you can thank John Watkins from Australia ,my club Pres who competed at the Cactus who sent me the pics of the x7
the car looks good ................like to know whats under the body thats such a secret !!!!!!
will be asking him a lot about the car when he gets home!!!!!!
hope u got on well Chazz as John is a top bloke!!!:thumbsup:
i need a X7 now!!!!!!!!:drool::drool:

We did a good podcast with John; it has been sent to the WebQueen and should go up, with a big bunch of others, in the next few days. The WebQueen is very pregnant, so some times things take a while.

Good bloke, John.

I managed to see it body off at the weekend...I won't try and describe it though for two reasons:

1. I'm sure the guys will show us when they are ready!

2. I've never really seen anything like it before, so I'd only describe it wrong anyway!

I don't think that shorty lipo would be enough in a 4WD (at the moment)

hmm gonna go out on a limb here and back up a statement i made much earlier in this thread about the trransmission layout.

If you look at the gearboxes, they are very small, and if you consider the size of a B4 type diff gear, well looking from the pics from the side its hard to see how theyve squeezed a diff, idler, and layshaft gear in there.

I think both gearboxes ONLY contain a diff and layshaft gear, which would mean the belts spin backwards to a regular belt driven 4wd.

This would then allow the motor to be rotated 180 degrees from a traditional belt driven car, so the motor would sit in place like it does on the Cat SX3 (motor shaft facing the left hand side of the car).

This way, there is no need for additional gears in the middle of the car, and it also means the motor can be used to control the car in the air much better.

Same here, from a design point of view its rather interesting and well thought out. Just hope that some of these proto items actually appear on the car when its for sale to us lot.

When I was looking at the pictures closely yesterday I was actually wondering the same thing. It looked like there may be no idler gear in each gearbox which means reverse rotation belts. My way of thinking states that in 2wd we need to rely on some weight transfer from motor and gearbox rotation to help get weight either on the drive wheels during acceleration or the front wheels during braking but on a 4wd we'd want no weight transfer that isn't natural since every wheel drives and brakes. Counter rotating belts would help cancel out the rotation of the wheels to a certain extent and if the motor were placed near the center of the chassis it's rotation could be used to help chassis orientation in the air.

Keep in mind this is all opinion and speculation.

I love to see all the thinking and speculation :) I will say some of you are getting pretty close to the mark. Also, pretty much everything you guys are discussing (motor rotation, number of belts and placement, chassis layout, etc) has been tested by us over the last ~2 years, form the old "test bed" cars through what Ellis and I are running now. I am a firm believer in track testing ideas, rather than going from CAD to molds. Among other things, this is still the first whole car I've designed myself, and I very much want to get it right.

I know we come across as "teasing" with the no body-off shots, but there's of course a few reasons why. First, we have been changing nearly everything, and showing off the design last year or 6 months ago wouldn't represent the car we're working on now/going to be selling as the X - 7. Especially the electronics mounting room and weight distribution is much better now, and those are things that dramatically change the look of a car's layout. Second, I believe we've solved a number of issues regarding this drivetrain and chassis layout. It may sound slightly paranoid, but I'd rather not give competitors time to look/study/copy even before we're ready to release it.

All that said, I think we're getting pretty close. The new "v6.0" car solved a lot of issues we'd found with the older cars and had only one design flaw that needs fixing (I'll be honest, I bent the slipper shaft at Cactus. I had a spare and made a track-side hot-fix for it, but we need to re-design the supports as the spur/slipper assembly are too far from the supporting bearing at the moment).

It's been guessed/posted that they are 2-gear transmissions (diff and top shaft), and I think Chazz posted that it's a pure B4 diff inside, for parts continuity between all our cars. Small details I've been happy to share with people at the track but I haven't seen posted:
*The front and rear gearboxes are the same
*Pop a ballcup and pull 2 screws and the front gearbox comes out. 3 screws to get the rear one out because the left wing mount is in the way.
*Modular construction - the entire "rear clip" or "front clip" can be pulled off in 5 screws, much like an 1/8th scale car comes apart.

