THE crip cap (in tha car) mod....
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ph2t
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THE crip cap (in tha car) mod....
As seen in our Articles section...
I’ve been doing this method on a few cars now and settled on this being my standard for all my cars when increasing the range. With the method outlined below I can achieve 10 meters (approx 30 feet) indoors.
First of all, here’s my stock MS 49Mhz with a Skyline shell and crapola antenna, it will be the guinea pig for today’s little exercise…..
Now let’s remove the shell and carefully prize the plastic pcb cover off. For all you Aussie Compact Char-G owners the pcb cover is actually glued so be extra careful. The M’Sizers don’t suffer from this, dunno about Bit Char-G.
Next, let’s locate the nasty 'lil bugger, you will see it outlined in red below. NOTE: This is in every car I have seen to date. Unlike the crip cap in the TX which varies at the best of times. Upon closer inspection you will notice that the solder work done on this surface mount capacitor is messy and not as clean a job as the rest of the circuit board. There are theories going around that TOMY added this cap after production due to the range being too good…..go figure…..
Prize open the pcb from the chassis CAREFULLY, you don’t want to break anything, especially little steering wires... This is done from the side OPPOSITE to all the solder pads that say L R B F V+.
Once you have opened the chassis up sufficiently, flip it over and secure it to your bench top using some plastic putty stuff, I’m using Bluetac in this example. You will need the pcb to be secure to give you the leverage you will need to continue…
Now, here’s the trickiest bit of the whole procedure. Make sure you have the capacitor in the grip of some needle-nose pliers, using a soldering iron heat of the solder pads on each side of the capacitor and slowly work it loose. Be careful to not damage other components close by.
Ahhhh, now isn’t that better? See below…. No more @#$%^ cap!
Look how bloody small the thing is, shown here next to a steering knuckle.
Now that the hard parts done, let’s add a new antenna. For those people paying attention I had removed it earlier. Shown below is some enameled wire (0.25mm dia) I’m using for an antenna, it works well for its purpose…..
Remember to always TIN your wire first to allow for an easier solder job when connecting it back onto the pcb. I cannot stress this enough.
And you’re done……
With the cripple capacitor removed and a new antenna added, we’re ready to hit the town.
Not without our crew though!
I’ve been doing this method on a few cars now and settled on this being my standard for all my cars when increasing the range. With the method outlined below I can achieve 10 meters (approx 30 feet) indoors.
First of all, here’s my stock MS 49Mhz with a Skyline shell and crapola antenna, it will be the guinea pig for today’s little exercise…..
Now let’s remove the shell and carefully prize the plastic pcb cover off. For all you Aussie Compact Char-G owners the pcb cover is actually glued so be extra careful. The M’Sizers don’t suffer from this, dunno about Bit Char-G.
Next, let’s locate the nasty 'lil bugger, you will see it outlined in red below. NOTE: This is in every car I have seen to date. Unlike the crip cap in the TX which varies at the best of times. Upon closer inspection you will notice that the solder work done on this surface mount capacitor is messy and not as clean a job as the rest of the circuit board. There are theories going around that TOMY added this cap after production due to the range being too good…..go figure…..
Prize open the pcb from the chassis CAREFULLY, you don’t want to break anything, especially little steering wires... This is done from the side OPPOSITE to all the solder pads that say L R B F V+.
Once you have opened the chassis up sufficiently, flip it over and secure it to your bench top using some plastic putty stuff, I’m using Bluetac in this example. You will need the pcb to be secure to give you the leverage you will need to continue…
Now, here’s the trickiest bit of the whole procedure. Make sure you have the capacitor in the grip of some needle-nose pliers, using a soldering iron heat of the solder pads on each side of the capacitor and slowly work it loose. Be careful to not damage other components close by.
Ahhhh, now isn’t that better? See below…. No more @#$%^ cap!
Look how bloody small the thing is, shown here next to a steering knuckle.
Now that the hard parts done, let’s add a new antenna. For those people paying attention I had removed it earlier. Shown below is some enameled wire (0.25mm dia) I’m using for an antenna, it works well for its purpose…..
