HPI Nitro RS4-3 Build #1

[coldvod]

Here’s a pic of my first ever Nitro RS4! It was just stock, but ran great with the 2 speed. The Flareside body just does it for me. Wish I could find another..
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And here is my first shelf queen. I bought it this way, it was completely new
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Unfortunately ended up selling both for a hell of a deal. They say you don’t know what ya got til it’s gone..

I've got that body but it has a few rips on the fenders and the front bumper. i dont really use it much as i want to put a different body

 

[Defiant]

Installed this sweet New Era roll bar and put the factory color foam bumper back on

 

[Defiant]

Switched to foamies

 

[Chubaka]

Switched to foamies
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Got me foaming at the mouth.

 

[Defiant]

I finally got around to doing a proper wire tuck, and the final result is pretty clean!

Previously it was a jumbled mess of wires, I’ve been putting it off lol
Summary of things done:

Wire tuck
Added rechargeable battery pack
Relocated receiver and antenna
All new servo screws
Fixed brake and throttle linkages they are now 100% functional
New power switch
New steering linkage
Swapped out the Kyosho tank for a factory HPI fuel tank and lines
Aluminum tank mount
New front and rear body posts

Only a few minor things left to do before it’s 100% complete!

Tags: HPI, HB, Hot Bodies, T3.0, G3.0, Carbon Fiber, Graphite, Aluminum, Alloy, Titanium, RS4, RS-4, RS4-3, Nitro, Gas, RC, MST, Build

 

[TenTlover12]

I finally got around to doing a proper wire tuck, and the final result is pretty clean!

Previously it was a jumbled mess of wires, I’ve been putting it off lol
Summary of things done:

Wire tuck
Added rechargeable battery pack
Relocated receiver and antenna
All new servo screws
Fixed brake and throttle linkages they are now 100% functional
New power switch
New steering linkage
Swapped out the Kyosho tank for a factory HPI fuel tank and lines
Aluminum tank mount
New front and rear body posts

Only a few minor things left to do before it’s 100% complete!
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Tags: HPI, HB, Hot Bodies, T3.0, G3.0, Carbon Fiber, Graphite, Aluminum, Alloy, Titanium, RS4, RS-4, RS4-3, Nitro, Gas, RC, MST, Build

Where do you find the cooling heads?

 

[Defiant]

Where do you find the cooling heads?

I’m actually selling it if you’re interested

 

[Defiant]

I began swapping out all the shiny screws for black screws with purple washers. Also installed brand new HPI turnbuckles (old ones were cracking)

Later I added a brand new hpi Racing fuel tank as I wasn’t a big fan of the factory nitro 3 tank design - the fuel lines were too close to the gears.

I also added a front tension rod setup using Sakura turnbuckles

After the tension rods were added I messed around with a Sprint 2 rear camber link mod. After test fitting there noticeably less slop in the suspension

After that some brand new orange sway bars went on.

And I got so lucky to find a hot bodies carbon fiber bumper brace (bottom), been tracking one down for a year now..

Picked up a THS tuned pipe kit, time to retire the old CVEC..

Bling bling

The fitment is pretty decent, but am not a huge fan of how close it runs to the fuel tank. Thankfully the heat tape should help with that

 

[Defiant]

Scored some hybrid carbon rear uprights

New springs

Also a new cooling head (finally lol) and stripped the anodizing off the rear camber links
Here’s a massive photo dump

 

[Defiant]

I removed all the aluminum suspension arms and replaced them with new factory plastic arms. Saved quite a bit of weight doing this

I also changed the swaybar mounts front and rear to blend in better with the color scheme. The bright green just didn’t look rigjt

Added a purple tie brace while I was in there and put in new lower bulkheads

 

[WickedFog]

I remove all the aluminum suspension arms and replaced them with new factory plastic arms. Saved quite a bit of weight doing this

Wait. You de-blinged one of your builds???

Looking great as usual. Except for those red sway bars lol

 

[Defiant]

Wait. You de-blinged one of your builds???

I did that to nearly all of them actually, this car is much more toned down compared to how it looked on the first page. My other builds will show this later as well once I make some more progress and have something worth sharing.

 

[Defiant]

Shimmed the rear suspension it’s super tight now

Also, new HPI shocks!

 

[Defiant]

I picked up some HD (18SS) drive cups and purple swaybars

I began taking apart the front diff where I quickly remembered the front has a one-way diff and uses bespoke drive cups. So I opted to just polish them to match the rest
Before (right) and after (left)

I grabbed a brand new plastic housing (because I have so many) and dropped the freshly cleaned and greased diff into it with brand new bearings all around

I decided to label this one so I don’t forget

Buttoned back up with the new purple swaybar

Did the same with the rear. New housing, bearings, grease and drive cups

I also swapped shock springs so now I shouldn’t get complaints about any of the colors

There are about 3 separate hop ups left that I’d like to do to this car. Not sure when that’ll happen though as they’re somewhat low priority.

 

[Defiant]

The gearbox was in need of a full rebuild so I used this time to make it the best that it can be. Started by polishing the stock 2 speed shaft to a mirror finish

I also did the same with the clutch housing and put a new spur gear on

I went and glued some brake material to the pads, and also polished the back side

Finished it off with another new spur gear, new bearings, new brake cam and hardware and of course properly shimmed everything.