Toprace211/Huina 1550 upgrade

[jerry56]

Ok... So I've been screwing around with this for months and finally decided to get it done so I can move on to another project....
I wanted an Excavator that wasn't super expensive and that scaled well with my Tonka...
After looking around the internet "scale" was all over the place so I took a shot in the dark a while back and bought a TopRace 211 since it was like $80 to my door and already RC...sort of, I figured I'd take a chance.
https://i5.walmartimages.com/asr/4e4...d053fda35.jpeg
I didn't take a picture before I tore it apart...so that's it....
I've seen Cat 320s around the area (I think that's what it's supposed to be modeled after) and they aren't super big it seems to look right next to my Tonka...so I decided to make this thing capable of actually digging...I hope...
So the Journey begins...
First I tore it down...


Yes it's all plastic.....and the tracks are rubber....plastic gears....but we'll fix that




First I cleaned up the cab base


Then the track base


The plan is to epoxy a thin sheet of aluminum into both.... I figure the plastic,aluminum, and epoxy should give it enough strength to hold up to the digging I plan on doing.... I'm not going to be digging house foundations or sewer lines thru the countryside...I think it will hold up with a little care... If not then I spring $500 for the all metal version... all the upgrade parts I put on this can be swapped over to the TopRace 211M/Huina 1580 both are all metal...time will tell
The two plates are cut



And glued in... I let the epoxy "ooze" up around the mounting posts to help reinforce them a little ... first a test fit



These excavators come from several "manufactures" in China...TopRace,Huina,and a couple others they are all basically the same there are some subtle differences but overall they are pretty much the same so what you do to one "should" work on the rest...with that said I'll let the epoxy set up for now....

[Blender]

First pic being a box of parts

Now that you've handled the slew bearing mounts, what are the other areas that need to be improved?

[frizzen]

"So i got this thing... then it tripped... Here's a box of parts"
. That's a great way to introduce a project!

Can't wait to see how you stiffen up the rest of the machine and add motors / servos / linears everywhere

[jerry56]

Blender.... LOL...I'm keeping the plastic shell of the cab and the track assembly(for now anyway that may go to if it gives me problems) ..... and that's about it... the boom and everything in it goes, the slew motor and gear goes and all the electronics gone....
There are a lot of upgrade parts for these....
Yeah Frizzen I forgot to take a picture of it before I tore it apart... This was actually simpler than I thought it would be, it just took forever cause when the weather warmed up there was a ton to do around the house and in the yard....Now that were bumping 100degrees here it's time to head to the basement and get this wrapped up...

[frizzen]

I really hope it's going to be able to meet your design expectations with all your upgrades!

If it doesn't, there are some other ideas you could still threaten it with...
https://rctruckandconstruction.com/s...ad.php?t=13421
Franken-conveyer

[jerry56]

You Know.......
one of the plastic huina's and a Bruder conveyor belt might be a pretty easy mash-up

[jerry56]

Time to update this a little.....
I got the plate glued in and you can see the epoxy oozed up around the posts... These post are what I'll mount the new boom mount to....I got it off Thingiverse made by a "MrStas"....works really well.... anyway I have the floor reinforced and the mounting posts gusseted up and I'll drill them out and run m3 screws with a little JBweld up from the bottom so they should be a solid metal reinforced post


You also see the new slew motor....
I upgraded to a new slew motor,slew gear and 4 wire slip ring


Here's the new gear in place.. you can see one of the m3 bolts I ran up thru the bottom...

The slew motor comes on a 3d printed mounting base but because of the reinforcement I did it held the motor up to far... so I made a new one about have as thick so the gear would get full contact....
I'll get some pictures of the boom mount and update later....but that's about it for now....more to come....

[jerry56]

I had to find the pictures....
This is the boom mount as designed ....Well most of it.... it started to lift on the printer so I stopped the print that's why the boom mounting holes aren't done....I'll show you on the reprint...


I sits right in the original location and the cab goes right back on it....


I remixed it a little and cut out the part in blue.so I had the space underneath it and I clipped a little out of that inside corner to clear the new slew motor so it nests right in tight to the mount.

[frizzen]

Cool upgrades, i bet this machines going to suprise some people

How much power can that slip-ring handle?

[jerry56]

The wire is pretty thin and the description is lacking but similar slip rings are good for 2a per wire...my mileage may very...
They have been doing this mod for a couple of years now and 35kg servos used are pretty darn strong so yes it is a little stronger than most people think...

[Tgrzes]

Looks like a fun project! Having that 3D printing capability really takes your builds to a whole other level!

[jerry56]

I know, Right....It's just another tool and once your used to having it.....
I assume they are still around $200 for a ender3 and mine has paid for itself just in wpl and lego wheels.... I'm just a novices with it but I'm able to make brackets and basic stuff that I probably wouldn't do otherwise. I use PLA+ and it's a lot stronger than I thought, and since most of my stuff is more 1/16 it seems plenty strong for what I use it for...

