The Everything RC Thread

[sanford12]

Don't know if this has been done before but looks like we have quite a few RC enthusiast so I'll start. Doesn't matter what RC your into. I have 7 trucks, cars and a tank, 4 planes and 2 drones. I've built 2 kits. A Traxxas TRX 4 and a Tamiya VW Sirocco. Both very nice kits. The rest have had some modification from slight to fairly extensive.


Here's my RC ground vehicle station.

The Sirocco

Why I got the Sirocco.

Airplane Video

 

[Chris Brown]

I was really into RC as a kid in the 90's. I had a Team Associated RC10 that I bought used from the local hobby shop when I was 11 or 12. Old school brushed motor, 27Mhz frequency crystals, NiCd batteries... After a handful of years the car fell into disrepair and I sold it to a friend.

Fast forward to 2010 or so and another friend of mine and I decide to get back into the hobby. On a nostalgia-fueled impulse buy, I got a 2WD Team Associated RC10B4.1 brushless RTR model.

A picture after my first repair, mostly stock aside from added RPM front bumper:


After a few months I had upgraded almost the entire car:


But I soon came to the unfortunate conclusion that, nostalgia aside, this really wasn't a great car for my purposes. It was just too fragile, a side effect of being designed to be as light-weight as possible for better performance while racing on the track. I don't race on the track though.

So I decided to take a different route and get something else I had always wanted since I was a kid, a genuine high-performance 4wd monster truck. I went with a Traxxas Stampede 4x4 VXL (Brushless).

Traxxas Stampede 4x4 VXL in stock form, approx 2011.


I really loved the truck and realized immediately that I should have gone with the Stampede first instead of the RC10. The RC10 pretty much became a shelf-queen at that point, although I still have it, waiting for that one day when I might actually go to a track...

This Stampede ended up being the last RC that I ever bought new.

In a very short amount of time I had the thing almost fully upgraded:

Oops:

 

[Chris Brown]

Over the years I upgraded so many parts in my Stampede 4x4, including all new electronics, motor, tires, A-Arms, shock towers, shocks, chassis, CVDs, controller, etc. I looked into my parts bag and realized that I had almost 80% of what I needed to build a 2nd truck, so that's exactly what I did, filling in the gaps with parts from eBay.

I used those two Stampede 4x4 for a while, but many of my friends were making the jump into larger 8th scale vehicles like the E-Revo. I resisted getting an 8th scale vehicle because I would constantly see my friends with E-Maxx and E-Revo have their cars break constantly while my trusty Stampede could just keep taking the hits.

I decided on a compromise. I converted my main Stampede 4x4 into a Monster Truck based on the Slash 4x4 platform. The Stampede 4x4 and Slash 4x4 platforms have almost full parts compatibility so this was a very easy conversion. The Slash chassis is much larger so it increased the size of the vehicle considerably. I went with full 8th-scale speed control and motor (Mamba Monster X and Castle 2200kv 4074 motor) and stuck an E-Maxx body on there. It runs on 4s LiPo. That is close enough to "1/8th scale" for me and still allows me to keep using all my common parts.



I modded a much larger fan onto the speed control heatsink so that I can run full throttle uphill through tall grass in the summer and still not hit thermal shutdown anymore:



And then I took the Stampede 4x4 that I had built from spare parts and fully upgraded that truck also, so I would still have at least one Stampede 4x4 that remained true to the Stampede 4x4 platform. It's running a Mamba Max Pro with a 2400kv 3674 motor, also on 4S LiPo.



Also did some creative mods to the Mamba Max Pro. The stock heatsink actually detached from the mosfets after a hard crash, so I replaced it with a much larger heatsink in addition to a bigger fan.



My friend had the carcass of an old 2wd Rustler VXL and sold it to me for cheap. I restored it and made it into my street car / speed run car, although it still does okay off-road also. Currently running a Castle Sidewinder SV3 with a Castle 3800kv motor, on 3s LiPo usually.



After that I built yet another Stampede 4x4 out of spare parts. The purpose of this truck is as a beater / loaner. Certain environments, like running the truck on the beach is really bad for the truck as both the fine grains of sand as well as the salt just cause tons of issues. Also, deep mud puddles in the middle of winter, etc. I wanted a dedicated truck to run in these environments.

