speedxl

I was about to post about that!

And the Novak was adjustable with a plastic screw driver. LOL!! Funny thing we would set it at 80% now it would be cranked up past the stopping point! :rolleyes


Adrian I swear someone is paying $100,000,000.00 to push for four cell, man you got answer for everything! Geeze boss!

Matt Howard

iTrader: (6)

those are current limiters, not voltage limiters

fathead

And the chassis we buy to race NOW aren't race only chassis???

People don't buy, 415, FTTC4, Xray, Mi2's to run around the street, they never were and never will be designed for that kind of abuse.


One thing is for sure, touring car is going to self destruct if something isn't done about the spiralling costs, and it's going to be sooner rather than later.....doesn't matter what the change is there will be people moaning and screaming.

I personally believe that 4cell could be the way to go for touring, but we all need to stop flapping our lips and go out and do some testing, not that it will matter, if we think that a bunch of loud mouthed internet forum jockeys is going to influence our governing body then we are all living in a dream world....

vtl1180ny

Well, isn't that part of the problem? The manufacturers are producing cars that do nothing to attract people to this hobby. I'd never run my Xray in the street, I have a Yok CGM and a FT TC3 that my son and I race each other with in the street.... Difference is, I've been in this hobby for a long time and I have had time to build up what I have...

Advil

iTrader: (19)

Last year during the carpet season the 4 cell discussion came up on this very board. I believe that Adrian was a proponent from the start. Well, some of the guys decided to ask for a class at the track. It was granted and the guys ran 4 cell mod. Results???? Two race days later there were no more entries. Looks like our locals that tried it said.....uhhhh, no thanks.

speedxl

Limiting current reduces the punch feel by controling the drive frequancy. Doesnt reducing the power surge"softer punch feel" make the motor run cooler?

tomdav

iTrader: (44)

Perfect. For me I decided to just go back to racing 2WD offroad. I've spent enough on RC in the last five years to buy a New Jetta and with disposable income shrinking needed to stop the madness.

We all want to see RC racing grow and prosper and in the end our wallets will dictate what forms of racing will survive.

Terry_S

iTrader: (3)

I make a living in this hobby and I also take part racing in this hobby. I have been racing in various classes for 28 years now and I've seen quite a few changes in that time! I started racing because I enjoyed it and it was fun, I still enjoy racing these days but I also get great satisfaction from being involved with designing and developing electronic products for racing. My motivation for working in RC comes from "I know I can do better" I know it's possible to make a product that's the best possible rather than just good enough, that's what I do, that's why I think you are right bvoltz when you said:

Quote: bvoltz
"In order to keep cost down, you make a product just good enough to do the job."

Well that's not what I do, it's not the way I look at it, maybe I'm wrong. I say make the best and then try to get the cost down to make it a viable product to sell. I believe the problems are also partly in peoples minds as Scrubb says. Maybe it's about changing the way we think, maybe even thinking more and not just following the latest trends and the hype. Those sales/marketing people have a lot to answer for!

What we do is a hobby but it's about racing and winning so to me just good enough is not the way to win. That's why I'm doubtful that changing things as fundamental as reducing the number of cells is really the right answer. I can see some advantages but also some big disadvantages, not least the change itself. What I've been saying and still say is as others have said - we need better products, more reliable motors and speed controllers.

I'll stick to the electronics as that's what I'm involved with.

Here's an example of what I'm getting at. I'm sure Rick knows what he's doing as he says the problem was not too much voltage/energy in the batteries (the reason put forward for making changes) but was his over aggressive braking which generated the heat that caused the problem. A speedo designer would say the problem was not Rick's braking but a weakness in the braking circuit specification. Braking on a speedo is just as important as the forwards drive. If the speedo had more or better brake FETs then it wouldn't get so hot, or at least not so hot that anything overheated and failed. A speedo designer could include protection circuitry to prevent damage due to overload it's simple enough to include, a speedo should not simply 'blow' or 'smoke' just because it gets overloaded and gets hot. If it does in my view it's a bad design (just good enough = cheap) with the correct FET spec and a good design it won't get too hot in the first place and if it did its best possible (and not just good enough) thermal protection would limit the throttle/power to reduce the load on the FETs. The result, no matter how hard the driver accelerates or brakes the speedo would not be damaged. It really is that simple. It's as bvoltz correctly said "I just do not get all this talk and the answer is a simple one" it's just something as simple as a well designed speed controller. As for the problems with motors I'll leave them to the motor experts to explain, maybe we just need better designed/better spec (and not just good enough) speed controllers plus better motors, and we should stay as we are with the number of cells.

