Champion Genes – Hot Bodies D8T

Middle
The build of the centre part of the chassis starts with the centre differential. It’s similar to the front one but of course offers a centre gear instead of a bevel gear. Different from the buggy the D8T’s centre gear is a 50T item (instead of 48T found on the buggy) to compensate the larger diameter truggy tyres.

The centre differential is filled with #7000 silicone oil. The differential attaches to one piece centre bulkheads that also house a two disc brake assembly. The brake discs are made out of nearly 4 mm thick glass fibre which promise enormous and virtually non-fading stopping power. When installing the brake cams make sure you put them in the right way around. We didn’t at first and wondered why the brakes locked on full throttle!

Located on the right hand side of the D8T is the radio tray. Steering as well as brake/throttle servo are mounted in the usual upright position to avoid complicated linkages. The battery box is large enough for a 5 cell hump style pack but care is needed when fiddling in the wires and plugs to avoid crimped cables. The best thing is to carefully secure the length of wires with shrink-wrap or cable ties and to place them beside the battery pack. The rest of the radio tray build is straight forward as the boxes offer some sort of channel for the wires of the servos etc. to make for easy and reliable routing of the wiring. Just make sure that you do not squeeze any wires when attaching the radio tray to the chassis.

The supplied clutch offers a 13T clutchbell, three plastic composite clutch shoes and medium rate clutch springs. The engine mount is a multi-part item with a one-piece base and two supports to mount the engine on. If you want to take out the engine for maintenance reasons etc. you just need to unscrew the upper part of the mount which ensures a consistent mesh between clutch bell and main gear.