Tamiya Jeep Wrangler Project

Page 2: Chassis Upgrades!

Here is the pile of upgrade parts that I purchased before even starting the build. I wanted this to be a unique and spectacular Jeep given that I was putting all this effort into creating one from another kit. The bulk of the parts are from an Xtra-Speed aluminum kit, but I've also got some Tamiya shocks and stroke extension kit.

Here is a comparison of the nice aluminum CC-01 shocks with the plastic version contained in the kit. Honestly, the plastic version are fine but I required the aluminum parts in order to make my Jeep "ultimate".

The next thing to install was the aluminum 4-link "upgrade". You can compare before and after above. I was not very happy about these parts. Although they look OK, they have a much smaller range of motion than the plastic parts. This wouldn't matter if the suspension was otherwise stock, but the stroke extension link set requires the links to be able to drop down lower when a wheel drops into a pit. That is not possible with the aluminum links and therefore they effectively prevented the stroke extension link from doing anything. The other thing I didn't like is the bolt head which protrudes down below the lower links. This will hang up on rocks if I try to slide over anything.

Next up is a replacement of the notoriously sloppy steering linkage. Shown is a comparison of the nice looking new aluminum parts next to the original plastic parts. After installing the new parts, I found them to be absolutely terrible. Much worse than the original, actually. At this point I gave up on the Xtra-Speed chassis kit, removing the parts already installed and returning the originals.

The original CC-01 Wrangler came with nice (plastic) wire mesh wheels which are now impossible to find. I was able to get these even nicer aluminum beadlock versions from RC4WD. I also installed a set of real Goodyear Wrangler tires which seemed appropriate. As you can see in the comparison photo, the aftermarket tires are somewhat larger in diameter than the stock Pajero tires.

This upgraded rolling chassis ended up having nothing new except for the new wheels and tires and the stroke extension kit. I had to increase the ride height significantly to make room for the new tires so they wouldn't hit the wheel well or body, especially when turning. In the back I actually put shims under the stroke extension kit to lift the neutral position up about 1/8" (3mm).

These accessories from CCHand comprise a skid plate in front and a fuel tank in back. The front skid plate takes a beating since it is just sheet metal.

Phase 2:

Months after completing this model, I found that I was wishing this particular CC-01 behaved more like a crawler. In particular, the stock motor and gearing is way too fast for hard off road use which makes it difficult to go slow and crawl over obstacles. I solved this problem by swapping out the stock 27 turn silver can motor for an 80 turn from Yeah Racing. This dropped the speed by almost a factor of 3 and makes it a much better low speed machine, though at the expense of top speed of course. High turn motors also have very little torque so it is pretty easy to stall this one out. Not an ideal solution, but acceptable.

Phase 3:

The remaining problem I had with this model was the weight. Because of all the accessories I added, the rear sat really low and the rear tires would scrape on the body even on level ground. I tried to fix this by adjusting the collars on the shocks as far as they would go and adding a bunch of spacers under the stroke extension links, but even so it scraped going over even minor obstacles. On the left you can see the best I was able to get it even with all those adjustments. It was years later that I managed to find a part which would correct the problem. The result is shown on the right. It may not look like much, but that extra 1/2" made all the difference.

Here is a before and after view from the bottom. On the left you can see that the shocks attach to the side of the lower links behind the axle. The links are made of such a soft material that they bend and roll to the side nullifying much of the suspension height. On the right I've added the brackets which move the shock attachment points to a rigid bracket with many hole options to choose from.

Since it's pretty hard to even see the parts I added in those photos, here is what they look like.

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