TA05 Countersteer Setup

Last year my friend Sunny introduced me to countersteer drifting, but it wasn't until recently that I decided to give it a real try. With a countersteer setup the chassis' rear wheels spin faster than the front wheels, which transforms its handling characteristics to those of a rear-wheel-drive car. This allows for more countersteer to be applied while drifting. To achieve this effect, a smaller diff pulley and larger center pulley is installed for the rear belt, and vice versa for the front belt. So far I've only changed the pulleys for the rear belt:

Tamiya 18T pulley (#53989):
XRAY belt tensioner (#303071):
Tamiya 32T pulley (#50877):

Square Carbon Damper Stays

Thanks to my friend Sunny I was able to get a set of Square carbon damper stays for my TA05. I had been holding out for these in particular because the rear body posts stay in the stock location:They'll be on my car as soon as I get some CA glue to seal the edges.

Spool Maintenance

I've never been a fan of the steel outdrives that Tamiya includes with their spool for the TA05, so I replaced them with delrin outdrives (Tamiya Item #9804268) and aluminum sleeves (Tamiya Item #9804267) that are standard on the spool for the TRF415.

Before:
After:

Long Overdue Maintenance

Today, I replaced the belts that had been on my car since last June. They were still in pretty good shape, but they looked haggard. While I had the car apart, I also installed a brand new ball-diff with diff shields.

I cleaned a spot on both of the belts so you could have an idea of what they used to look like. The belt on the right had a run in with a rock at one point.

Team Excel belts installed:

Square TA05 Hop-ups

Yesterday, I installed some hop-ups on my Square TA05. I switched out the bushings in the steering arms for a nice set of ball bearings and also added some 5mm shims to eliminate play on the posts. While I had the upper deck removed I sealed it with CA glue.

Bearings installed:
5mm shims installed (Tamiya #53587):
Sealed upper deck:

TA05 Tuning

I changed some settings on my TA05 today, the most noticeable one being the ride height. I lowered the rear 3mm to give the chassis more steering response.

Tech Racing Torque Rod Set

I installed one more hop-up for the IFS today. It's a set of front and rear chassis torque rods from Tech Racing. Because this chassis is set up for drifting, I only used the rear torque rods. There is still a tiny bit of flex that comes from the center of the chassis, but the rear is now significantly stiffer than before.

Included parts:
Rear torque rods:

Test and Tune

Today my friend and I did some tuning on his TA04. It's a good chassis for drifting, and with just a little bit of tuning it becomes a great one. A while back I added some weight to the front bumper to help the weight distribution on the chassis (the majority being located at the rear), and today I lowered the front ride height to give it just a little more bite.