Paul's X - 7 was ballistic at ARCS Hobbies near Ashtabula, Ohio over the weekend. He finally got things together for round four Sunday AM, TQing the round by over 5 seconds on the only 18-lap run.

In the main it was clearly the fastest car on the track but was sidelined by the same problem as at Cactus, except on the other side: a front CVD stub axle broke. Wheel still on and rotating, but 3 WD now. We are looking into possible causes (could be too much steering throw!). This is why we test so much, as Paul says above. Yes it takes forever to get the car to you, but when you get it it's right.

[QUOTE=colmo;637895]+1. Are those front wishbones original, or from another car? They're huge! Are the diffs Team Associated, B44 or (N)TC3? The front driveshafts are also enormous...

This car looks the real deal, but I fear the cost will be astronomical with all that milled alloy and carbon fibre :S - maybe a case of 5 minutes of (wallet) pain, followed by several years of (racing) pleasure....


The gearboxes also seem to be delrin/nylon as opposed to alloy,as to wether they will be produced in alloy?

Also is it me or does the front appear to run two belts,seen through the window on the pic with the car facing you.possibly running a single belt fron the motor/slipper assembly,on one side then from the other side to the rear,still giving a two belt setup?
probably just my suspect eyesight!!

Still badly want one either way!!

They'll probably be moulded plastic, but you cannot machine that kind of moulded plastic, you can with Delrin/nylon, that's why it's used in most prototype cars from diverse companies.

Looks like it maybe a ladder brace running front to rear and up and over the motor,servo,receiver,esc etc as there's a similar piece of carbon on the right rear view

the arms r schumacher the chassie is flat carbon with 4 plates at the top like ladder frame and i beleave two belts and two b4 trannies with 3 gears!
i also beleave it may hav a splliter for front to rear drive bias???????

cant wait to have one ......as its looking good and going by reports super fast!!!!

here is the best body off shot i can show u .....you cant see much but dont want to let too much out!!!!!!!!!!!!
:o

It will be a CF car, which we will make in house, saving money for us and you. As with many other 4WDs, there will be a good few aluminum bits, so the X - 7 will not be the cheapest thing on the market. But it also will be far from the most expensive.

The transmission cases will be molded; Delrin is among the best materials to machine for precision parts like trans cases, thus prototypes from Delrin. The tranny mold will be made and run by the same company that makes our current 4-Gear trans; that is one beautiful trans so we expect top quality there.

We will mold our own arms. Current X - 7 prototypes are running Shuey front arms that have been heavily modified to fit.

Still not taking orders yet :lol: Im really looking forward to this, Ive already got my cash put away for it! Im currently running and loving my x6 :thumbsup: Keep up the good work guys.

Ellis takes 3rd at R2 BRCA national held at Robin Hood Raceway according to report here
http://www.rcracer.com/off-road-elec...honours-shared

E's 3rd was with his Gen 5.2 car. The 6.2 will be shipped to him this week and he should have it for E.P.R.

Paul ran the 6.1 at Cactus and found two small issues, which we believe the 6.2 solves. We think the 6.2 is a pre-production car.

In response to a question on RCTech about body-off pix, I posted this:

"There are some things going on in the driveline, engineering principles we have been working with since the very first 'test bed' cars, which make the X - 7 accelerate and run faster, and we don't want people seeing them. We keep getting closer. Ellis and Paul are both assembling their new Gen 6.2 cars as I write, and Ellis will run his in the National at E.P.R.

The 6.2 is, we hope, the last prototype. If it works as we think it will, next up is to produce about 10 of them for Team drivers and work out set-ups, gearing, etc. During that time we also commission a body, and then we're ready to send out R.F.P.s to the Supplier Family."

buy one when it comes out and then u will see whats under the body....

im hanging for this car!!!! after seeing BIG E,s car on video at the last round of the English champs the car has heaps of punch out of corners!!!!
also chazz we just had round 2 of our drivers championship and im glad to say im leading after the 2 rounds so fingers crossed for three championships in a row!!!!
the last round was held on a very slippery track and the X6 TQed the only thing i had to change was the rear spring the car was great!!!!!! u can find some pics of my X6 on my facebook page!!!

my X5 is still running strong but got smashed in the finals and had my car broken twice so was not happy!!!!:thumbsup:

speedie dads x5 chassie mod looks great!!!!!

