Complete novice needs advice
 

Hi everyone

Iv just purchased a maverick strada xb evo s (It hasnt arrived yet)
This will be my first ever RC car
Im currently looking on ebay for battery packs to get the best performance from my RC car, but there are so many im just completely baffled.

I dont know if i should get a 7.2v or a 7.4v

Plus what is mAh?
And the c number on the end??

For example 7.4v 5000mAh 20c

What does all this mean??
And what is best for the model i have purchased.

Any advice would be massivly apprechiated

Thank you

Paul

i would check out what ur local hobby shop has and talk to someone there that is knowlagable ebay is nice byt u can easily spent alot of money on junk most hobby shops carry good quality porducts that well supported by there manufacture

Hi....welcome to the madness!

Firstly, good advice to check out your local hobby shop (LHS) as alot of ebay stuff is junk...I'm not referring to your car though, as I don't know what it is.

Re: the battery situation...it kind of gets complicated. The current battery technology is LiPo, which are nominally rated at 7.4v...their real voltage being closer to 8.4v when full charged. The mAh rating is the capacity of the battery...ie the amount of charge it holds, or in other terms the amount of gas in the tank'. The bigger the better. Lastly the 'C' rating is the discharge rate of the battery...ie how fast the battery can supply charge. Essentially faster motors will perform better with packs with higher 'C' rating. All of this is a simplification on battery technology...it goes deeper but that's basically it in a nut shell.

You have 2 real issues though:

(1) Lipo's have been known to self combust if overly drained...when their voltage drops below approx six volts (give or take). The better ESC's have a built in feature calls a lipo cut off, which shuts the car down to prevent battery fires as the voltage approaches the cut off voltage. I'm not sure your car's electronics has this feature...if so, get a lipo. If not, get a NiMh pack, which still performs OK but is more resilient to abuse etc.

(2) If you buy a Lipo from ebay, some of the no name brands hve false ratings, so they seem cheap but you don't get what you're expecting.

Just my 2c, hope it helps, but do go down to your LHS for a better explanation.

Cheers,

Steve

howdy Paul -

welcome to the hobby.

If the car you purchased is this one: http://www.goradiocontrolled.com/aca...-rc-buggy.html
the website states that it comes with a battery. The website specs show a 7.2V pack, that would make it a 6 cell NiMh. Along with the points from the other 2 previous posts - I would also seek the advice of your local hobby shop in relation to battery / charger connectors. Most batteries online come with bullet type or deans plug type connectors. The listing of the maverick shows it comes with a Tamiya type connector. Switching connectors is not hard - but can be dangerous (battery short could occur).

Thanx everyone for the great advice and the warm welcomes!

Macavant, that is my car. It has actually got gold bullet connectors.
That said, i have decided to stay with nimh batteries after reading the above post about lipo batteries exploding lol
The trouble im having now is finding a good nimh battery that comes with bullet connectors, they all seem to have Tamiya connestors.

Iv just been looking online for hours looking for some kind of female Tamiya to bullet connector but cant find one anywhere other than ebay in aussie.

Do you or anyone know of anywhere online that either sells nimh batteries with bullet connectors? or a female Tamiya to bullet converter within the UK?
Or that will ship to the uk. AS many of you have suggested, my local hobby shop is a good place to look, i just aint had the chance to go and look yet.
Internet is sooo much easier lol

Ideally i want a 7.2v nimh 5000mah with gold bullet connectors

buy the parts needed to make the adaptor and solder it together yourself or ur local hobby shop can do it for you or a budy that can solder

Try TowerHobbies.com for the tamiya to bullet connector. I am a complete noob too and I ran into that problem. I am switching everything over to deans plugs (learning how to do it tomorrow). But im pretty sure towerhobbies ships to you over there lol. Good luck man im in the same boat as you too.

check here : http://www.hobbypartz.com/73p-sc5000-6-s.html