[jerry56]

Time for an update....
The boom for this toy was plastic so it had to go.....I'm using a metal boom for the Huina 1580, it's a little longer but should be fine.... to replace all the plastic gears and drives I'm using 35Kg continuous rotation servos....Got them all from Aliexpress.... I didn't take a lot of pictures because folks like Wes Scheideman at Scout works RC and John Gibbs at Huina exclusive have been doing these for years and have some really good videos so I'll just give a quick overview of what I did...
This is the boom and servos.


These are the screw drives that you put on the servos....they are up-grade pieces for the Huina 1580


A straight on view of the screw drive and servo


The drives fit the servos pretty tight, all you have to do is shove the screw drive on then drill a hole thru the servo splines using the hole in the screw drive for a guide...
there are 3 lengths typically the long one for the boom, the medium one for the stick and she short one for the bucket....But then you have the issue of the bucket drive or the stick coming out ( I didn't use limit switches)
I bought 2 sets ( well actually a bunch of sets ... you never know) then use the two longest ones for the boom and stick and the medium one for the bucket.... you still get the full range but the screw drives can't come out because the boom comes to it's travel limit first....
You just have to pay attention and not over drive them or you will tear something up....I got steel roll pins cause simple m3 bolts don't cut it if you get heavy handed

I'll get a shot of the boom assy when I get it all together....

[jerry56]

Ok ...it's time to get rid of these rubber tracks....

I'm going to use the metal tracks for the Huina 1580....which by the way are the exact same size as the Bruder 963 tracks...
But that means the drive gear, idler, and the little "boogie" wheels have to be changed... so I decided to 3d print them... I'm sure they will wear pretty fast but if they do I'll print another set...
I used the dimensions for the 1580 small idlers that I found on Aliexpress... and just kind of used the tracks for the big idler width and diameter and the drive gear I just experimented using the Bruder 963 drive gear and a 1580 drive gear and just made my own...





The old rollers were soft plastic and were just two plastic wheels molded on a plastic axle with the roller part on the outside edges... I cut some m3 brass to make axles and printed the rollers to work with the new tracks which need the "wheel " part centered...so I needed to notch out the old roller openings



And here it is together...


I think the drive motors are going to be the weak link here they are just 130 can motors with a series of plastic gears for reduction....I need to think of a different system before these fail...
I hope to get some painting done on it and get is finished up here soon....

[jerry56]

Well I didn't get a lot of pictures before I painted it... I went with white and green....Only because I thought it looked good, Years ago in the D.C. area there was a company called "Acacia Crane" it was a small company they had 2 or 3 50 ton Groves Hydra-cranes (as they were known back then) and there colors were white and green. The company was so small that at one point when work got slow we had to "hide" one at the house so it wouldn't get repossessed... We lived off the beaten path and I got my first lessons on the finer points of crane operation...LOL....any way...
here are some shots of the boom and servos mounted...



I opened the servos and pulled the wires around and ran them out the other side so they wouldn't show....
I also only ran the white signal wire back to the receiver, the pos and neg I ran back to a power block so the servos aren't fed thru the receiver and they get a full 7.2v



This is just a simple "brace" I 3d printed, it keeps the servo centered and helps support the m3 screw that runs thru it for the screw drive end. It doesn't really take any force it just spreads it out along the bolt.

the cage is a remix of one "Dave R." did on thingiverse I cut it apart and added the light box at the top....and it gave me a place to mount a beacon...







I'll get some pictures of it together and some of my wiring mess this week.......

[Tgrzes]

Looking good!

[Zabco]

Very nice, I like your colors.

[frizzen]

That's looking sharp, and really coming along great!

[jerry56]

OK, here are some close-ups of the boom servos




I painted them a satin black hoping they would kind of visually disappear against the white boom....


The metal tracks look pretty good, now we'll see how the printed wheels hold up






So I finally took it outside for a test run....As you can see it's red clay but even at only 9lbs I was able to break thru it and get a full bucket of dirt...I think this will do everything I need or want it to do...








Here it is next to my other equipment, to my eye it sizes up pretty well, the 320 isn't a huge excavator so I think it looks ok with everything else








Over all I'm pretty happy with it... I know it has limitations it's mostly plastic but I didn't spend $500 plus another $200 for upgrades to a Huina 1580 and it's a far cry from the $1500 and up for hydraulic machines.
This is a fun hobby but it doesn't have to be mind blowing expensive... I probably have around $350 in this toy now....I enjoy building them and playing with them with in their limitations....I hope others will see you don't have to spend a fortune to play in the hobby....Time for another project.... I got some ideas....