Posted: 8/24/16
This is one of the first RTR version's of Axial Yeti SCORE Trophy Trucks out to the public. I have had this truck since October 24th 2015.
The very first run Dominic Longoria and I took it to a local race track and did a short video.
This truck has been run a lot, I stopped counting after 48 battery packs. It has been a blast.
Its been jumped, crashed, kind of abused. Hundreds of people have drove this very truck! It has been to a few events as a demo truck for people to drive, before it was released to market.
It was driven by some random people and a few 1:1 MINT400 drivers. So it has some miles on it for sure. I have had a servo horn screw back out and then in the month of May it took a 10-foot drop breaking the first part. So it has seen seven months of total abuse. If you drive hard or abuse your trucks, parts will break and you may get away with it once or twice, but its flirting with the breaking point. I have heard people say these are designed to be abused so they shouldn't break... Umm, I disagree and agree... While I do agree this rig is designed for abuse, I don't agree that it shouldn't break. That would mean that some parts are going to be way too soft. Breakage is something that is going to happen. It's all a sliding scale as you don't want it too hard or too soft. This truck has been driven pretty hard by lots of people and it stayed together beyond my initial expectation. Its taken a lot of abuse and It took a big drop to break it.
So here it sits at AXIALFEST 2016. This truck has never had any maintenance done. I do not recommend this at all, but I am going for a true longevity test. The wheels have never even been taken off. Zero upgrades and none of the parts have ever been changed out.
While at AXIALFEST2016 Johnathan Schultz said it was dirty, I said its never been worked on. He took it as a challenge and stripped this bad boy down.
Transmission dropped out along with a few debris and about to be opened for the very first time.
Everything still looks good! I was expecting a completely dry transmission and some metal shavings. 48+ battery packs and tons of desert dust berms, I'm impressed!
It did managed to get some dust in the receiver compartment, but Las Vegas has some seriously silty areas, so I expected this to be a lot dirtier.
I think you can tell how much run time and or abuse this truck has seen! The control arms and pan tell the stories of all the good times this rig has given.
Again I am shocked, the front diff still has grease.
There is no visible damage when the front end is opened.
The internals of the rear diff still look really good. If you only knew how many hours of drive time this drivetrain has seen.
"It might be a racer thing," Johnathan stated as he took apart every nut and bolt to clean it. But I was also reminded of a rumor I once heard about Johnathan's father taking apart ScottG's rig in the middle of a race to help him. Something about half in the garbage and the other half in a cardboard box and handed back to him and their heat was about to start... so I watched Johnathan like a hawk! I want this rig up and running to continue this long term test.
It's down to the floor pan. Now comes the cleaning.
Some simple green, brush, and lots of elbow grease. This little venture has worked well into the night. Since we are at AXIALFEST2016 as part of the early crew setting up, we have a downtime in the evenings and we are just R/C 247'ing up!
Looks so much better than from when we started.
The rear axle is cleaned and put back together.
Transmission looks like knew, its hard to believe it looks this good after all its been through. It spins smooth, no squeaks, or noises.
Stock ESC, servo, and motor going back in.
If you scroll back to the top of the page you can see what a difference this is. One thing I will recommend if doing this, get new bearings before you do it. We replaced a few plastic ball ends, simply because they were worn and had some slop. Put shocks back in same position as stock, and I have added some 30 weight oil to the shocks, not full, just enough to lube them.
My thoughts on the Axial Yeti Trophy Truck.
I've really truly enjoyed driving this thing! It reacts and moves how I imagine a real SCORE Trophy Truck would. But hey, that's the fun of R/C! The rear suspension drop is awesome to watch in action! It handles well out of the box, I couldn't recommend this as a track truck, but I am not a track racer. The rear locker is fantastic off road, not sure if that's beneficial on a track. I would recommend a higher pinion for a little more speed. If you purchase this for kids it's plenty fast, 3S is the way to go. I have heard people are ripping the lexan bodies after a while, I had a wrap done on mine from SOR.Racing and you can see mine has not ripped or torn. Axial also has the Retro Bodies available. I have owned other trucks and you can only go fast so many times and jump so many things before you get bored. This is so scale I run it all over and don't lose interest. It's still fun because of how it runs and reacts as a whole.
It was definitely the "reset button" on 1/10 scale off road trucks in my opinion! When "short course" trucks came into the market there has been two groups of people who were attracted to the segment, but things change and transition as a natural progression. One group has almost transitioned back to what racing was prior to the short course trucks.
The other group are those who saw this as inspiration for the next step in scale progression with a live solid axle like the full size big desert racing machines called TROPHY TRUCKS! A Trophy Truck is NOT a short course truck! So thank you AXIAL for recognizing the difference and containing to appeal to the scale enthusiast!
While it took Axial a while to get here, it was a risky move as a business in the public face of R/C short course racing. It's been funny to watch as most want to categorize the Yeti TT as a short course truck, that it is NOT! This rig offers everyone that same chance to hit the "RESTART BUTTON" on FUN! This is just like what short course trucks did when they came onto the market. For the scale community, this is our truck and the Yeti SCORE Trophy Truck is a MUST OWN truck!
In Axial we trust, scale we must!
Just my opinion,
Rivas Concepts