I also got a Traxxas Blast boat, since I'm not that far from many lakes. It's a pretty basic boat but I rigged it to use a 2s LiPo with an external Low Voltage Alarm (stock ESC does not have an LVC) and it's a trooper. I can run it along-side my 17" Boston Whaler when we are out on the lake and it does a good job keeping up.

Fun hobby.

 

[sanford12]

I have a Gen 8 Redcat IH crawler that had a garbage front end and servo also the shocks and electronics weren't good. After those upgrades it was a completely truck because it was almost a completely different truck.

The Traxxas crawler kit was a great build that teachs you a lot. Nice to be able to pick out all your electronics.

The 40 to 45 mph typhoon is a hoot to drive. With that much power and four-wheel drive you can do a lot with that car and it's tough as nails.

The other fast truck I have is fun but not anywhere near as durable as the typhoon or the Traxxas.

I found when you add aluminum parts you might want to think where they're going because if you wreck that aluminum part is going to transfer all that energy into the plastic and winds up breaking things that might have survived if they still had that plastic flex

 

[devnull]

I have a Tekno MT410. Spent a ton on that thing, but honestly it was just the build that I was after at the time. Not many places to run something like that around here anyway.

I have one of the smaller E-Revos from Traxxas too. I also bought a aluminum chassis quasi-Revo that was built by a company that eventually was threatened by Traxxas for the name chosen and they made a quick exodus. I'll damned if I can remember the name now.

However, the latest venture I'd dug into is collecting glow model airplane engines. This a recent acquisition. It's the second iteration of the original four stroke engine from a major engine manufacturer. It's an OS FS-60 MKII. There are three versions of this engine. MKI - MKII - MKIII, with the MKIII being the most common. There are some MKII models around, but they're not easy to find. They come up on eBay occasionally. The MKI is the most rare. I don't think I've even seen one for sale, although I've only been collecting engines for about a year -- and haven't really made an effort to find one. That one will be expensive. These were made in the late '70s.




This is an OS FS-90. Not sure of the exact years of production. Later '70s - very early '80s.



Second generation OS-Graupner Wankel



Early Technopower II 5 Cylinder Radial



OS FS-120SP - a supercharged engine. the box hanging off the back of the engine is an actual roots supercharger. I have two, one new in the box and another that's never been run but no original packaging.



I have a bunch more. I typically only look for four stroke engines. I do have some two strokes, but that's not really where my focus is.

 

[devnull]

Dug out another SD card with some images.

I tend to try to find open rocker engines from major manufacturers. In the early years of production of the four strokes, most if not all engines were made with open rockers. Open rocker being there were no valve covers on the overhead valve engines. These are typically the most sought after of the collectable four stroke engines.

Enya 40 4C (from later '70s/very early '80s)

I fully rebuilt this engine. It was not in terrible shape when I got it, but it needed cleaning. I tore it down and ran everything through my ultrasonic cleaner. Somewhere along the line during shipping the carburetor and intake pipe disappeared too. Believe it or not I found NOS replacements. This is an example of Enya's first four stroke engines.

The exhaust appears to be glued into the head. I didn't try to remove it. Might some day, but I don't really care at this point.





OS FS-75

These are fairly rare. They were marketed in the US (later '70s) after they introduced the FS-60. For whatever reason the FS-75 was not as popular as the FS-60, and was pulled from production. They did not produce many.

I have torn this engine down since the picture. This engine could not have been run more than few times, perhaps for a breakin procedure. It was exceptionally clean aside from the typical bearing rust -- luckily the crank and everything else is fine. There is no residue on the piston or anywhere else.



Profi Cirrus 35cc V8

ok, so it's only a closeup of the area between the cyinders. heh. I haven't set up and taken proper pictures of it with the camera I use for these shots.

Very expensive engine. Wasn't really looking for one when it became available. Had to make the decision based on the realization that I might only get one shot at buying one.





Webra T4 80

I don't see many four stroke Webra engines. Have been looking for them, too. A few showed up on a forum I read, but you basically have to be constantly watching to catch them as they sell quickly. On US eBay I just don't see many.



I have a number of Enya 4C (four stroke) engines, but when I was scanning through the pictures I didn't notice them. They're in there somewhere. Maybe I'll track them down.

