Not a big rig, more a small one, but couldn't see a more appropriate sub-forum. Anyway, I needed something civilian to pull the forklift trailer besides the military trucks. See
https://rctruckandconstruction.com/s...d.php?p=170566
[Side note: if images don't load, see
https://rctruckandconstruction.com/s...7&postcount=16 ]
Had more free time lately, so I figured I'd liven things up a bit here and do up some picture threads of my builds vs actually building. Might give ideas to the next guy, might stimulate discussion for good ideas to change up this build or for the next one.
Bit of background: I've been building things of many sizes for years, ranging from scale models to RC vehicles to a 1.5ton ride-on backhoe with working hydraulics. I hate hydraulic fluid.
This one was done as another sort of quick and fun build while I was avoiding other responsibilities (work, other projects, feeding the cats, the usual), but still snowballed.
Quick beauty shots for reference:
I like to mix up my builds with the amount of 3D printed vs fabricated vs off-the-shelf parts. This one has a 3D printed body shell, because I found some designs on Thingiverse, but you can get predone kits if you that's your bag.
I happen to prefer the older "Series" style Rovers to the newer Defenders, so printing allowed me to mix and match. Started with these two
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2739745
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2395001
and then added some accessories like the roof rack and such from those designs.
As always, start by drawing it up. This time the designs above are imported in, and then other stuff added to make it whole
Had to fiddle with the scaling to fit the drivetrain, and the tires aren't quite right, bit small in diameter and oddly too wide for vintage Rover, IMO. But if I go bigger on the tires they scrub up front and then I gotta lift the body off the frame and it snowballs ... so I leave it be.
The frame is just aluminum angle, with printed crossmembers
Drivetrain is Chinesium bits from Aliexpress. The axles and springs are actually metal
though I had to print up longer hangers for the leaf springs. Clearance was surprisingly tight in there. Amazingly, the little motor unit is actually two speed, has a spot for a 9g servo to shift between "fast" and "ohmygoditsgoingtocrash". Guess I'm used to my big military trucks which are geared waaaay down to pull their heavy trailers.
Spare goes on the bonnet as is only right, though the tires are a bit wide and it would likely block all of the driver's view. Again I take some license from the 1:1.
The body is painted an approximation of British Racing Green. With careful planning, the roof and other bits can be printed in other colors, no need to paint.
For instance, the grille is silver (-ish, as finding shiny chrome filament is actually really hard.) Took some doing, but managed to finagle a Land Rover emblem that is almost legible. As appropriate for the era and weird British regulation, the front markers are white (top), with amber turn signals.
In the back, there's turns, brake, and backup lights, plus one for the license plate. Because, you know, LED's =)) The headlights drive straight off the ESC voltage. The little LED's are driven by an Arduino, which allows for things like blink patterns, and also mixing the brake/markers (marker is dim, but brake is bright on the same LED.)
Up top has a light bar, printed from the design of one of the nice folks linked on Thingiverse above, with sockets added for 10mm LED's. I found that even though they're supposed to be directional, they bled a TON of light out the back and sides. Ended up painting them silver from the socket back, which mostly keeps the light to the front.
That's driven off a little MOSFET on an auxiliary channel, glued to the underside of the roof in the pic above, straightforward RC stuff. I *could* have set up a separate MOSFET driven by the Arduino, but KISS applied.
Same for the winch; it's Chinesium, with a little micro-ESC that runs off an aux channel and a three-position switch. Send it 1000, it pulls in; 2000 it pulls out, and at 1500 it stops. Bit noisy, but will actually pull the Rover straight up off the ground, like in "The Gods Must Be Crazy." ("Where's the jeep?" Points up into the tree sheepishly.)
Finally, has a trailer hitch, also off-the-shelf pot metal, and a light plug. I add the springs to the hitches so they can latch either onto a traditional tongue, as used on the utility trailer above, or around a pintle hitch as used on the military trailers. The lighting plug carries power and the iBus off the RX, so it's actually all 14 channels. So far my trailers only do lighting, with the exception of the HETS M1000, which is a whole other thing, but iBus would allow a trailer to have servos or actuators or whatever.
As with most projects, there are things I'd do differently if I had the chance to do over. Scale the dang tires right, make the body easier to get on and off the frame (pix don't show but it's a pain to align now), and do something with the windows. Could just put in black styrene sheet like I did with the HEMTT/PLS to at least hide all the stuff inside. But it was fun, and because it's smaller and lighter, it gets taken down off the shelf far more than the big military trucks.