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Hello

Im new to this website. Ive been collecting tamiya RC's for about 10 years now.

I recently acquired a Ford ranger from a colleague at work. it was in quite bad condition but I have wanted an SRB for a while so I decided that i would rebuild it as a runner sand scorcher. So far I have got a nearly complete rolling chassis made up of original and rere parts. Im using a kamtec radio box and converting to direct steering.

Im at the point where i need to think about suspension. The rear springs are ver hard and the dampers were in very bad condition. I was thinking about replacing the torsion bar set up with 55mm coil over shock units. I have seen some from Ansmann for

Haven't done it myself, but I can't see why it wouldn't work ... my only worries would be are the springs firm enough (it's a heavy car), 55mm sounds more like a touring car size, so have they got enough travel ... and that in my experience, Ansmann shocks aren't very good - they loose adjustment, and oil. Tamiya shocks will cost three times as much, but are much better quality.

Another alternative is to fit new seals or entire new re-re dampers ... and/or fit them upside down - they work just as well, but gravity will help keep the oil in

Welcome on board BTW

Thanks for the reply. I think they are touring car shocks, the firmness of the springs was also one of my concerns. At the moment i have the chassis built up with the original torsion bar and that seems too firm, although at the moment it has no electronics, battery, wheels or body fitted so its hard to get a real idea of what it would be like in use. There are some RC Channel original style shocks on ebay for about

Yeah Racing has a line of really affordable and good quality shocks.
They're oil filled, alloy, adjustable and usually come with different spring sets.
Bought the 60 and 70mm version (blue) myself. I think I paid about $20-25 incl shipment at RcMart.
So it would be worth having a look around... all you'd need to get extra is oil.

How long would the shocks have to be exactly?

The distance between mounting point centres is 54mm

That does sound quite short for a buggy (like Jonny R also mentioned) but that length shock (55mm) should be easy to find since that is the regular touring car (on road) length...
The ends (mounting points) of the shocks would be the main thing to look at - so you'll be able to attach them at all.

I'll investigate a bit...

What i meant was a shock that short will probably have a very short travel - 10mm or so, as you don't tend to get big bumps or any rocks on a tarmac track ... IIRC the deflection allowed by the SRB dampers is more like 20mm.

There is more room under the body to go longer (looks like approx. 15mm or so on the front, more on the rear), if you don't mind getting creative & raising the top damper mounts, 70-75mm shocks are into off road territory & should have much longer travel

Ive done a bit of searching on google and found a few examples where 55mm touring car shocks have been used. I might buy a cheap set to see how they are. if they're no good ill revert back to standard suspension.

The budget seems to be going out of the window as i've just impulse bought a ball diff and now im tempted by an aluminium chassis.

ill workout how to get the photos off my phone and the start a build log.

I am a little nervous about the shocks leaking. I've noticed that some people mount the shocks up side down, keeping the oil inside that way. But I am sceptical to the full function of the damping by doing so. Anybody tried it? Was the handling different?