K'NEX Buggy With Independent Suspension

by K’nexFun in Living > LEGO & K'NEX

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K'NEX Buggy With Independent Suspension

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This is a K'NEX buggy I've been working on for a few days now. I got a lot of inspiration from various builds I've seen on Instructables and Youtube. I've come up with a fairly simple build that should be easy enough to follow. The end product is pretty sturdy, and the independent suspension is a lot of fun to play around with!

I also fiddled round with adding steering, but I found you have to sacrifice sturdiness in order to do so. I will, however, publish another Instructables in the future showing how to add front steering for those of you who are interested.

As I write this article, I'm already thinking of improvements and changes. I'll be uploading an updated model soon I'm sure. Please feel free to comment with any thoughts or suggestions!

Front and Back Suspension

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Front and back suspension/wheel mounts are identical. Build 2.

These are a bit fiddly to get together, but they are the hardest part of the build.

I used No. 30 rubber bands.

Body

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Pretty straight forward, the purple flexible rods are the same length as a standard grey rod.

Attaching the Wheel Mounts, Nose & Spoiler

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Slot the back wheel mount in and fix on the spoiler to hold it in place.

Do the same with the front using the nose.

Wheels

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I like to double up, meaning you need 8 large wheels.

You could use white rods though if you only have 4 wheels.

Make Your Own Improvements!

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Now that you've finished the basic buggy, make your own tweaks and improvements! Please feel free to share them for everyone!

As I said in the introduction, I found that steering along with suspension complicated things and made the buggy not so sturdy. It broke a lot more frequently. But if you come up with a simple and sturdy steering system to complement this suspension system, please please link me to your solution!

Note: If you build out the body of the buggy more, you'll need to use more rubber bands to hold up the weight.

Please feel free to leave your thoughts, comments and suggestions!