12th scale pan cars are the original and purist form of electric racing in my opinion. Most of your 12th scale chassis's are quite simple compaired to a nitro or electric 1/8 or 1/10 scale car, so thiers not as many aftermarket parts needed. All standard electrics work in them. It is a very competitive and fun class to race! If you can get up to the Westminister HobbyTown on a Wednesday night or Sunday afternoon you can watch em' run most of the racers are very friendly!

Radio question for you guys...

Raced my 1/12th scale last night on a small carpet track (very tight racing)
The owner of the track kept telling me to turn up my dual rate (also known as exponential right?) - Did just that and I felt that the car got ultra-twitchy, is this how most of you drive your 1/12th scale cars? I drove another guys car and I could barely make 2 corners in a row with it...

Thanks in advance...

I normally drive with around 60% dual rate (however my EPA's are both turned up to 150% and then adjsuted from there, so its probably more dual rate in actuality than 60). I have an m8 radio btw...

As far as feeling ultra twitchy, it could be you might want to run more mechanical grip than steering throw, or maybe the otherway around. What car and whats the set up? since its hard to make suggestions otherwise.

Car: CRC Carpet Knife 3.1
Radio: Futaba 3PJS
Tires: Purple / Grays
Front Blocks: Angled
Springs: White
Caster/Camber: default
Center Spring: Silver, unknown oil
Side Dampers: unknown

Does that help with suggestions?

No, dual rate is how much the wheels turn, for example if you set the dual rate at 10% you couldn't turn the car in a barn and 100% would turn in a two foot circle, not real numbers just an example.

Exponential is the sloop of the turning versus input. In other words if you run a lot of exponential the first few degrees of wheel movement (on the radio) would turn the car very little but the last few degrees would turn it a lot. The total amount would be the same. People use exponential to get rid of twitchy ness on the straight away. About 10 to 15 should be max but most people I know don't use any with on-road cars because the steering is not linear with it...............sorry this isn't very clear. Do you get it?

Ted

OK you seem like you should be close, but how's about your clear up them "unknowns"

Caster- set it at 1 deg. -built at stock settins the associated guide has you around 2 deg.

center shock- rebuild it with 35 weight oil, if you got the car used go ahead and get yourself a rebuild kit and replace the plastic parts and o-rings

Side dampers- Losi medium hydro fluid or Associated diff lube... you decide which works best for you!

Dual rate- set it so you have just a lkittle more than what is needed for the sharppest turn on the track, any more and you will scrub alot of speed off!!

how much front sauce are you running? since thats huge, also what front springs?

however, from that description you probably are around where you should be (i would get a 17lb spring, either the CRC red or the Speedmerchant black and figure out what you are running for fluids, its huge set up wise).

I have been told by mulitple top 12th scale drivers that you dont want to run more than 5 degrees of expo. if you run more (and this is from my expeariance) it actually makes it more twichy, since if you want to move slighlty, its really hard since when you turn its nothing, nothing, nothing, then BAM it TURNS! lol

I do not know how good of a driver you are or how fast you are, however a fast car has a lot of steering that doesnt scrub speed. You want to be able to make most corners without having to let off more than just a blip, however not everyone can drive that way, since it requires alot of concentration.

Ways to take out the twichyness:
-Old style front end
-Stiffer front springs
-more castor (which is tough with a strut front end since the castor blocks are poorly made)
-higher front ride height
-less front sauce
-less dual rate
-less tension on the center spring
-slight amount of exo (try like 3%)
-Parma Bently Speed 8 instead of Ascari body (if you are running an ascari)


Really the best suggestion I can give you (Since i dont know exactly what the car is doing, someof the time if its twichy it could be a mechincal problem, not set up issue) is to find someone at that track who is really fast and ask them for help. I can try to diagnose the problem online and give suggestions, however it only goes so far.

Hopefully I was of some help...

I've heard some people say they use smaller wire for their 12th scale than 10th scale sedans. What guage should I use? I'm trying to fit a GT7 in my Quad12. I think I'm going to remove the inline diode and try to relocate it - any suggestions?

Thanks!!

Thanks guys, lots of fantastic information, I will go ahead and rebuild the center shock as recommended and the side dampeners....

I have CRC White springs up front on the car...

I am doing half front sause (Paragon) when I am running on the small track, maybe a little more then a quarter on the more flowing track I run on...Full rear tires...

And yes I did get the car used, so I am noting the setup as I work on various parts of the car, but the last two things above will get rid of all my unknowns on the car, so then I consider the car mine

Thanks again guys!!!

Stumper, Yeah when i wired my 12th up i did use smaller guage wire. Think it was 14awg, possibly 2.5mm. I usually use monster 12awg for my touring car.

You don't need monster mire for 12th as there is much less current flowing. For me this has a few advantages, lower wieght, greater flexibility with the power wires to the motor so less chance of stopping the rear pod moving, and more importantly a perfectly good oportunity to use up all that thinner wire that i have laying about

18 awg is fine

Hey Tiger, try this there is a setup here for the knife 3.1. http://www.teamcrc.com/teamcrc.cgi Just click on setups.

D,
I use the GT7 in my Quad12 and I use the wire that came with it, but I did relocate the diode...to my parts box. It is tough enough to find room for the capacitor, much less that damn diode. Seems to work fine in stock, modified might be a different story.
A Novak tech told me on the phone to solder it to the motor. I don't think this guy ever raced 1/12 scale.

D.P.

Unless you want some flames and smoke to go with that nice orange case, I would suggest relocating to somewhere within the car (and prefebly soldered to a wire that is connected to the esc).

the reason why its a good idea to run a small guage wire on your 12th scale (at least for the motor wires) is because the wire will act as a spring and will really mess up your handling.

DPowell- If you do not want to void the warranty of 120 days that Novak has with there electronics, then I would suggest running it lol. Also that set aside, it was updated for a reason dont you think you should?... Who cares what it looks like. If you care that much remove the shrink wrap and mount it to the side of the case, with 2 zip ties. Either way you should run it.