47LikesALPHA OFF ROAD ENGINES
08-27-2012, 06:38 AM
#8011
Just in case anyone had any doubt of the reliability of these engines, here is proof. I bought a used A352 about 3 months ago, went through it, everything looked good. The guy I bought it from said there was 3-4 gallons through it. I put a gallon and a half through it. Saturday at my local track, I noticed that the motor was very, very, very rich. I ended up leaning the top and bottom about 3 turns each. Why? The motor had very little compression. The motor made it through two 8 minute qualifiers, warm up time included and a 15 minute main and still ironically got decent milage. I did a one stop in the main. My lap time were only about 1.5-2 seconds slower than normal.
Motor goes off to Lance at Triton RC/RCRenew this morning for a fresh rebuild.
Motor goes off to Lance at Triton RC/RCRenew this morning for a fresh rebuild.
08-27-2012, 07:09 AM
#8012
I had some great runs at the RC Pro East Round at Cape Fear in NC this past weekend with my Alpha as well! The plan was to run my Z852, but apparently my rod decided to not play nice. The last flameout I had at Wicked Weekend was actually my rod opening up on me. Strangest rod issue I have seen, but anyway....the PSR was fine....but I had to run my backup engine. A modded S852....in my Buggy. Sounds fun right? hahaha
After struggling with too fat of a tune most of the morning....we just decided to run it the way it was. I was putting in some fast laps in the Open Buggy class, but it was still running way fat. I TQ'd all 3 rounds with a 1,1,1 and the hottest the engine came off the track was 192. Now mind you.....we had leaned the HSN @ 8 hours throughout the course of the day...and the LSN at least 4-5 hours. The temp fluctuation was @ 10 degrees....but it was running pretty well. Only had issues coming down the insanely long straight.
We made it work....might be the same problem Elliot is having....low compression. Either way.....ran in 1st the entire 25 min main, and ran out of gas on the last lap with half a lap to go. lol Had a great day though! Met some new racers, and we all cursed out mother nature together when she dumped 3 hours of rain on us @ 3AM the night before the race. So it was a muddy mess for Round 1, but the track came in nicely...and all the Alpha guys had a great showing!
Ryan Lutz was there with his mechanic Wes and dominated every class he entered, but we had a few locals that at least kept him in sight for most of the race. Ken Rand got himself a second place in Pro Buggy with his A852 powered Team C Buggy!
Some great racing!
After struggling with too fat of a tune most of the morning....we just decided to run it the way it was. I was putting in some fast laps in the Open Buggy class, but it was still running way fat. I TQ'd all 3 rounds with a 1,1,1 and the hottest the engine came off the track was 192. Now mind you.....we had leaned the HSN @ 8 hours throughout the course of the day...and the LSN at least 4-5 hours. The temp fluctuation was @ 10 degrees....but it was running pretty well. Only had issues coming down the insanely long straight.
We made it work....might be the same problem Elliot is having....low compression. Either way.....ran in 1st the entire 25 min main, and ran out of gas on the last lap with half a lap to go. lol Had a great day though! Met some new racers, and we all cursed out mother nature together when she dumped 3 hours of rain on us @ 3AM the night before the race. So it was a muddy mess for Round 1, but the track came in nicely...and all the Alpha guys had a great showing!
Ryan Lutz was there with his mechanic Wes and dominated every class he entered, but we had a few locals that at least kept him in sight for most of the race. Ken Rand got himself a second place in Pro Buggy with his A852 powered Team C Buggy!
Some great racing!
08-27-2012, 02:17 PM
#8013
Tech Apprentice
I have now put near a gallon through my A872 with 2090 pipe and 7.5mm stinger. It is around 120C after a hard run and my needles are...in strange positions. Performance is great though. LSN is 4 turns out from bottom and HSN is 1.25 out from bottom. Is this normal? No odd behaviour, no flame outs and nice smoke when hitting full throttle from idle. Outside temp 15C.
Last edited by flat7; 08-27-2012 at 02:54 PM.
08-27-2012, 03:22 PM
#8015
Lutz edition failure
Anyone had any issues with the Ryan Lutz edition motor? I just purchased one two weeks ago for the wicked weekend race in Ga. I did the suggested break in process. Had several people at the track including a alpha driver try to help me tune this motor and nobody had any luck. The engine seemed to have abnormally high pinch when trying to start the engine. While running full speed on the straight away the connecting rod failed and pretty much blew up the inside. I had to borrow a friends motor for the rest of the weekend.
