After installing my IRC Shocks and the mounting kit I moved onto installing my new steering servo, Savage X radio box and the steering servo. After talking to a few people and seeing what the general consensus was I opted for a HiTec 645MG servo. This is a higher torque rating than the standard SF2 servo that ships with the Savage 3.5. Its not the best servo in the world by any stretch but for the price its a good one and I eventually plan to move this onto the throttle and brake anyway and get an even better one (read more powerful and faster) for the steering.
Parkermarsh over on the HPI Savage Forum told me to get the Savage X Radio Box and now having bought and installed it I'm so glad I did. Its a 1000 times better than the standard radio box and makes working on the electronics so much nicer (and its a dead cheap upgrade too). Whilst I was taking this all apart anyway it also made sense to replace the standard plastic bushes in the servo saver with some decent sealed bearings. I bought my 6x10x3 bearings from Innovative RC at the same time I ordered my IRC Shocks.
The specs for this servo running at 6v are:
As you might be able to work out, I immediately ran into a problem. I simply couldn't get these servo saver mounting posts off the aluminium diff plate. I think I used too much Loktite!!! Anyway, rather than battle with this I decided to work around it thinking "Well if i can't get it off, its not going to work loose now is it!".
You can see in the image to the right the complete Savage X Radio box containing my new HiTec 645MG Servo on the steering and the standard SF1 on the break/throttle.
This box is a really great design that makes so much more sense than the standard Savage 3.5 box. In fact I never really got the radio kit sitting in the 3.5 style box properly. The design felt really half assed and bodged together to be honest. This Savage X box feels like it was thought about a lot more. In fact it made the task of swapping all that radio kit over a pleasure.
The cable you can see at the front is actually a charging cable on an upgraded switch which basically means I don't have to open the radio box or remove the hump pack in order to charge it. A small but very cool feature.
Swapping the servos over pretty straight forward and actually pretty mundane so I'm not going to bore you with details about the ins and outs of it. The only thing that needs a mention really is servo horns. The HiTec servo comes with a stack of horns ... don't use any of them!! Savage kits come with a selection of alternative servo horns for you to use, each manufacturer has a number (count of splines I think) and since the SF1 & SF2 servos are made by Futaba. The one that is factory installed is 25, HiTec is 24 and Airtronics/JR/KO/Sanwa is 23.
All that needed doing was to remove the horn the 645MG Shipped with and then install the number 24 horn that came with my Savage. Job Done!
Next up was the Steering Bearings upgrade. These are replacements for the standard plastic bushes that come with the standard kits. I believe plastic bushes are standard across the whole Savage range but I maybe wrong.
I've also heard from other users that when they have come to do this upgrade if the truck has had a lot of bashing already the new bearings may not sit in the housing too well since the increased friction in the system has worn the mounting positions too much to allow for a decent fit. Luckily my Savage is still fairly new with not much use so mine fitted really snug.
You can see the lower steering bearings in the picture to the right and the steering servo saver.
These are actually a set of bearing I bought from Innovative RC that I ordered at the same time as the Innovative RC LST Shocks and Mounting kit. You can order them from the IRC web site here. They are metal shielded 6x10x3mm bearings and are a really good upgrade for improving your steering and strengthening the whole steering setup.
Next up in the upgrade session was a Fastrax Center Skid Plate ...
Whilst I had the truck apart to this extent I decided to remount my fuel filter. Rather than have it flapping around at the rear by the rear shock tower it makes sense to put in the fuel line just past the outlet of the fuel tank. You can see this in in the picture below.
