For Sale - on Ebay

StampedeProject.com RWDP Under the Hood - Brushless GTX2

Want to know how the RWDP works. Here is a behind the scenes under the hood complete walk through.

The Battle Plate Walk Through

Happy July 4th touring the RWDP

Yes this is the infamous RWDP Remote Weapons Deployment/delivery Platform developed by your's truely. The pinnacle of years of RC experience and fabrication.

Based on a 15lb HPI GTX2 coverted to brushless (the only one in existance I am aware of) with sod ripping power via huge Neu motor 1527 motor with Tekin RX8 esc.

On board is a flame thrower, dual 120 db pain generators, two seperately remote triggerable rocket leads with servo minted rocket guides, 5 watts of remote switched high output LED lights, and an AUX remote switched power output. Here are a couple video to show you how it all works.

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Posted from my iPhone

Neumotor's SuperMassive Neumotor's Oversized SuperMassive 6700Kv 2000 Watt Brushless Motor

Neumotor's SuperMassive
Neumotor's Oversized SuperMassive 6700Kv 2000 Watt Brushless Motor

Were some are just nuts over Nitro, I am completely besotted by brushless. In my quest for ultimate brushless dominance, I found Neumotors ("New Motors"). Along with powering more than a few boat world speed records holders, Neumotor has also powered the current RC Car record holder at somewhere North of 130MPH. What caught my eye was their brand new 2.8HP SuperMassive 6700Kv 2000 Watt motor... now this looks interesting.

Though Neumotor is well known in both boat and aircraft circles, they have never produced a "R/C Car" specific motor. The closest thing the company has to a R/C car motor is the 1.56" diameter 15XX Massive series motors. With a little beefier length and width than the industry standard 1.4" diameter 540/550 sized motor cans, you can now understand the name. The Massive name also applies to the a super high efficiency design, which delivers nearly double the power (wattage) of other competing motors. All Neumotors feature maintenance-free lifetime sealed bearings, high torque 4-pole magnet design, 60,000 maximum RPM, industry leading 85+% efficiency, a standardized 4 bolt motor mount pattern, high current motor leads, and solid milled aluminum body design. Neumotors' intent is to eventually release R/C car focused motors, but for now Neumotor should be considered an advanced custom upgrade. Need a special winding, high current gold banana connectors, or in my case a 3.2mm (1/8") pinion shaft instead of 5mm? Yep you can go completely nerdy here and Neumotor will build your motor exactly how you want completely by hand.

A problem picking a motor was that there are a ton of options in every series, but Steven at Diversity Model Aircraft (the sole distributor) worked through specs to find a solution to my application. In my case I wanted to use my Mamba Max sensorless brushless ESC to deliver both stupid speeds and moronic power all without running tons of cells. The solutions was the 2000 watt, 200 AMP, SuperMassive 6700Kv (aka the 1509/1D/3.2) measuring 1.56" W X 2.1" L.

The downsides to this beast of a motor are that it is not plug and play, has somewhat confusing airplane focused installation instructions, perforated can ends that must be covered to prevent dirt from entering the motor, and heavy duty 8 gauge soldered wire motor leads which are painful to connect to. The size itself could also present some challenges with mounting, but fit like a glove on my Traxxas Bandit with room to still allow a pretty broad gearing range. The SuperMassive comes without a notched pinion shaft, but I experienced no slippage even under very heavy loads.

The upsides are that the 2.8 horsepower Neumotor SuperMassive 6700Kv is the most powerful high Kv motor which fits into most small 10th scale R/C's with twice the power output of Castle's CMS36 motors, or any of Novak's motors including the HV series, or ... well you get the idea. Efficiency is about the same as Hacker's C40 motors, but the SuperMassive still delivers a higher Kv and a third more power - i.e. it will be faster with less input. To make connections to the Mamba Max ESC simple and easy, 4mm male banana connector tipped motor extensions were attached to the motor leads. Sensorless motors have no particular wire order, if the motor runs in reverse, switch two of the leads. The can holes were sealed with clear packaging tape to keep the motor running clean. Due to the power hungry 4-pole motor design, starts were rough when geared for warp speeds, but tweaking settings on the Mamba Max smoothed things out a little. Observing the 60K motor RPM limit I stuck with my trusty 6 & 8-cell GP3300 high current side-by-side packs for testing.

