Repairs for 2005 Andrews 30lber, Xhilarating impaX had taken quite a beating in its three competitions in 2004. The season had ended well with us taking the 30lb trophy at RCRA II in September but a  few things need to to fixed before heading for Motorama in Febuary. Checking the bot out we found that there was a lot of lateral play in one of the wheels, one of the belts was binding a bit, one of the two Lexan front wedge  supports  had split and finally the main power switch need replacing. One side of one of the drive belts has started to delaminate and fray. This is probably caused by friction when the belt rubbed against one of the guides. We  will order a new belt. The broken Lexan wedge support had split from the corner of a cut out hole. Careful cutting ensuring no sharp corners would probably have prevented this as  the sharp corner allowed cracks to form and propagate easily. The main power switch used to have a socket head screw epoxied into it so that it could be operated through a small hole in the top armour. At RCRA II this  came loose and we had to turn it off and on with a pair of pliers. The switch looks past saving so we'll get a new one. On closer inspection, one of the colsons has a big crack in it. This was probably caused by Totally Offensive at RCRA II. The rubber rim is holding it together  and we'll add some super glue and keep it as a spare. This hit may also have damaged this bush which then allowed the excess play in that wheel. The four wheel assemblies have been cleaned and repaired as necessery ready to go back on the bot. January 17, 2005 The new belt and Team Whyachi power switch have arrived. A set of mounting holes were drilled and countersunk roughly in the middle of where the old switch was mounted. The new belt has been fiitted and the switch secured using a couple of 8-32 screws. The new switch saves about 6 oz and we were already 8 oz underweight before. Might be  able to add more armour..... The replacement wheel really shows how much the others have worn. We may have to buff it down a bit if it affects badly how the bot drives. January 25, 2005 I decided to try to reduce the diameter of the new wheel as the bot would not sit squarely on all four wheels. I did it by hooking up the drive on that side to a 12v  Hawker battery and holding a file against the spinning wheel. It worked even better than expected and quite quickly reduced the wheel to a closer match to the others. The original ground clearance when first built was about 3/16" but three competitions and a lot of test driving on concrete floors and out in the street had reduced this  to about an 1/8". The front wedge had been lower when first fitted but was now almost scraping the ground and liable to be a handicap on anything other than a perfect arena floor so I ground the bottom edge  back till it was flush with the bottom of the bot. Xhilarating impaX has now been completely reassembled ready for Motorama. It drives as smooth as ever. The top and armour have been given a quick paint to smarten it up a bit. The "bullet holes" add a dramatic touch.  The stars on the top equal the number of wins so  far.