Syncro Horatio's TLR 22X-4 Elite Build

[Horatio]

So, race day....

The 22x-4 was ready - but was I?

There was a decent turnout in both buggy and touring classes.

My rig next to the Sworkz - little would I know these 2 were going to have a coming together in round 1...

Track was laid and jumps were in place for the buggy classes.

Round 1 was really just a chance to get to grips with the buggy, in particular the 5.5t on such a tight track that everyone said would end in tears....

But actually - the 22X-4 took it all in its stride and I felt immediately at home with it against these seasoned veterans. Until....

The beautiful Sworkz took a tumble over the track markings onto the straight - at the precise time I was powering onto it. It was literally 1000/1 bad luck.

There was a sickening 'crack'. Stuff was obviously broken. Both cars retired.

Rear centre driveshaft had popped out, but bizarrely - nothing was broken or bent....how did it escape? Bearing in mind this is a very rigid carbon chassis. Then I saw the rear right shock - with a near 90° bend in it...

So, shocks off, attempting to straighten the shock shaft in time for my next heat....

Yep - Team Associated shock, thanks to Russell Thomas. After the next round, we fitted a matching pair of them for the rest of the meeting. I eyeballed the preload and lived with it!

Turns out the weight distribution was pretty much spot on.

The Sworkz on the other hand - not so lucky. Centre diff was destroyed. No spares. Both spare slipper clutches were on stop, so it had to bow out.

So technically, whilst I went on to qualify 2nd, with 1st place out of the running, I was on pole for the A.

The final was a very close run thing. I gained an early lead, but gradually I could see the gap getting smaller. In the latter stages of the race, I actually thought I had lost my lead on lap 25 - whilst hugely entertaining - apparently I had already won the race on the previous lap with 24 laps 5:01.81. I obviously missed the memo and was enjoying myself too much to care. Thankfully I wasn't penalised for carrying on.

Car was kept immaculately clean by magic elves!

Sadly, I had to remove the brand new Team Associated shocks and give them back to the rightful owner.

Later this week, I shall attempt to rebuild my beautiful TLR shocks with a new shaft and seal pack.

The very unlucky driver of the Sworkz donated me a vintage bottle of TLR 40 WT shock oil.

Shout out to SWRCCC. It's a great club.

 

[Peter V]

Chapeau for the gained results. And with those round-times. Also respect for the "staying cool" during repairs and maintenance.

 

[Horatio]

Chapeau for the gained results. And with those round-times. Also respect for the "staying cool" during repairs and maintenance.

Cheers!

You just do what you can and carry on. The car felt very similar with the Associated shocks if I'm honest.

It handled just the same. In fact, my race finishing time was faster than my qualifying time - and I had the fastest lap - 11.41 seconds. My average lap time was 12.56 seconds, so I need to work on my consistency. If I had been lapping at my fastest lap speed - I'd have been on for a 26 lapper.

Racing buggy on carpet is essentially touring car racing with jumps. The lines are quite precise. Each time you come so close to taking off a lower arm.

So, I need to get back into it, perhaps hone the car a little to my style of driving.

My steering, throttle and brakes were 'quite aggressive' and it would have been easier to find the consistency if I'd taken the time and toned it down a bit. But it was fun!

Brakes are insanely good - the car just halts quicker than my brain can process.

A squirt of full throttle, followed by freewheel (no drag brake) could take me from the start of the straight, all the way round to the first jump.

Tyres got better through the meeting. I only grip rolled once. Cactus Fusion 2 on yellow compound are excellent.

 

[Horatio]

 

[Horatio]

You turn your back for 30 seconds and - RC buggies have multiplied....

Here we go.....racing is extremely addictive...here is my Grandnephew's B7 Team....

 

[AggyMi]

Great to see the little ones getting involved, honestly so much in this hobby is a basis for fundamental life skills

 

[Horatio]

Great to see the little ones getting involved, honestly so much in this hobby is a basis for fundamental life skills

100% it is.

Hand-eye coordination. Problem solving. Mechanics. Physics. Electronics. Racecraft. Managing expectations. Etiquette. Socialising. Debating. Travelling. Making excuses.

It's literally all in there!

 

[Partydaz]

Great to see the little ones getting involved, honestly so much in this hobby is a basis for fundamental life skills

I've learned some new swear words while being in this hobby I tell you that and learned I can call inanimate objects some awful things if they don't do what they told .

 

[Horatio]

I've learned some new swear words while being in this hobby I tell you that and learned I can call inanimate objects some awful things if they don't do what they told .

