Originally Posted by
gti5notrkt
Recently an on-road track opened up a convenient distance away and so after a 16yr hiatus I am about to pull the trigger on a new set of 1/12 equipment. I will be running 17.5T blinky and maybe a small amount of 13.5T on a 80x40 CRC carpet. I have already sourced;
Tekin RS w/hotwire
Revtech Putnam 17.5T with tuned rotor/ceramic brgs
Trinity D3 13.5T tuned
Sanwa SRG-HR servo
Fasst radio/AMB
I therefore am faced with two key sourcing decisions;
Batteries;
I see the brand name lipos selling for $60-80ea, 5400-6800mAhr and 50-100c. What should I be looking for 17.5T? I don't want to be buying different batteries for 13.5T. How many packs, 2?
Chassis;
Narrowed this down to the RC12r5.2 or Serpent L120 ltx. In the early 90's I ran associated and had a hard time with consistency. When is was fast it was a dream, but the tuning envelope was fairly narrow for a bottom half of a club race A-main type runner like me. I switched to a Corally SP12G and got a far more consistent ride albeit at maybe slightly less raw speed.
Are the Associated and Serpent equally easy to tune? Cost of the chassis is not the main concern. Durability and ease of tuning/maintenance is. I'm leaning towards the Serpent as I think the engineering quality is superb.
Thoughts?
Thanks,
Jon.
As mentioned you will need a booster or RX pack, personaly you will only need one batt pack but having a spare is not a bad idea. I have the serpent car and your correct the quality of the componets is on par with BMI and IMO those two are well above the rest in that department. But as mentioned all the kits on the market are solid and can win any given race with the right setup and driving skill.
One thought, as you've been out of the game for abit you were likely driving a t-bar car then and almost all of todays cars are a link style design. Like you I ran 1/12th back in the 80's and then dropped out for a while so going to link cars was a change for me that I really cannot get used to. Its not the cars but just that I like the feel of driving a t-bar car, thay are just more consistant for me. Thats whay I still run the BMI car more than any other car I've tried, and I've tried all of them except for the newest CRC and Speedmerchant; just food for thought.