Let's contemplate that 2000 Watt figure - that's almost four times a Novak High Voltage Brushless 6.5 Maxx focused motor and the 200 AMP limit matches the max output of the Mamba Max! It's like putting a Hemi in a go-cart. The performance of this 2000 watt motor will make your jaw drop and is simply stunning. With stock geared the Bandit wheelied at any speed. Can you say torque flip. As a bashing setup the motor produces comical amounts of torque which shredded the Bandit's plastic idler gear in mili-seconds and required an immediate aluminum Idler gear upgrade. With the Traxxas 31T speed pinion installed and running 6-cells, I witness 52.3MPH. With 8-cells the SuperMassive delivered 62.5MPH and was power wheelieing at about 30 MPH. Why does anyone need more power than any normal brushless system? No idea, I am still giggling. I can now terrify both myself and any other R/C short of a 3.3 Jato with with 60+MPH speeds on just 8-cells and a near stock Traxxas Bandit - don't forget the RPM bumper. With an extra cell or a 3S LiPo pack, beating a 3.3 Jato is a very careful trigger pull away.

WHAT DID WE LIKE?
Torque, torque, and more torque, what's not to like. On just 6-cells, the 6700Kv SuperMassive kicked out insane amounts of power that rocketed an almost stock Bandit to illegal speeds that would make any Nitro R/C envious. The super high motor efficiency, extended run times to well over 10 minutes when geared normally. At 6700Kv, 60,000 RPM, and 2000 Watts, there is nothing else like this motor from any any brushless motor manufacturer.

WHAT WOULD WE CHANGE?
With a sticker price of $225, the NeuMotors SuperMassive isn't cheap but in the higher end class of brushless motors such as Hacker and Lehner, the Neumotor offers specs beyond their offerings at around the same price. Although the high current 8 gauge stumps are appreciated from a current perspective, solder tabs such as those on new Novak motors and non-perforated end bells would be greatly appreciated. Smoothing the motor out at starts and low speed with high gearing is tricky. Please make this ROAR approved - we need more 360 degree torque flips in races.

CONCLUSION
Even with the shortcomings and the $225 price the Neumotors SuperMassive motor gives us a peak at how good brushless technology has become and delivers huge speeds, enormous torque, at impressive efficiency that justifies the price and install hurdles of this high efficiency 2000 watt 6700Kv motor. If you want ultimate nitro destroying power, are willing to pay for it and can put up with a few installation inconveniences, the Neumotor SuperMassive stands alone in a big way.

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ON THE OTHER HAND
Neumotors are not for the neophyte, but out on here on the benchmark defining fringe where efficiency, power, torque, and speed take on a different meanings, Neumotors are simply the finest brushless motors currently available but are the price of an entire system. Taking this motor to the max and upgrading the Bandit with RPM 5x11 carriers and bearings would easily deliver 70MPH speeds. When geared normally the acceleration is like nothing you have experienced.
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THE FINAL CALL
Highs - Any complaints are immediately forgotten once you pull the trigger. Great fun at track day - kinda get looks like your R/C is powered by alien technology.
Lows - Not for the brushless beginner. Open can design, painful attachment to stumpy motor leads, one size "may" fit all, and rough starts. ROAR approved? [Insert laughter]

SPECS Type: Sensorless Brushless Motor: $225 Class Rivals: Hacker & Lehner
SOURCES: Neumotor sales contact Diversity Model Aircraft www.FlyDMA.com Phone 858-693-8188

Thunder Tiger EB4 S3 RTR 1/8 Scale Buggy

Thunder Tiger EB4 S3 RTR 1/8 Scale Buggy

So I ended up with the Thunder Tiger EB4 S3 RTR 1/8 scale buggy from RC Car magazine as a "feel the love gift" for some articles I did. Honestly I don't think anyone else wanted it, but hey don't look a gift horse in the mouth.

The RC Car review blasted the buggy for a ton of things of which I can say were all true. As brutal of a review as that was they were being kind. The Thunder Tiger EB4 S2 is pretty much a giant piece of junk that at even at $300 it's overpriced. The motor and RX/TX are good, but everything else is really scraping the bottom of the barrel with quality.

This looks pretty much part for part like my Yusa. The bad news and very sad part is that the Yusa is a much higher quality build and I only paid $79.99 each for those. The EB4 doesn't even have sway bars, or adjustment nuts on the links and has fixed tension on the servo saver. The chassis braces are all plastic not metal like my Yusa. It's like Thunder Tiger took a decent cheap roller chassis and then stripped it of everything good.