And as u know the X6 is the 2012 stock Australian champion!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!:thumbsup:

Not heard of this, tell me more ;)

"X-Fiber"
https://fbcdn-sphotos-a.akamaihd.net...57477650_n.jpg

That looks awesome!
I still have many fond memories of my X-5 :wub, still my favourite ever 4wd. The X-7 ought to be a must have - if the benchmark performance is X-5.

The official name for that critter is the Carbon Fiver.

I haven't run it much since Cactus but I'm going to try to get it to the track more. It is a one-off to try new things with my machining. It was fun to build,

I just posted this on RCTech:

Ellis got his together in time for the last practice session at E.P.R. before the National next weekend, and pronounced it 'very fast, handles very well, and certainly is better than the 5.2 car I took 3rd with at Robin Hood.'

Paul finished building his Friday night, and was slated to go racing Saturday, but woke up sick from allergy problems. He felt a bit better in the late afternoon and took his 6.2 across the street to run a bit in a parking lot. 'It's very fast and looks a lot like a production car.'"

We posted several pix of the "X Fiver" on our FB page, http://www.facebook.com/XFactoryRC

The car looks absolutely awesome, and includes lots of very trick aluminum parts carefully designed and machined by Speedy Dad, + the custom-made CF. Dad's car keeps the basic X - 5 driveline but changes the idler location; because we know so much more now than we did when the car's chassis mold was produced, Dad's modifications work much better than the original. It's dialed, and the X - 5 Squared body fits too, along with most X - 5 parts.

With the X - 7 about to be released, I can't see a need to produce the X - Fiver, even if Dad had the time, which I doubt he has. So take a look on FB, because it is very cool indeed, and hang on for a great ride with the X - 7.

http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?s...1292903&type=3

Chazz, as I still have my X-5 (and a ton of spares) I'd really like to still race it... I only run on very high bite astroturf now, so belt skip would be a big challenge. It has all the belt roller upgrades, plus 3x home made rollers. Would it work for me if I moved the idler location on the std. X-5^2 chassis? (like Speedy Dad) And could you explain in more detail (pics too?) what to do please?

The X - Fiber is something Speedy Dad made on his own -- he has a router and a mill in his garage and loves designing and building stuff of all kinds. He also has SW on his comp. From what I saw at Cactus -- the only time I've had the X - Fiber in my hands -- it would be extremely difficult to change the belt path on the molded chassis to something like what Dad designed.

Dad started with a flat sheet of CF, so his problem was how to mount the components. Most of the mounting is taken care of by the molded chassis; Dad designed and built aluminum parts to do the work, and these aluminum parts hold the driveline. From my memory, you would have to tear out much of the center belt tunnel, then build aluminum parts at least similar to Dad's to get the new path. When you cut out the belt tunnel, you lose much of the car's stiffness, so you may as well cut it all out. Heck, just start with a new sheet of CF as Dad did! LOL

We suggested to Dad that he might be able to sell the X - Fiber. At the time, three months ago, he said it would be far too much work to make small batches of them, and the cost would be astronomical. Plus, he has a wife, children, and a job. No time or interest to do production of whole cars. That's our job...

If you want to do it yourself, I think there is a pic on our FB page of the right side of the car that better shows how the thing works.

So first of all, its called the Carbon Fiber. A play on words for my favorite material.

Chazz is correct. This will be the only one. I built it to learn more about my CNC machining. I will not offer it for sale. It will remain my personal 4wd buggy.

The idler location was done just to get everything in one small area. Moving it probably wouldn't have much impact on drivetrain performance.