Kid vs. Dad RC

[ZooMad75]

We got the cars out together just now. So far before I got the Rusty, the kid has put a whoopin on me racing. The Blackfoot (older than said kid in question) was no match for a fresh Bandit. So thinking I got the upper hand now with the Rusty we went out and I got it handed to me again. DANGIT!

At least this time it wasn't due to the older machine, but a partially charged battery. Having calibrated the ESC and charged the new battery before I thought I had him. We take off and mine is putting around with it seeming to be in training mode. I had half the speed of the Bandit. So I dink around re-calibrating the esc multiple times changing modes multiple times and it still was 1/2 the speed of his. Then a light went off in my head. "check the battery stupid!" I had the kid bring me his car for a quick heart transplant. Mind you this was after he t-boned my foot with his car at WOT. OUCH!

A quick swap of batteries and bingo, the Rusty was leaving a proper rooster tail of dirt and hauling tail like it should. Not to be a total killjoy I put the good battery back into the kid's Bandit. I figured I might as well run out the juice in my pack and get the steering trim dialed in.

So the kid is up 2-0 on me now. I've got my pack on the dis-charging station to drain it down and then I'll toss it on the peak charger.

I'm probably going to have to invest in a solid two battery at a time peak charger and another couple of batteries. That way we can stay out more. 7 cell....hmmm This is going to get expensive quick...

[newracer]

The Dynamite dual peak charger is pretty good, $70

http://www.dynamiterc.com/ProdInfo/DYN/450/DYN4033-450.jpg

[ZooMad75]

I saw that one last night in my search. I found a duratrax intellepeak on ebay for cheap too. I got a $20 bid on it. I like the one you found though because you can plug your DVOM to it and monitor the charge process. Worst case, I buy another $30 prophet peak charger like the one we already have.

[ZooMad75]

Oh and my BIL called to tell me he has a brushless Rustler coming for his son. We might be getting some racing action going down here. He's got an e-maxx too. Should be fun.

[ZooMad75]

We had a major bash session yesterday. Met up with my BIL and his son to see how the Brushless Rustler runs. His son just got a XL5 rusty like mine too. All total we had 4 flying around. Pretty fun. It was nuts to watch the Brushless truck fly. He was running it on a homemade pack of 9 cells from a couple of Dewalt drill batteries. That thing flat cooks. On 9 cells it was easily twice as fast as my brushed truck on 6 cells. Plus it sounds like a dentist drill with tires as it screeches down the street.

He had some other 7 and 8 cell packs he made up that we could try on ours too. Took the speed up nicely on our brushed stuff. Looks like we may go in on a batch of cells and make up a few packs.

Time to start saving $$$ for a Brushless setup. I almost wish he didn't bring it over. I knew it was going to be fast, but now I got to get one too!

[Ghettojeep]

I have a hobbico dual peak charger, I'd let you have for $30, it cost me about double that 4 months ago. I've picked up another charger since then.

Charges Nicd, nimh, and lipos, I would not use it to charge lipo's though. Works great, always did really well on the nimh's.

http://www.southeastrc.com/WebImages/content/hcap0290main-2.jpg

edit: saw your in Pueblo, I'd do it for $35 shipped payment via paypal. :thumbsup:

[ZooMad75]

I found that before. It's DC only right? I'm in need of AC since I don't typically charge out at the dirt where we goof off at. I might be interested if you have an AC power supply with it.

[Ghettojeep]

I found that before. It's DC only right? I'm in need of AC since I don't typically charge out at the dirt where we goof off at. I might be interested if you have an AC power supply with it.

Sorry, I have a power supply but I'm currently using it.

If you have a battery charger for your car you can use that though, as long as it's an adjustable one. I actually used a 2 amp trickle charger with this too, but I could only charge one batt at a time due to the amperage.

[ZooMad75]

Thanks for the offer. I've got a couple of chargers I've bid on ebay that ends in a few days I can't back out of one since I'm the high bidder, but I may not press it if somebody raises the price over my bid.

I do have a car 12v car battery charger I could use for the time being. Let me see how this auction pans out and I'll shoot you a pm.

Thanks!