Remember to always TIN your wire first to allow for an easier solder job when connecting it back onto the pcb. I cannot stress this enough.
And you’re done……
With the cripple capacitor removed and a new antenna added, we’re ready to hit the town.
Not without our crew though!
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TheFanMan
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CaboWabo
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excellent tutorial ph2t!
I might try this too.
one question though, have you removed this crip cap and kept the stock antenna? if so - what were the results?
picked up any transmissions from outside the universe with those antennas? lol
I might try this too.
one question though, have you removed this crip cap and kept the stock antenna? if so - what were the results?
picked up any transmissions from outside the universe with those antennas? lol
Dear Life Cereal, Where do you get off? Part of a balanced breakfast and delicious? Who do you think you are? By now you may have guessed I'm speaking ironically and have nothing but good things to say about what you do. Life cereal do not change a thing.
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ph2t
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Thanks fellas.... 
Cabs, I haven't tried leaving the standard antenna on man. Give it a go though, I believe you will still get an increase in range, prolly not the full extent without an antenna change.
Running one of these 'lil fellas in front of my cable TV unlocks the pr0n channel which is pretty good, lol!
ph2t.
Cabs, I haven't tried leaving the standard antenna on man. Give it a go though, I believe you will still get an increase in range, prolly not the full extent without an antenna change.
Running one of these 'lil fellas in front of my cable TV unlocks the pr0n channel which is pretty good, lol!
ph2t.
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cowfish_29
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hahahahaha! man, I'm so bringing my cars to thefanman's house next time i come...ph2t wrote:Thanks fellas....
Cabs, I haven't tried leaving the standard antenna on man. Give it a go though, I believe you will still get an increase in range, prolly not the full extent without an antenna change.
Running one of these 'lil fellas in front of my cable TV unlocks the pr0n channel which is pretty good, lol!
ph2t.
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cowfish_29
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dood, try it on a dead pcb first and get a feel for it...if it wern't for practice all my cars would be dead.TheFanMan wrote:WOW, that's awesome yo. I may have to do that on my car... unless cowfish says not to... like I said b4, I have problems with overmodding cars until they no longer work at all
oh, d00d i need that dead 45mhz car you got...you will see
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ph2t
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Some extra info....
Each car reacts differently. On top of this you can tune the varible inductor on the car to really tweak the reception, giving you a possible few more meters to play with.
EG: my 27Mhz Skyline Compact Char-g was 3 meters out of the box, now it's 9 meters. My 27Mhz MS RX-7 was 2 meters out of the box and now it's 10 meters. My 49Mhz MS Mitsu Lancer was 6 meters out of the box, now it goes 11 meters+ (longest distance I have in my house)
So you can see it varies. I've yet to tune the variable inductor on any of these babies yet...
The variable inductor tuning mod is AKA QFM's "tuning the POT" mod...
EG: my 27Mhz Skyline Compact Char-g was 3 meters out of the box, now it's 9 meters. My 27Mhz MS RX-7 was 2 meters out of the box and now it's 10 meters. My 49Mhz MS Mitsu Lancer was 6 meters out of the box, now it goes 11 meters+ (longest distance I have in my house)
So you can see it varies. I've yet to tune the variable inductor on any of these babies yet...
The variable inductor tuning mod is AKA QFM's "tuning the POT" mod...
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ph2t
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To paraphrase Micro_amps from the thread @ ausmicro.
"Ph2t, tuning the vari-inductor is a must when replacing the aerial. The car may still "stutter" in certain places around the house due to the Rx being slightly off tune and receiving reflected wave signals.
Heres how,.....
Put a rubber band around the Tx steering button and go for a walk, do it outside.
When the steering stutters, adjust th vari-inductance (the 'pot') 1/8 to 1/4 of a turn. If the steering stops working, turn it the other way.
Keep stepping away from the Tx and adjusting at the same time until you cant get any better.
Dont hold the car too close to your body, and dont have your body between the car and the Tx.
And dont use a metal srewdriver.
Once complete, you have tuned your new aerial, and should have better range and stronger signal reception when it is within range.
Simple and effective.
If you are going to put a longer aerial on then it is worth the time tuning the electronics to suit it."
