dismantled due to hopelessly stuck set pins on both outdrive cups, else could've completed by now. The frame is cut & drilled which lowered the entire unit. Links are bent at 15 degrees, nothing fouls with motors so far at normal & extremes. Put it all together to check alignment, seems alright.

Some more late(very) night work.

Not many crawler fans here it seems. Anyways the truck is taking shape.





Front BTA steering complete. Working well on the bench. The turn is not sick due to a different knuckle design of the axial scx10 but good enough considering i''ll be keeping the rear steering. Feels pretty solid with metal knuckles.

Now a long wait for the second servo to arrive & dismantle rear differential.

This looks really cool sub'd!

Amazing update! Love your crawler.! well I love crawling myself. so i recently ordered a axial scx10. hopefully it should be here soon. Love to see more posts! Keep them coming!

Tnx guys : )

While waiting(still) for the parts, did a test run of the steering. Also had to flip the electronics tray over to increase battery space. Will be squeezing out few more degrees of turn at final tuning, sanding down the stopper nubs.

Really nice...
Awesome work and upgrades... i love crawling too and i have summit... but its not a full scale crawler..  i dont mind making a crawler like yours directly from spares... coz anyway one needs to spend almost equivalent to the car on upgrades. What is your take on this?
.

Well, even i considered importing as spares but it came up to 1.5+ times the stock price plus customs issues from the Tx. It's better you get stock & work on it. Maxstone or rockslide depending on preference for shafty or moa. If premium, go axial.

The spares above are just the upgrades. The entire truck was bought stock.

Finally got around to finish it up. Hooked up the lipo too and there's a perceptible increase in wheel speed. Articulation is some more without the canopy. Squeezed out a bit more steering angle too. Gearbox lube is airgun grade moly paste. It's the best for metal gears. Spur gear plate is still the notorious stock plastic disc, will change to aluminium if & when it breaks.

Will keep it this way for a while before going FPV. If sky permits, hope i get to blast it around.

looks awesome   

Tnx bro : )

Some wheel walking over the curb & spins. Front left tire has this tendency to go up in air during full speed turns. Need to adjust it.

Finally FPV done.

All parts are from GB/BG/ebay(in/com) ~3.5k total.
Emax Night Vision IR 1/3-inch CMOS 800TVL cam
2W 5.8G VTX
AOMWAY 3dBi SPW antenna
2S 2.2Ah 20C lipo
1.5A vtx current consumption/2.3A @full load
3W leds
~45 min runtime
Range untested.

A small test run. There's no DVR yet so video & screen grabs from goggles with the phone, so the lower quality & hard to control due to phone delay.


I know the 2W vtx is overkill but i got it new on offer<600mw price. Can't complain, & i don't feel cooked around it yet. It doesn't get hot on 2S even after a full battery run unlike some reviews say, just feels warm to the touch & it stays constant.

There's some level of pops & cracks around obstacles but feed remains drivable, and some noise probably from the high power vtx but no interference with truck's electronics or servos. I'm still waiting for the IR led to arrive, so the NV part isn't fully tested but there's a bit more exposure with NV on. So it's fun to drive around at night with headlights & NV, looks like blair witch project! The body is modified for that H1 feel which gave more space for the electronics. So far so good.

Which goggles are those?

This.
http://www.rcindia.org/self-designed-diy-and-college-projects/diy-fpv-video-goggles/msg247857/#msg247857

Did you get your Axial yet?

That looks awesome!

What's the expected range?

2W in air is reported to have 20km+ LOS with proper antenna. Being ground fpv with omni, it should be much less & i'm not sitting on higher ground either. I'll give a fig when i get to take it to trail soon.

Lovely unboxing of rc crawler.

Gonna do a crawl video for us?

@Carl Thanks!

@mateen
I doubt that. I like fpv driving across non existent roads than crawl. It's risky to do serious crawls with fpv, & clearly not with current body. Will try when i get another shell just for bashing around. I chose the crawler platform for the rig coz it wont get stuck as much & is slow enough for stable video.

I think you were planning for an Axial. Did it happen?

Yes it did. Had some huge issues with customs. It's been at my bombay address ever since. I'll post a pic when I go back got a new phone and don't have pictures. And now  I also got myself a 250 quadcopter for fpv. Your goggles look sick! Can I come try them the next time I come to kerala? Instead of buying one maybe I can make your design.

Sure thing! Just let me know. Buying one or even importing is a fleece job considering what you get for the price.

About the goggles, it might need one more ski goggles to perfect eye relief but i got adjusted to it now & no eyepains even after 45 minutes. The current adjustment might not work for all.

My next RC will be a 250 fpv quad too, whenever that happens. Do share the custom issue if you can.

If im not doing a diy goggles. I would be going for the quanum v2 to start off with. and maybe get the fatsharks by the end of this year.
image ru
how to screen capture

V2 seems like a good deal with proper resolution non BS screen but at ~5k, it's some 2k more than DIY which barely touches 5k with all electronics included. If it wasn't for the BG snowflakes screen, it would've been even less. Still go for it if you have  the electronic bits already.

I had eye for the 450 quads once but now it's all 250. I like your build, you have a thread for it? I'll be picking the 1806 motors on emax CF frame.

No build log but here are the specs.

Emax nighthawk 250 clone cf frame
4 x Cobra 2204 2300kv motors ( came with the sunnysky 2204 2300kv motors)
4 x emax 12A esc, fried 2 of them. (Going to replace them with the Little Bees 20a esc this week)
and a Flip 32 6DOF fc (Naze acro clone)

Looking to get the fpv  setup this month.

What fpv specs are you planning? The emax cam i'm using can do great night runs. Another is the tiny runcam owl which was originally planned for the truck.

Im looking at this kit.
http://www.quadkopters.com/product/fpv-kit-and-accessories/fpv-kit-mini-5-8ghz-600mw-32ch-txrx-with-mini-600tvl-camera/
comes with a 600tvl cam.

Night vision complete, plus remote switching.

IR 5W 820nm LED x1
Buck converter @1.4v
4 ch remote switch board

Now it can go on the prowl at night without any lights on. IR illumination is more than double compared to normal headlights & responds well with cam's NV mode. Remote switch is working as expected in self locking mode with enough range so far. It controls FPV, NV mode, headlights & IR led. Yet to test full range .

Cool

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Micro Minimosd
MWOSD 1.6 standalone
Voltage, timer presently
Current planned

Amazing

Got a new beater body for the truck. Fits quite well after some trimming.

Looking Awesome...............👍👍👍👍

Thats a great crawler.  I also have one fully modified with gmade r1 chassis now and 6 ch radio control motors also swap with torque ones.

nice crawler u got there bro. . mine is modified with gmade r1 chassis

Awesome job!!! Sub'd

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Dusted out the old rig and it's still alive. Redid a few areas and made a quick night run. Cam in IR mode & IR LED activated. It's quite dark out there in the yard, save for a couple of streetlights.  The image on CRT is much cleaner in person, it's just hard to capture on video properly. The batteries are quite old but they still lasted 45 mins on full load before beeping.