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Building the Holiday Buggy 2010 By: Joe Anderson
Building the Holiday Buggy 2010 By: Joe Anderson
The Holiday Buggy has always been a unique radio control product. From it's simplistic design to the driver of a off-road buggy sporting a cowboy hat. This year brings new hobbyists something even more unique, the 2010 Holiday Buggy.
Now perched on the DT-02 chassis, not only is it easy to assemble but it will give you many years of driving enjoyment. This DT-02 is equipped with a 380 motor for old-school speed, but can be easily modified to sport a 540 type motor. This kit comes with plastic bushings, for better performance and battery life you can add ball bearings instead. It does come with a TEU-104BK Speed control for your driving enjoyment.
This article will take you through the build process of the new Holiday Buggy 2010, and point out some information along the way.
Step #1
Charge your Battery
Step #2
Front arms - take note of direction of arms and hinge pins
Step #3
Front axles- Take note there is a raised mark on the top of B1
Step #4
Front end- Note hinge pin direction and (L/R) axles
Step #5
Diff gear- Make sure you add enough grease to gears for smooth operation
Step #6
Counter gear- add grease to gear (and shaft if using plastic bushings). I am using ball bearings on this build.
Step #7
Gearbox- add grease to diff gear before assembly.
Step #8
Motor and Spur gear- add grease to shaft if using plastic bushings.
Step #9
Attaching motor- Grease smaller gear on spur only. use double sided tape to attach motor brace (when using 380 motor)
Step #10
Gear cover- add grease to spur and pinion
Step #11
Rear lower arms- Note hinge pin direction.
Step #12
Upper rear arms- Note hing pin direction. Add some grease out-drive shaft and match shaft to slot of diff gear.
Step #13
Rear axles- Note hinge pin direction. Add grease to wheels axles and dog bone pins.
Step #14
Dampers- Build 4 friction dampners (2 Front, 2 Rear), add grease to rubber tubing. You can also add oil dampners instead.
Step #15
Rear dampners- Note what site of the shock tower they are mounted.
Step #16
Front dampners- Make sure you use the metal tube in lower arm.
Step #18
R/C Gear- Check functionality of gear before mounting in vehicle.
Step #17
Battery Cover- Add sponge tape to front of chassis.
Step #19
Servo saver- Choose your servo plate for the servo manufacture you will be using.
Step #20
Servo adjust- You must power on servo and find neutral/center before mounting servo saver.
Step #21
Servo and Switch- Note Direction on both before assembly
Step #22
Steering Rods- Use calipers or manual to measure your rod lengths correctly.
Step #23
Install electronics- use double sided tape for ESC and receiver. Keep wiring free from moving parts and getting caught up.
Step #24
Front suspension- Snap rod ends to balls and mount front section securely. Use countersunk screws on bottom.
Step #25
Assemble rear- Secure Gearbox to chaasis.
Step #26
steering setup- Power on R/C gear so you can fine tune your steering to drive straight.
Step #27
Wheels- Tires are pre-mounted on wheels, for best performance it is recommended to glue tires. (add grease to front axles if using bushings)
Step #28 -29
wiring- place battery in vehicle and adjust wiring of car so that it does not interfere with battery removal or maintenance. Use provided zip-ties to keep wiring clean.
Step #30
Stickers- clean body and dry before adding stickers.
Step #31
Cockpit- paint cockpit. (Driver head and hat pre-painted)
Arms XF-15 (Flat Flesh)
Shirt XF-2 (Flat White)
Interior XF-1 (Flat Black)
Step #32 - 34
Lights- Paint as described.
Headlights
Front XF-3 (Flat Yellow)
Rear XF-1 (Flat Black)
Rooflights
Front XF-2 (Flat White)
Rear XF-1 (Flat Black)
Step #35
Rear Body Mount- add the shock tower extension for the rear body mount.
Step#36
Mount Body- Feed antenna through body and align body posts.
Mods
Mod #1 Changing 380 motor to a 540
If you want more power you can add a 540 size motor, per the steps in the manual. I would recommend that you build your Holiday buggy with full ball bearings, you will get better performance from the added power.
Required
540 type motor
Motor spacer(washer)
17 tooth Pinion
Remove old 380 motor (if installed). Place spacer on motor, and mount motor in rear gearbox.
Align Pinion gear and tighten (might be a good idea to use locktite on grub screw).
Screw the gearbox cover back on a attaching motor wires to ESC.
Mod #2 Front End
This mod will take us through a few steps quickly.
#1 We will be adding oil shocks from kit #58374. You can use shocks from any DT-02 but I said this one so the link has a manual for you to get part #'s.
#2 We will be ditching the top arms for adjustable rods. (Also from kit #58374).
3x46mm rod and your two rod ends (TB2)
Assembled with 33mm space between ends (See manual for 58374)
Parts needs to attach them to the front suspension. (See manual for 58374)
To do complete front:
Two assembled turnbuckles
BA4 x2 3x18mm
BA3 x2 3x15mm
BD3 X4 5mm
Snap BD3 in the ball ends ahead of time for easier assembly.