 

[devnull]

I was just thinking of something I wrote in another thread here about some of the stories behind these various engines I've acquired. Many of my engines were available because of a collector passing away. As I mentioned there, collectors don't sell.

I quite often have conversations with sellers regarding engines I'm buying. It's good to know histories if you can get them. One that I don't think I'll ever forget is about an engine I bought about 10(?) months ago. I saw a two stroke engine listed, and for whatever reason decided to buy it. I don't typically buy 2 strokes as I mentioned.

The engine in question is a McCoy engine from about 1960. It's not one of their better engines. From a collector standpoint, not worth much. (easily the lowest value engine I have) But I bought it anyway. I found out from the seller that he and his brother bought engines at about the same time. They were just kids at the time. The seller said he put his engine on a plane and used it. His brother just put his (the engine I have) on a shelf and never used it. He would oil it periodically, but never used it. It's in great shape.

The seller just seemed like he wanted to find a good home for the engine. It was representative of the memories he had. He didn't explicitly mention that, but you could tell. It seemed like it was part of the mourning process.

I'll keep this engine in my collection until the end of days for myself. It's not a value thing. Don't care about that. It just seemed like the guy wanted a good home for the engine his brother had.

 

[Mystic]

I, too, RC'd (along w/ my younger brother and a couple of friends) a lot in the early Seventies, interest petered out by circa '74 as I finished HS and prepared to go away to university. Never returned to RC toys but did spend time w/ military (recon oriented) RC gear... note NOT drones and especially not Kill drones, still a ways off from a role in the sandbox.

 

[devnull]

I, too, RC'd (along w/ my younger brother and a couple of friends) a lot in the early Seventies, interest petered out by circa '74 as I finished HS and prepared to go away to university. Never returned to RC toys but did spend time w/ military (recon oriented) RC gear... note NOT drones and especially not Kill drones, still a ways off from a role in the sandbox.

Out of curiosity, what RC gear were you using in your HS years?

 

[Mystic]

Out of curiosity, what RC gear were you using in your HS years?

We lived on Lake Michigan as well as very near to what's called The Wooded Lagoon (east and West portions) in Chicago's Jackson Park, so for us powered remote boating was the big thing. Our father had an interest in flying stuff, and w/ that we dabbled some, but under his watchful eye. But the remote boating wsa ours for the choosing when 'n where. It's been years -- 48 -- since I last did this stuff, but IIRC most of the boats were "inline" motored and to the best of my memory we purchased our remote boats from Sears, that catalogue and/or the "big store" in the Loop (i.e., downtown Chicago). I also recall having and loving the hell outta a remotely-managed Hovercraft. Also -- IIRC -- a lot of the boating kits we acquired were manufactured in Japan. That's about all I can remember. Hell, by the time I returned from university and just before I disappeared into the U.S. Military Industrial Complex for about a decade, all of our powered boats & related had vanished. Maybe grabbed by younger cousins alsways coming by our place, maybe packed into a long-since box by the old man, maybe ....? And so it goes.

 

[sanford12]

Not RC but it could be done

Went through Hobby Lobby the other day. They had Estes rocket kits on sale. Had a kit for 19 bucks that included the launch pad. Buy some engines and your in business for less than 30 bucks.

Brought back some wonderful memories building and launching them with boys. The look of delight on their faces and how proud they were of their rockets was heart warming.

We had a completion where my boys, brothers and friends got together and had a launch day. There was only a few categories like highest, most spectacular were the top 2 and I went after the highest. Built a 3 stage using either C or D engines. The tube was just big enough for the engines. Stood about 2 foot and was so heavy I didn't know if it would leave the pad. Couldn't test it because there was a good chance I'd never see it again. When lit my worry about being able to lift itself seemed well founded. It ignited and sat for for a second or 2 then slowly began to rise. Took so much of the first engine the second ignited about 15' off the ground. When the first stages weight was jettisoned it really started moving and when the 3rd engine kicked in was nearly out of sight and was quickly gone. Someone caught site of the chute. Landed over a 1/4 mile away. We did a check for light aircraft when launching the high fliers

My oldest got the most spectacular. We built an SR 71 for him. By the time we launched it there was a light breeze. At about 30 feet it heeled over into the wind and proceed to fly over a nearby cornfield doing slow rolls the whole way. It did look spectacular.