'that MF tree literally jumped out and tripped my Truggy over....and that mail box has been trying all day to break my A arm. It was inevitable. The b@$t@rd!!

 

[Horatio]

B7 nearly ready for electronics.....

 

[Horatio]

More racing....

A heat of Minis - Batcave, Mardave and Kamtec.

My round 1 time saw me hold TQ - until round 2. That's when my pinion decided to take a vacation - taking most of the spur's teeth along for the ride.

Repairing this after marshalling took me to the 30 seconds before my next round. Whilst I improved, I dropped from from 1st to 3rd on the grid for the A.

During the final, there was a lack of Marshals. They seemed late arriving on the track. During this time, after the starting tone, I realised that there was no room for error whilst the missing marshals made an appearance. My third place on the grid was a blessing. Pole and 2nd had a coming together quite early on lap 2 which I managed to avoid and sailed into a lead of about 1 lap just by getting 11.5 ish second laps - 20 of them to be fair.

However, on my last lap, my front left wheel decided to fall off, which required me to complete the last lap on just 3WD. Incredibly, I completed the lap just 4 seconds off my usual lapping pace, resulting in another A final win.

Fastest lap on 4 wheels - 11.188 seconds. Average lap 12.101 - 3 wheel lap - 16.169 seconds!

Cracking day's racing that I'll remember for a long time.

It dawned on me that my pit table looked terrible, so I've picked up the following items...

Trying these hex drivers - CNC machined. Spring Steel hexes - £8 - because Teemu doesn't like you leaving things in the basket! They seem pretty decent. And they have big boots to fill - as I'm using them alongside my Hudy drivers. One thing I will say - they don't roll around - this is good thing.

Socket drivers. Again, these are pretty tidy.

Tool mat, with non slip base with a silicone heat proof parts mat on top. It has magnetic zones where I can place my flexible holders and a number of recessed areas for screws and parts.

It's a decent size - perfect for 1/10th and 1/8th.

Strategic use of titanium screws. And serrated M4 wheelnuts are on the way.

My TLR donor car is on the way, along with a custom painted body.

I'm still racing this TLR. Just because Horizon have gone all weird doesn't mean my sponsorship has to change! You're welcome, TLR. Perhaps just make sure my parts get to me within a month next time.

And Wheelspin Models - if you have 90% of the order that I've 100% paid for - send me my sh1t! I need it for race day. Don't hold on to it while the prodigal part makes a return to the Western world. I need the other gubbins, right now! Besides - I've pre-paid for postage - over a month ago. Perhaps future us can quibble over the hypothetical postage another time. Add the postage to my next order. Or else - there aren't going to be any more orders! In the meantime, your customers are missing rounds because of parts that are sitting in your pending tray, capeesh?

And I'll soon be pitted against a former World Champion driver, too. It's just a matter of time....

 

[Horatio]

Donor car with 2 additional sets of tyres mounted on yellow rims.

Shock package is slightly different, but they'll help get me out of a scrape!

 

[Peter V]

Very impressive. And racing against "a former world-champion" >> Heis 'former" so he has been beaten by another race-driver?
That wasn't you ........

 

[Horatio]

Very impressive. And racing against "a former world-champion" >> Heis 'former" so he has been beaten by another race-driver?
That wasn't you ........

I dare say he has been beaten by numerous other drivers over the years since his world title. But the point is - he's not just a regular Joe, and if I lap anywhere near his finishing times in 4WD MOD, I'm doing something right.

I've also beaten him a good while back at a National touring car round, and at a regional event in the MT class. We'll see if it can happen again, but even if it doesn't - I'll still be looking forward to meeting him again after all these years and to see if he still remembers our previous racing escapades!

Over the years, I've been blessed enough to race against 3 different former World Champions. Truth is stranger than fiction!

 

[Horatio]

Racing on the weekend went really well to be fair.

I gave the Azumi's a test to see how they compare to the Cactus rear. I'd say that once the grip came up, they were slightly higher bite than the Cactus, which has surprised me.

The extra grip at the rear has subtly altered the car's balance and I feel that the buggy is less aggressive on steering for the twisty layout we used for the round.

Altering the rear roll centre by raising the inner camber link up position up by 1 hole seemed to help a little. Either way, it felt quite easy to drive and the slight mid corner understeer wasn't slow. My 11.9 second lap was the fastest buggy lap of the meeting as far as I'm aware.

However, I was on for TQ - but my HW XR10 G3 did a flunky thing on Round 3.....