08-27-2012, 03:56 PM
#8016
Tech Master
iTrader: (8)
Anyone had any issues with the Ryan Lutz edition motor? I just purchased one two weeks ago for the wicked weekend race in Ga. I did the suggested break in process. Had several people at the track including a alpha driver try to help me tune this motor and nobody had any luck. The engine seemed to have abnormally high pinch when trying to start the engine. While running full speed on the straight away the connecting rod failed and pretty much blew up the inside. I had to borrow a friends motor for the rest of the weekend.
08-27-2012, 03:58 PM
#8017
Anyone had any issues with the Ryan Lutz edition motor? I just purchased one two weeks ago for the wicked weekend race in Ga. I did the suggested break in process. Had several people at the track including a alpha driver try to help me tune this motor and nobody had any luck. The engine seemed to have abnormally high pinch when trying to start the engine. While running full speed on the straight away the connecting rod failed and pretty much blew up the inside. I had to borrow a friends motor for the rest of the weekend.
08-27-2012, 04:01 PM
#8019
This past weekend I had the pleasure to join a lot of Alpha drivers, Moto, Lutz, etc at the RC Pro race at Cape Fear. The track was awesome with what seemed like a 300' straight. I ran the F850 in Open Buggy. This was one race where I have seen the best performance with unbelievably low temps. All weekend long the Alpha ran great. Come main time I started 6th on the grid but moved to 3rd/4th fairly quickly. Pit strategy was bothering me a little but I left the call up to my pit man. He decided on 9 minute stops which would 2 stop me. No problem at all making 9 minutes running fairly hard trying to keep up with MotoGod.... An unfortunate bobble and extended lid time caused a flame out which popped the glow plug at about 17 minutes. After a plug change I went back out, frustrated and bummed but did finish. It was a great weekend and the Alpha F850 ran flawlessly with very minimal needle turning!!!!
08-27-2012, 04:22 PM
#8021
3/4 gallon is barely enough to loosen up most stock alphas. They normally loosen up in the 1.5 to 2 gallon mark when broken in properly.
They can be run on a track prior to that, but not all that hard. Rich tune and no full throttle sustained pulls ( such as back peddling the straight). Gotta let things loosen up a bit, and then you can beat the snot out of them. :-)
They can be run on a track prior to that, but not all that hard. Rich tune and no full throttle sustained pulls ( such as back peddling the straight). Gotta let things loosen up a bit, and then you can beat the snot out of them. :-)
08-27-2012, 04:28 PM
#8022
To add another note on runtime. My buddy was running an A872 in truggy. The clutch was slightly soft for the amount of traction Cape Fear had so there was a VERY VERY slight bottom end bog that I couldnt get tuned out. He didnt have any other springs so he just decided to run it. I called him in to pit the next lap at 8:45 as he passed pit lane. He decided to run another lap on top of that. At 10:45 he decided to come in for fuel and had right at 50cc remaining in the tank. At that rate he probably couldve pit at 12 minutes.
08-27-2012, 04:37 PM
#8023
You always ultimatly have to go by how tight the engine is before you go all out on it. There is no real way to go by how much fuel has been thru it. If its still really tight its not broke in yet.
Running an engine thats real tight and not broke in yet will usually end badly.
If you break them in slow and be patient the good thing is they last a very long time.
Running an engine thats real tight and not broke in yet will usually end badly.
If you break them in slow and be patient the good thing is they last a very long time.
08-27-2012, 06:31 PM
#8025
You always ultimatly have to go by how tight the engine is before you go all out on it. There is no real way to go by how much fuel has been thru it. If its still really tight its not broke in yet.
Running an engine thats real tight and not broke in yet will usually end badly.
If you break them in slow and be patient the good thing is they last a very long time.
Running an engine thats real tight and not broke in yet will usually end badly.
If you break them in slow and be patient the good thing is they last a very long time.
Out of the 10 or 15 Alphas we have had some lossened up after only a couple quarts and others took well over a gallon. Also ALWAYS preheat the engine to around 200F before starting untill the pinch is loosened up. The rod will thank you.