Assembled side
In order to mod the body (Patch the holes), I need to drop the front shocks that stick through the body. So instead of recreating a new Shock tower for the front, moving the top of the shocks to the next hole down, should be enough.
adding a 3x15mm x2 threaded rod to mount the ball end to on the lower hole.
Using a dremel plastic cut wheel and sander drum, I cut both tower sides down to the lower hole. Then you can add spacer X3 x2 and balls BD3 X2 5mm to each rod. (More parts from Kit 58374)
Another Shot of both posts cut, with shocks mounted.
I'm still testing out the way I want to finalize the shock mounts to bottom arms, so as not to rub or bind. I will update this part when I have mad my decision.
I added the rear oil filled shocks and turnbuckles to this DT-02 chassis.
You can see how the rear came together nicely.
Body work
The biggest complaint I have see on the Holiday Buggy is the fact the body mold was altered to allow the shocks to poke up through the hood, via newly added holes. I understand from a Tamiya Collector standpoint they hate to see something changed like this, so I wanted to give an option to those people.
Please remember this body is made of Polyethylene and is much harder to work with than plastics like ABS, Styrene, etc.. So to get a perfect fill will be difficult and should not be tried by most. This will require you to paint the body, which is not easy either. Please be careful when following the steps I outline.
First some info on Polyethylene: This plastic is made to be flexible and non stick, it repels almost anything that touches it. It is not effected by most chemicals and gasoline. This is why is it so suitable for use on Gasoline containers. It is also use for such things as Milk containers and plastics for Dirt bikes (Fenders and such).
Because of this plastic repelling most things very much like a teflon coating, we can not use just any glue or bonding agent. (Bondene, Plastistruct, Tenex 7R, CA glue, Epoxy, etc..) Tap Plastics does carry Poly weld, that is made to mend and repair Polyethylene Containers.
I won't go into all the specifics on the Poly weld as the Youtube video they have tells the story.
#1 We need to heat up the plastic around the holes we are going to fill, This you need to do as the video states and not so much that it melts the plastic. You can use the drip of water test to make sure you have heated it enough. Be careful as this plastic holds heat a little longer.
#2 Place some tape to the back of the holes underneath body to give it support as it dries.
#3 Using the syringe, squeeze out equal amounts and mix together, After mixed add mix to holes. It is good practice to add more adhesive than needed as excess can be sanded away.
#4 Allow at least 24hrs to dry.
#5 After allowing proper dry time, you can start sanding with the fine paper. This is not normal glue, I noticed it heats up quickly to friction then gets a little harder to sand as it changes to a bit softer surface. The trick I found that works is sanding for a bit and using either compressed air or canned air to cool the surface before sanding again.
#6 As you get closer to flattening out the adhesive, you should switch to fine paper as to not take too much off. You need to hit the complete body (Anywhere you plan on painting with the fine paper. After you complete that it would be good to hit is with the very fine paper.
#7 Remove your Painter's tape from the bottom.
#8 Just for extra support, I glued with the poly weld a thin piece of styrene over each hole. This will give it an extra layer underneath to help with impacts to the filled holes.
Poly Weld does not stick to Styrene that well so I would not think about cutting blanks to fill the hole and trying to glue them in, it will not be as strong as the procedure above that I have supplied. (You will have to trust me as I tested the glue bonded to other plastics, before trying and writing this)
Painting
Just as before the Polyethylene body will not except most chemicals, so you must use a paint made to adhere. Both Krylon and Rust-Oleum make paint to use on most polyethylene plastics.
These paints ask that you test on the plastic before painting complete item. So after I sanded my complete body with very fine sandpaper, I chose to heat up the entire body and sand it again. I figured with what the Poly-Weld tells you to do can't hurt in trying to get stuff to stick. Heating the plastic up is suppose to change the chemical makeup of the surface and allow things to stick better.
I chose to shoot my body in white.
After each coat I hit it with a light sanding, as I noticed this paint is not very smooth. I've got about 4 coats on the body so far. Do not forget to hit the underside in the wheel wells (but you must sand them first)
I hit the rear with normal Tamiya flat black that seem to stick well to the paint.
Lighting
So the stock fake lights will not cut it for me, so I have opted to create functioning lights from these blanks. First You must dremel out the front lens on each light. I will be using 3mm LEDs so I will use the existing screw hole in the bucket to mount the LED, By using my step drillbit to ream it out a bit the LED will fit nicely.
On the Round lights I'm using yellow lenses from the Ford Highlift kit(Rollbar lights)
For the square, I will start with rear lenses from the Mercedes Semi Truck kit. These will only need cut length wise tp fit.
Painted the bucket flat black and cover aluminum.
Mounted the first one.
Mounted both round lights.
Painted bucket flat black and cover aluminum.
Both are mounted.
Some pics of the finished body.
Driver painted.
Light'em up
Here they are powered up. I chose not to go ultra bright as I wanted it to be old school, like the body style.
We bring this build to an end at this point. I may pick up on this and mod it a bit more in the future, so check back to see if I have updated the build.