Advil

iTrader: (19)

Perhaps a REALLY BIG CHANGE is in order. How about, instad of "Timed" racing we change to "Lap" racing? X-laps or 5 minutes, whichever comes first. I believe that this is an accepted race format world wide and could alleviate some of our current problems. hmmmmmm.......

MadMikeB

Terry_S - top post mate. All this debate about slowing things down because components are melting down doesn't address the fact that technological progress is driven to a large extent by component failure.

Where is design and construction improvement going to come from if every time we react to component failure by legislation as opposed to a rethink of the component design, why it failed, and how to do it better next time?

Mike

DerekB

Let's answer this question.


How many people have issues with Stock/19/MOD

I go to lots of club races and overheating/motor blowing up isn't an issue. Maybe we need to go back to 4 minutes?

I think we're making decisions based on the wrong people.

bvoltz

iTrader: (44)

Yes, I agree 100% with you..... The club racers want more time in the heats, they want lipo, they want the cost to go down... and most of all they want to be competive... by not tossing money to get it.... Some how people in TC racing feel that they have to buy speed.... This is the way it is down here in the south....

Personally I can see the points from the high end people, but they had to start some where... that is my bottom line point....

Look I get it, you will not win over night, I have invested a lot of time on the track, to get better. Newbie do not understand this about TC....

RTolle

This is the way I see this discussion. I'd like to start by saying that I've basically given up on cars. I've moved onto helicopters and to my surprise they are actually cheaper.

As much as I hate to say it the cars are just to fast. Abeginner used to be able to at least get the car around the track but not anymore. They are frustrated b/c they are constantly breaking or are being lapped by the same people over and over in a BEGINNER CLASS. If you slow down all the classes you allow for people to "advance" without extra cost and not only do you make the lower classes more friendly but far less costly. Any car currently on the market is outdated come december so who cares if they change designs. To those that say it's dumbing down the hobby how fast were they when you started. Think of how long it's taken you to learn what you know. u started dumb and are now above average but refuse to move on. At the end of the day your scared that you won't be top dog anymore. You try to keep it that way by making it nearly impossible to start at a low level. You can't dumb down the hobby. Even if the rules were changed to 4 cell you STILL wouldn't run mod b/c it's too fast. You'll find something that is equivalent to where Stock is today and there you will stay. Personally I love the challenge but I didn't feel I could better my skills in stock. I would rather not run at all then ruin it for the other people by bringing advanced skills to a beginner class. I moved to mod but couldn't find anyone to race so I talked a couple other quickly advancing drivers into a 5800 class. All of whom wanted to increase there skills. Granted this is 12th scale. As soon as stock became a race that anyone could win on any given day attendence jumped because it was fun again. As people got better they would also move to 5800. The cost was no different but the speed sure was. Sure I'd like to run no limit and so do the pros but you must all realize that sometimes you need to step back to step forward. Let's face it stock 12th on an 80 x 50 track with 8 to 10ft lanes is pretty forgiving. EXACTLY where stock TC was 5 years ago. Today stock is equivalent to mod from 5 years ago. You all know it. Quit acting like nothing has changed.

If special speedo's and super low turn motors did anything don't you think oval of all places would have been there done that. If aclass obsessed by pure speed hasn't found a 4 turn motor to be advantages I doubt TC would.

That's my 2 cents. Whether or not it means anything to you I don't really care. Racing just isn't what it used to be. It's too cut throat and serious for those looking for a good time. My helicopter is far more relaxing and challenging at the same time.

POOKYT

You will get even more "tracktime" in a couple of weeks at Beat the Heat in Memphis bro!!!!!! On our monster track in 100 deg. air and 145 deg. track temps, I'll bet we see a few meltdowns from stock up to mod!

Brant

Mongo

In six years of racing I have never smoked a stock motor. But this summer I blew winds off two stock motors. These new batteries put out some serious power. Gearing was no different they any other week.

But man... motors really screw hard before they let out that last puff of smoke out.