drive shaft surgery

[cteno4]

so a chap came to one of our shows a few months back with a kato 500 car where his kids were running it on top of carpet and it sucked in a lot of small carpet fibers. finally gummed up and stripped one drive shaft and totally sheared off the other one. so i got him the part number and he was able to reorder the truck/drive shaft from kato thru katousa--took about 2 months to get here. he brought it by today to pop the new trucks/drive shafts in for him.

 

all well and good, but first we thought it was a pair of trucks in each package (all the other kato power truck sets ive ever gotten have been in pairs) there was only one... i had some spare trucks from previous repairs to replace the old one that was gummed up (could have cleaned it but it stripped its traction tire as well), but still one drive shaft short. unfortunately all my various tomix and kato drive shafts i have as spares, none fit the kato universal joints on this model...

 

but i realized there were two good drive shaft ends from the two broken ones he had so clipped them in half. then i just grabbed a little length of styrene tubing and kept drilling it out with increasing larger bits until it was just right snuggly fit the tubing. used the length of tubing as a coupler between the two good drive shaft ends. works great! tomix actually sells drive shafts like this that are telescoping, but the ends did not fit the kato universal joint sockets.

 

was also fun as the snapped drive shaft had the end still stuck in the socket and also the nubs had fused into the grooves in the universal joint socket, so i had to carefully carve out them out again. luckily was able to drill and carve it out to work as new.

 

so dont toss those old stripped drive shafts out! if you have a pair of good ends you can make a new whole one! also any extra parts keep them!

 

jeff

 

 

[keitaro]

nice Jeff.

 

I have been through and replaced a shaft before.

 

Mine was rather crude.

 

Got a pin and bent the ends and cut it to the right size.

 

doesn`t run as good as it used to but it runs allright.

 

doubt i will have to replace it anytime soon though lol.

[cteno4]

thats an idea, put an L in the end and then make a small hole in the side of the socket for the tip to grip. sort of what some of the micro ace drive shafts are like. only issue is getting the length just right as the usual socked and head design gives a mm or so play in and out to let the truck float and turn.

 

in the past ive always been able to get the proper shaft or use another one (tomix in kato and kato in tomix!) i have to replace the stripped one.

 

im just glad he didnt chuck the pieces!

 

i was starting to think about taking a piece of styrene rod and cutting slots in the end to make the + cross section to fit into the socket to see if that might work, but with the two good ends the connector was a lot simpler to make!

 

jeff

[inobu]

Calling Doctor Jeff! Calling Doctor Jeff! you are wanted in surgery room 5.

 

Good procedure.

 

Inobu