With one way grub screws as links and without dual threaded adjustment nuts on any links the Thunder Tiger it was/is a nightmare to tune, so much so that at a point RC Car kind of just gave up on trying to tune the thing. It is tunable, however it's a pain and the factory settings are just stupid. Why Thunder Tiger didn't just have one of their factory drivers set one up and just copy that setting on the production units baffles me. I would say unless you are desperate, strapped for cash, and have an "anything will do just get me a buggy" mental moment, the Thunder Tiger is a poor choice. Honestly I am not really sure what Thunder Tiger was thinking since they make such solid motors. On that the motor is a tank and assuming you do take the pain and weather the agony to tune the S3 it will run and run and run and will probably outlive the chassis.

I did a partial tear down side by side with one of my Yusa rollers. The problem as I see it is that other than the aluminum front hubs everything else would be a downgrade if I started moving parts to the Yusa.

FYI - RC Car flogs their test vehicles viscously - none of that snap a pic and write and article garbage that apparently occurs in other magazines. The Thunder Tiger unit they sent over had a bent deck, front shock tower, caster link, both front shock shafts were bent and the tires were bald. I of course straightened everything out and will simply just flog this thing until something breaks.

No bad for free, $200 maybe, but I wouldn't waste my money on it at $300-400 retail.

THE REAL STORY

Ode to Burnout
The Nitro Therapy Buggy

Since my first article with RC Car magazine the beginning of 2007, they have kept me busy... very busy. In fact in the last couple months I have had just enough time to complete article specific RC projects. My list of project ideas, parts, and targeted RCs continues to grow, however my "just for fun" RC time seemingly vanished. I love RC, writing, testing, and creating, however lately it felt like work and that's a very bad thing indeed - I was burnt out.

The un-intended solution came in a two-phased format. The first part of a solution was an agreement made with my wife. If we went to iHobby, no RC hobby work for two weeks. In light of my current state of mind that wasn't tough to agree to. I also asked Stephen (the editor of RC Car magazine) if I could skip a month and pick up in December. The break was really nice.

Sensing I was on the verge of being RC'ed out, Stephen fired over the Thunder Tiger ED4 PRO RTR Nitro 1/8 scale buggy at the end of my second RC free week. If you know me at all you know that I am a brushless guy, and generally consider Nitro to be a giant pain in the ... well you get the idea. Secondly, if you read the scathing Thunder Tiger EB4 review, you know there are a number of things that make the EB4 kinda suck. The used, abused and tested EB4 was even worse as delivered. Both front shock shafts and the front shock tower were bent, the deck was actually torque twisted (presumably from the same wreck) and the speed of the steering servo made you want to throw the whole RC through a wall. Even after straightening out all the bent parts and replacing the bald tires, the Thunder Tiger was definitely in the beater category of RCs with little hope of a return to perfection. Give me a break it doesn't even have a body. Stephen knew that, and knew that this was what we term a therapy car. A therapy car is one you have no emotional attachment to, in fact, you kind of hate it. It generally starts perfectly, goes mildly fast, and begs you to break something. This is the type of car you would attempt to jump your house with.

I don't like nitro, I really don't. Its loud, dirty, inefficient, takes 5 minutes to warm up, and another 5 to tune, and yet another 5 minutes of pulling the glow plug and adding a drop of oil in the cylinder after you are done... and let's not even get into cleaning the air filter. However, I must admit, it you are going to take out your frustrations and get a little therapy, all of the above is the perfect solution. Loud, dirty and painful is how I like to let it all out and screaming full throttle with a stinky cloud following was just what I needed.

I used the Thunder Tiger for a snowmobile on the hard packed snow for a cold but tolerable couple weeks of a Nebraska winter. Ridden hard and left wet comes to mind and a testament the Thunder Tiger motor, it started every time.

After about a month of beating the heck out of the Thunder Tiger, I Ebay'ed the POS... yeah it was that bad, but it did sell quick. ;)

http://www.axialracing.com/ftp/ax10options/index.html Optional parts from Axial

Builds

I have just been working on a ton of stuff lately. Tekno Brushless Revo, Hard Case (hard tail) crawler and an SCX10 Axial build. Fun fun