How to remove the wax from the inductor....
"Just scrape it out with a small screwdriver. It pretty much falls out when you have a poke at it anyway. I dont bother replacing it afterwards, and havent had any problems with cars going out of tune."
"Ph2t, tuning the vari-inductor is a must when replacing the aerial. The car may still "stutter" in certain places around the house due to the Rx being slightly off tune and receiving reflected wave signals.
Heres how,.....
Put a rubber band around the Tx steering button and go for a walk, do it outside.
When the steering stutters, adjust th vari-inductance (the 'pot') 1/8 to 1/4 of a turn. If the steering stops working, turn it the other way.
Keep stepping away from the Tx and adjusting at the same time until you cant get any better.
Dont hold the car too close to your body, and dont have your body between the car and the Tx.
And dont use a metal srewdriver.
Once complete, you have tuned your new aerial, and should have better range and stronger signal reception when it is within range.
Simple and effective.
If you are going to put a longer aerial on then it is worth the time tuning the electronics to suit it."
How to remove the wax from the inductor....
"Just scrape it out with a small screwdriver. It pretty much falls out when you have a poke at it anyway. I dont bother replacing it afterwards, and havent had any problems with cars going out of tune."
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payaso
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I did that mod to my 45mhz Supra, and it gets about 30' range now.. That was about 11 months ago..ph2t wrote:To paraphrase Micro_amps from the thread @ ausmicro.
"Ph2t, tuning the vari-inductor is a must when replacing the aerial. The car may still "stutter" in certain places around the house due to the Rx being slightly off tune and receiving reflected wave signals.
Heres how,.....
Put a rubber band around the Tx steering button and go for a walk, do it outside.
When the steering stutters, adjust th vari-inductance (the 'pot') 1/8 to 1/4 of a turn. If the steering stops working, turn it the other way.
Keep stepping away from the Tx and adjusting at the same time until you cant get any better.
Dont hold the car too close to your body, and dont have your body between the car and the Tx.
And dont use a metal srewdriver.
Once complete, you have tuned your new aerial, and should have better range and stronger signal reception when it is within range.
Simple and effective.
If you are going to put a longer aerial on then it is worth the time tuning the electronics to suit it."
How to remove the wax from the inductor....
"Just scrape it out with a small screwdriver. It pretty much falls out when you have a poke at it anyway. I dont bother replacing it afterwards, and havent had any problems with cars going out of tune."
silla
payaso...... 
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"Imagination is everything. It's the preview to lifes coming attractions" -Albert Einstein
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Yagbols
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Stoli
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I took apart the whole thing and the antenna is soldered through the board itself. Tried to remove it to add a bigger one and now I get less range 
to modding these little beasts. There just too damn tiny. I'ma gunna buy a 1:10 scale beast to take apart.-
ph2t
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Payaso, do this mod then re-tune the inductor, you'll get an even greater range. 
Yag'ster, the antenna is the enameld wire for a reason, this wire can bend and bend and bend. I've had the car go under cupboard doors, couches, etc... and the antenna just bends to fit without causing the car to flip, spin, etc....
Stoli, that's sad to hear....What type of antenna did you add after removing the stock one?
ph2t.
Yag'ster, the antenna is the enameld wire for a reason, this wire can bend and bend and bend. I've had the car go under cupboard doors, couches, etc... and the antenna just bends to fit without causing the car to flip, spin, etc....
Stoli, that's sad to hear....What type of antenna did you add after removing the stock one?
ph2t.
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Stoli
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CaboWabo
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Stoli you give up too easy, I was like that too, but then after I got one mod to work - I was hooked again lol
this is pretty tough mod just because of the tiny soldering on the pcd - don't let it get ya down man.
you were complaining about prices for bits, just wait till you go 1:10 scale... and break something.
this is pretty tough mod just because of the tiny soldering on the pcd - don't let it get ya down man.
you were complaining about prices for bits, just wait till you go 1:10 scale... and break something.
Dear Life Cereal, Where do you get off? Part of a balanced breakfast and delicious? Who do you think you are? By now you may have guessed I'm speaking ironically and have nothing but good things to say about what you do. Life cereal do not change a thing.