On the 4th minute, the ESC didn't like the voltage sag to 6.6v, so went into limp mode. TQ went out the window.

But we had 2 A finals - which with the LVC safety settings switched off resulted in 2 1st place finishes for the 22X-4 Elite. This brings my rig's tally up to 4 consecutive wins! Love this car!

The mini final was excellent and I'm very tempted to try a LMGT3 chassis. Chuck a mini body on and see if anyone notices that it's not a Batcave/Mardave or Kamtec.

The Team Xray driver was extremely helpful in getting my rig dialled-in to the track and was lapping at an incredibly consistent and fast pace with his XB2 26. His XB4 26 will be here soon. Can't wait to race him!

 

[Horatio]

And so here we go, track set up ready to race! The jumps are lifted after the buggy heats to make ready for Mini and Tamiya classes.

My TLR 22X-4 Elite was prepped with some interesting tyre combinations, ready for some tuning options depending on how much grip was required. It turned out to be a twisty track, with small jumps placed in awkward locations.

Former World champion was in attendance and in my heat for 4WD. Obviously I was dying to see how I stacked up. In round 1, I briefly got into the lead but unfortunately tangled up with a back marker. It seemed like I was in the lead on the track - but not on the clock.

It was an extremely challenging heat, with some of us lapping in 11 seconds, whilst others were struggling to get around in less than 20 , so cleanly passing back markers was key and on round 1, even the best of us fell foul to collisions...

Full names have been redacted, but you can see just how close it was between car 1 and car 2. I couldn't seal the deal, but I left the rostrum confident that it was doable.

Round 2 was cleaner, with all drivers improving their times, but the World Champ pulled out a 25 lapper!! Ooof, that was proof that consistency is everything. My fastest lap just 1/10th of a second off his, but my average time was just under a second slower, leaving me on a 23 lapper, still in 2nd.

I simply wasn't at that pace, and for round 3, the leader settles with his FTD and cleverly decides not to risk his buggy - confident that his time was good enough to stay on pole.

I on the other hand didn't do enough to keep 2nd on the grid - because car 3 pulled out all the stops and nabbed a crafty 24 lapper - 4 seconds quicker than I could. What a round! One has to conclude that when traffic reduces on the track, lap times improve along with consistency.

The final would see a DNF for car 3, due to spur gear failure. A real shame, as it was shaping up to be a really good race.

My race time was faster than my qualifying time, so whilst my winning streak has come to an end, I was happy to come second to such a good driver.

After the race, I was shown some great pictures of an HPI Baja trophy race held in the states and Ken Block Hoonigan appearance at an RC display held at Santa Pod. Our champ even met his wife at an RC event! Funny - my missus really doesn't like RC and at best she tolerates it just to humour me.

So, introducing my new Pitman......

I'm quietly confident that if everyone in my heat crashes, I might win next time!

 

[Horatio]

After mixing it up with TLR Vs Jconcepts wheels, Azumi Vs Cactus tyres with various inserts, I turned my attention to lowering weight, centre of gravity and reducing rotating mass.

Checking temperatures, I have concluded that 1 fan is more than enough. Another reason why it's a great idea to check your data logs.

Dropping to 1 fan has really helped save space and weight. Plus - less draw on my battery.

Next up: Lowered CoG. My ESC was mounted to the chassis using 3M dual lock. Replacing with 3M clear VHB has lowered the height by a whopping 5mm. Easy win.

The MOD bi metallic centre drive has reduced the centre drive line rotating mass by 50%

The pin cushions prevent slop and wear on the outdrives.

How much does this help?

Obviously, you still have to pilot your rig, but anything you can do that makes the car less edgy, corner faster and accelerate more readily - as well as brake more rapidly - will make your consistency higher.

I'm still rusty, but weekly practice is seeing me speed up, even though I'm old.

I'll take consistency over out right pace - unless I can have both!

There is no question that my rig is ballistically fast in a straight line, but on a twisty indoor circuit - the car's ability to corner harder is key.

Ride height has been lowered. But I also like to run a little rake - where the front ride height is lower than the rear. This gives my 22X-4 more steering.

I'm also running 2mm rollbars front and rear.

I can't fault this car. I know it's been around a while and TLR parts are tricky to source. But this buggy is oh so right.

It's definitely in my top 3 of all time.

 

[Horatio]

Lighter and lighter she gets!

 

[AggyMi]

View attachment 11190
Lighter and lighter she gets!

Get some helium in those tyres

 

[Horatio]