Project: \BACKSLASH
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What
This is my Traxxas Slash. What would you have expected it to look like, a truck? How boring & ordinary would that have been? I already made a short course truck out of a buggy, so it only made sense to make a buggy out of a short-course truck. It would need to be not just any buggy, though, but one with explosive acceleration, more speed than it can realistically use, and the ability to jump really, really far. Oh, and it needed to look good doing it. Piece of cake.
How
I had a starting point, the stock Slash, and I knew exactly where I wanted to end up with it, so getting from point A to point B was an extremely straightforward affair.
| Need | Solution |
|---|---|
| Proper-fitting buggy body | Evaluated 6 different bodies, found 2 that fit, chose 1 -- Pro-Line Crowd Pleazer for the Kyosho 777. |
| Appropriate wing | HPI Hellfire wing mounts, Pro-Line high-downforce buggy wing |
| 17mm wheel fitment | New Era adapters |
| 4.5" diameter tires with sufficient contact patch for a RWD vehicle | Ofna Dominator MT3 Split wheels, Panther Komodo LP tires |
| Speed | Lehner Basic 5300kV motor, 11/90 gearing, Castle Mamba Max ESC, MaxAmps 4000mAH 3S1P LiPo |
| Handling | Losi silver front springs, green rear. Shocks mounted at the outer holes on the a-arms to reduce droop, increase damping & progressiveness. Big Bore shock caps to keep it all together. |
To attach the body, I removed all of the Slash-specific mounting apparatus and used the stock Rustler/Bandit mounting point on the rear shock tower. Up front, I used an old-style Stampede front mount (used 6 years earlier to mount a different buggy body) that I had all but completely trimmed down to just a flat-topped hoop I could mount to the front shock tower, and to which I added a short nipple of a body post (see this photo, which was taken later -- ignore the velcro strip). I also needed appropriate, short overhangs, so I removed all Slash bumper structures and installed a Rustler front stub bumper.
That's it. No completely unusable dual brushless setup. No scratchbuilt dual-deck spaceframe. Just the exact parts & minor modifications needed to get the job and get it done well.
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Why
The Slash chassis is already one of the most perfect platforms Traxxas has created in its history. It takes the balanced performance & terrain handling of the Stampede, adds length for more stability, applies toe-in, throws in large-diameter ball bearings at all four corners, beefs up to steel turnbuckles and transmission gears for durability, and even sprinkles in the Rustler's bellcrank steering for good measure. It gave me everything I needed out of a chassis, so there was no reason to go crazy with a total conversion involving needlessly heavy aluminum, thick ugly Lexan, or $85/sheet carbon. I don't always follow the rule of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it," but this time it just made too much sense to ignore.
For the skeptics...
'Nuff said. Also check it out in full-screen or low-bandwidth versions on YouTube.