[TJ_Shunk]

I use a pirahna AC/DC Digital peak charger for all my batteries. Does Nicd and Nimh. Great when away from the house just attach it to the car battery and wait.

http://www.duratrax.com/caraccys/dtxp4005b.jpg

[Ghettojeep]

This is my new baby. It's nicey. I'd recommend one of these too. I got mine for Hong Kong for an screaming deal. Of course you have to wait for it to ship, etc.

http://i16.ebayimg.com/02/i/000/ae/e5/afa5_1.JPG

[ZooMad75]

Both cars are out of commission, currently in need of parts. The kid cartwheeled his car off the curb and bent one of the rear shocks. Not to be out done, I slid mine into my nephew's rusty and snapped my brand new VXL bearing carrier in half and took the camber link out with it. Two runs with the new bearings in and I knocked the motor loose the first time then I break all the crap in the rear the second time.

Me thinks the speed these cars develop on pavement adds to the breakage factor. Dirt is more forgiving, must go back to driving on it.

That being said the ebay gods are delivering RPM bumpers and RPM camber links for both cars soon. Still need to drop by the LHS for some new (straight) shock shafts and shock oil. Maybe even some more RPM uber nylon for the carriers and lower arms too. Breaking stuff sucks.

[ZooMad75]

Well, after buying new RPM arms for mine I decided the Bandit was tad delicate for my son's bashing skills. Shorter smaller tires seemed to transfer more damage when rolled. So I put the New RPM arms on my truck and swapped my old arms over to his bandit. This required a few more Rustler specific parts like toe links, front axles, halfshafts and front body mounts. My BIL donated an extra rustler body. I bought new Wheels and Dirt Hawg tires for mine and donated my old rustler tires to his. It's all complete now. Plus with the larger wheels/tires that have foam inserts it takes the bumps better.

I like the Dirthawgs a lot better than the stock pin spike rears and ribbed froints. On the first bash session the newly converted rustler ran good. Now I need some more batteries for longer bash sessions.

Here's a fresh pic. My truck is on the left with the new shoes and his converted truck is on the right.
http://chevytruckworld.tenmagazines.com/gallery/Zoos75K5/289097.jpg

[SUPERGILDO43]

dude, you gotta let me in on one of those bash sessions!!

[Budman]

Oh and my BIL called to tell me he has a brushless Rustler coming for his son. We might be getting some racing action going down here. He's got an e-maxx too. Should be fun.

I see you are in Pueblo. Do you have any property? Might be worth building a small track if you guys are going to bash a lot. That is what we did in AZ. started off as a small track with a group of friends. Ended up being a pro track with people paying to come run. We even put in a driving stand about 12 feet up.

Both cars are out of commission, currently in need of parts. The kid cartwheeled his car off the curb and bent one of the rear shocks. Not to be out done, I slid mine into my nephew's rusty and snapped my brand new VXL bearing carrier in half and took the camber link out with it. Breaking stuff sucks.

One of the things we learned is that we broke a lot less when we started running on a proper track.

[ZooMad75]

Bud- We own our house, but it's locked into a subdivison. I could tear the grass out of the back yard and make a sweet track but the wife might complain about the muddy dogs when they come inside!:D

We've got a pretty good spot to run on a makeshift track near our house around the corner. Dirt running has yet to break any parts so far. We've only broke stuff when we goof around at his grandpa's house out on the street. Pavement means better traction, which adds to higher speeds and higher speeds plus immovable objects equal more breakage! That and the fact I got some decent 8 cell packs to run that provide a lot more speed over the 6 cells we normally run. My boy managed to nail a mailbox post with the front end just right to allow it to spin. The spin threw the rear of the truck into a concrete step and broke the rear a-arm mount off of the transmission case. The case was $8 to replace so it wasn't a big deal.

There is a local track that's setup like you outlined. A guy out in Pueblo west has enough space he built a track and will let anybody run it if he's home. The have some organized races on some weekends too. Flyers are up over at American Pastimes hobby shop on 29th st. One of these weekends I'll have to charge up some packs and go over there to try it out.

[Budman]

You guys really need to go gas. Gas is a flat out blast.

[ZooMad75]

Actually, we are both going to upgrade to brushless motors and esc's. I'm sold on that technology. My BIL is easily doing 60+ on 9 cells with a VXL ruslter. With 3s lipo packs they are capable of 70+ mph.

We were goofing around with them again Yesterday and his VXL was rolling fast enough the front (non-powered) tires were expanding like drag slicks.

With brushless you get the more speed than gas without the need for tuning or tweaking. No mess at all and the brushless motors are maintenance free. Do some searching on youtube for rustler vxl and you'll come up with some pretty cool full out speed runs. Tops so far is 82 mph with a 4s lipo from a rustler.