Current Wisdom on 1s Lipo 1/12th Scale
 

Hi all,

I realize that some of this is buried in other threads but I was hoping I could prevail upon some of you that have/are running 1s Lipo in 1/12th scale to help me understand some of the equivalencies.

Is it possible for a 1s Lipo 1/12th car to be on an equal footing with a 4-cell car running the same motor (I'm thinking 17.5 Stock) at the same weight?

If not, what formulas are working to try to equalize the Lipo and 4-cell cars? Does a weight break work or is "motoring up" necessary to create some parity between the Lipo and 4-cell cars?

I ask because our regional race series here in Western Canada is trying to come to grips with having both Lipo and 4-cell cars in the same class and attempting to find some parity between them.

Thanks in advance for any insight you can provide!

Cheers,
Mike

I have not run 1/12 with the 1C, but in oval, I had to motor up to keep up. Even the weight difference was not enough. Went to a 13.5 on 1C and it is the same as the 17.5 4 cell. I could see that in time the 13.5 will be faster. The 1C did not seem to drop off as fast for lap times as the 17.5 4 cell. In fact I see no drop off in 5 min while the 4 cell do if their batteries are not fresh.

John

The answer is there is no parity between the Lipo and 4-cell cars; I would suggest that your club adopt one way or the other. But if you must run a mixed class then; imo; the 13.5/1c is the closest to 17.5/nimh. Bottom line, a 17.5/lipo will be a touch slower, 13.5/lipo will be a touch faster. I guess that if you mandated a higher weight for the 13.5/lipo you could get closer, but the car would not be the greatest handleing ride.

There is NONE!
but, a local track here (NW USA) came up with a solution for the guys who still HAVE to run "legacy" equipement; 12th Sportsman= 6min, any/all above 'stock' type power(you've read enough here to know that means 27t/17.5)NiMh 4cell/single cell LiPo......for the 2009/10 season 8min guys, we're goin' ROAR 13.5 single cell.(PERIOD, no mixing anymore,done,over and out!) Including the ROAR weight breaks for these 'older' and 'current' cars.......You want to hang on to the good-ole-days? then you get to pack around the extra weight!

We also are finding that; The faster you can unload your old stuff to/on the rookies, the faster/cheaper it is for you to get on-board with the new gear.

just a side note...did you find as i have the over 200 threads (just 12th) started, that have been answered in the main "12th Thread".......

No Answer Needed, just wandering the Age-Old question; 'which is better?' Link or T-bar.......

There is no equal way to race 4 cell and lipo. The motor combo or wt combos do not work well and the corner speed vrs the accel points are so different it is a very hard battle.

We started testing early this year running 3 cell nimmh and single lipo.... Logically we run a 6 cell or 2 cell lipo in a sedan and wt equal we all have agreed they Are equal on the track. Well long story short 3 cell nimmh and single lipo are exactly that equal... And very easy to balance 3 cells in a tbar car so no reason to feel you need to upgrade a chassis just lop a cell off rebalance and have all the gains of lipo. Lower tire wear and all.

here are a couple vids from our 12th stock 17.5 mixed lipo and 3 cell nimmh. Club size track 36 x 60.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFyOVqN7oqI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKjS5Ii1yBo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0NB7q3NQb9k

Yoose guys didn't by chance leave out the part where YOU spend all/most of your time 'babysitting' 'high-end-competitive' nimh cells to keep them competitive did you?

Well, did you?

Sure,Get 'em in, get 'em hooked, then show 'em the 1.240+ batts they'll need.......

yes we can all agree lipo is easier, but quit trying to play like nimh is "all that work" because its not, I know you have read the other NW threads we have been saying over and over we install a Nimh, and never take it out for weeks. the new cells are not like the older cells.

I was concerned about parity between 4cell and LiPo last year... and even earlier this year. But I think seeing how keen people are to get away from 4 cell, 1S specific ESC's and programs, and the overall advantages of a light low impact 1/12th.... Few people are going to run 4 cell this fall/winter.

So I think the parity concern is less now than it was last year or earlier this year since the chances of someone running 4 cell competitively are pretty low. Newbies may run 4 cell just cause they have the gear, and really who cares about parity with new drivers, they are just getting the hang of it.

But... from our testing:

a 10.5T/1S = 13.5T/4Cell = 19T/4Cell. Top speed is higher on the 13.5 4 cell, but cornering is WAY better on the 1S 10.5T chassis. On a real open and sweeping course the 13.5 may walk past the 10.5T, but in any technical cornering the 1S chassis is far superior.

I don't know about 12th scale, but at my large outdoor asphault track here, we run a WGT class and we run the following together:

13.5 1s lipo
13.5 4c subc

The nimh cars are signifigantly faster, even given the weight difference. I don't know exactly how much faster a 10.5 turn motor would be, but I imagine it would make the two chassis very close in speed... certainly closer than they are now... but alas, we only run 13.5 regardless of battery.

Cpt.

Have someone ever tried 1C in mod?
Here in Switzerland we run 4cell with 4.5 up to 6.5 motors.
On a bit larger indoor tracks of course...

I want to try 1C now, maybe with a 3.5?
Will the 1C battery work for 8 minutes?
BTW: Rollout is about 35 mm

I would be worried about the ESC in mod 1S Lipo. Many of the current crop of ESC's are having a hard time in 1/12 mod 4cell on carpet, at least here in Finland. Last winter we saw a lot of ESC failures.
And when voltage is further lowered the amps are going up.

Sorry 'bout that Richie, I did drift off topic......did run br00d enerG cells last year and you are correct, charge 'em, run 'em, forget 'em till next week.

You guys should look at the IIC race coverage from Las Vegas on here and look at the live scoring from liverc.com.

That is an all lipo race, including Mod 1/12th scale 1c racing. From the look of things its working great for mod.

Steve

steve is correct, full fields of mod 1s lipo here in vegas, not seeing any problems, however seems almost everyone is either running a rcvr pack or voltage booster. i don't have a list of winds people are running but i will ask tomorrow