wierd clicking noise

[TBrock]

I am posting on behalf of a friend. He recently purchased a XXX-s and all things considered its a great car. Nice and quiet (TC3 racer me). A problem has occured and its got us confuzzed. when he turns, left or right. HTe care makes a loud clicking sound. almost as if the ackerman is too great for the drive shafts... try as we may we are unable to solve the problem....any help would be much appreciated.

[Doughty]

is he running the spool diff?

I have the same problem, but with the normal diff or the one-way in it is perfectly fine, even at full speed on full lock so its not the CVD's

If I cure it I will let you know what to do

[TBrock]

yes, he is running a spool diff. I must ask him if the noise was happening with any of the others, diff's that is.

[Simmo]

I had this same problem, make sure that, if or when you are using full lock - the inside of the wheel rim is not rubbing on the Shock mounting screw...
I think thats what it was, can't remember exactly. (dont have the car in front of me)

[Doughty]

the ONLY thing I changed to make it go away was going from the spool to the diff or one-way, in my case the wheel was not touching anything.

[TBrock]

So is it a fault with the spool or is it being tightened too much?

I have heard of a "clicker diff" or something like that...ever heard of it...is it not perhaps the same thing?

[Doughty]

I don't know what it could be, I am still trying to find that out.

a 'clicker' from what I know it as is(was) a device in the xx-4 and street weapon that allowed you to vary the amount of braking the front wheels got. was quite a good idea, this is no longer used in any of the current Losi cars, unless you say that the Rally Weapon is current.

PS - just to let you know, you must have your full name somewhere in your profile, its the rules of the board.

[TBrock]

ok...changes to name done.

Thanks for the info on the clicker....

Now lets see if anyone can give a definitive answer to the problem at hand...

[kriss]

Is the spool diff the one you get in the kit? If it is what is the diff called which cure's the problem as it is driving me mad!!!
Chris

[Doughty]

the spool 'diff' is the one that gives a fixed axel, IE there is no diff action, if you have the car off the ground when you turn one wheel by hand, the other turns the same way.

in the xxx-s g+ kit this comes as an option.

this is the only thing that makes my car do what Trefor described above.

with the normal diff (same as the one in the back of your car) or the one-way unit (sold seperately?) it is fine.

replacing the spool to fix this problem is not really a fix, you would have been running the spool for a reason.

hope that helps

[TBrock]

i think this spool diff came in the kit as an extra..and I would have to admit that neither of us has any idea why we put the thing in the car as we have no idea of the benefits etc.

10:1 we will just put the standard diff back...

still would like to know what caused the clicking though.....:)

[Mike Calver]

Sounds very much like the problem i had
Are you using ali c-hubs ???

I bought myself some fancy blue fastraxx ones but with these on there was a terrible screeching/grinding sound whenever i turned into a corner.
So these were binned as soon as i found out they were the cause.

Other than that it could be a whole host of things.

Small stone lodged in the motor

dirt in the belt and diff pully

wrong sized wheels,tires

shattered bearing

My cars been fine with all the diffs although my belt skipped under breaking with my spool.

tell your mate to give all them a try first
Mike

[Doughty]

The answer I have on this is that it is a problem with the CVD's running at high angles and that the spool diff amplifies this as it is a hard link for each wheel. apparently AE have this problem too.

with the one way, there is free running forward so if one wheel 'catches' a little then the other wheel(and driveshaft) can just freewheel forward.

with the diff if one side 'catches' a little on the CVD then drive is transfured thorugh the diff to the other wheel.

with the spool, there is no movement, it is a fixed drive. so any problems are transfured across the whole front axel.

when I refer to 'catches' I mean when the CVD is operating past its 'smooth' angle, ~25 degrees or so.

Thats why I think this is the case.

Chances are that when the car is on the track under load this problem wont be noticeable.

I am just waiting on a response on if there are any plans to improve this.

[TBrock]

Please excuse the delay in responding. Our ISP sucks!

Thank you for the great response! We have enough things to try this weekend, If we do find anything out Ill let you all know.

Personally I dont think the skill level involved will even notice the difference or benefit from running the spool instead of a normal diff.