Round 3 of TGW is now in the books, and it’s becoming a very VERY tight series. Two rounds left and unfortunately, I’m in danger of losing my 3rd place standing in the series.
Bryan is how tied with me for third, and he’s brought his A-game, winning last nights A-Main.
Despite some mistakes in driving, the Kyosho Ultima SC-R is a nearly unstoppable machine. In fact the series points leader is also running a Kyosho SC, which seriously mitigates any advantage in running the best short course R/C truck money can buy. Regardless, it was a worthwhile change out from the SC-10. By changing trucks I went (virtually overnight) from a back of the pack running to a consitant podium finisher, and have a handful of wins, something that seemed impossible for me to accomplish with the SC-10.
With the slow destruction of my old race body, the damage done to the very old temporary body, and the debut of the BRCR Summer Race Series “Treads Gone Wild”, it was high time for a new body. But, time was not on my side, so my original plan of a complex and amusing theme was out the window.
When I originally started to race the first Cow Body truck a few months back, it was a big hit at the track. Despite it’s very simple design, and the multitude of very nicely done air-brushed artwork on other trucks, the amazing acceptance was, to say the least, surprising!
SC-10 "Cow Car"
Short Course racing takes it’s toll on these little Lexan bodies, so replacement is just part of the hobby. The neat part is that you are not stuck with a design forever. The bad part is that you can’t keep using your awesome design forever. I purchased a couple of new bodies on sale, and set them aside for the future. You never know when one will develop a catastrophic crack and need to be quickly replaced. With speeds of 30 MPH+, aerodynamics actually does matter.
“Cow Car 1” suffered a pretty nasty break in the rear mounting locations, and had to be retired about a month ago. But I was not ready with my new design concept, so I pulled an old Traxxis Slash body out of the dustbin of bodies past (for reference Traxxis is a good basher brand, but it does not have a reputation for real race performance). It was a musing for a while. People were shocked to see a crappy old Traxxis running so well and so smoothly on the track. LOL. Little did they know, at first, that it was covering arguably the best Short Course currently made, a Kyosho SC-R. But the body is pretty cheap to start with, and it was not long before the stresses of a very competitive race class took it’s toll too. Again, I was not ready with a new design.
After procrastinating for months, and with the start of a new Summer Race Series at our track “Treads Gone Wild“, despite my air-brushing skills being squarely in question, I had to come up with something fast! I literally had but a handful of hours to get a concept, design the pattern, lay it on the body and paint it up! Traxxis body was severely damaged in practice Friday night (so was the truck, but that’s another story), so I could not simple use the Traxxis body for the opening of the serious, and I had to fix the truck too. All in the matter of a few hours yesterday morning. Plus, it was the first warm sunny weekend day this year, so I also had to squeeze in some motorcycle riding. Had to act fast.
The “Cow Car” theme had stuck, racer announcers started to call me “Cow Car Dave”, and people expected to see me cowing it up. But I didn’t want to do the same old thing, again. Plus I wanted to experiment around with some design elements, like flames or tears. I spent some time looking at all the awesome designs in this RCTech air brushing thread, and It hit me. I could do both! So, I did!
In less than 3 hours, I knocked out this little gem, combining my first attempt at airbrushing rips, and adding drop shadows, but still sticking with the “Cow Car” theme (between “Cow Car 3”, shown here, and Cow Car 1, I also painted up a Cow Car for my daughter… more on that later.)
TA DA! Cow Car 3
It’s pretty rough, and there are a lot of mistakes in it. Some of it because I was rushing, most of it because this is only the 2nd body I’ve tried to airbrush (the first body was “Cow Car 2”, in the middle).
A lot of people liked the design, and I do too. I got my rips, my neon color and stuck with the Cow theme. All in all, pretty good. But, now, I’m really starting to enjoy the air brushing thing, and I want to keep practicing, and paining more bodies, but, I have all the bodies I need for my race vehicles. I guess I could just go and buy more bodies, paint them up and maybe sell them for cost at the track, so that I can practice, and not go broke doing it.
Finally, here is the full family of Cows, 1, 2 and 3 (left to right). Original Cow Car, Strawberry Cow Car, TGW Cow Car
BRCR implemented a track change in mid April, so I’ve closed out the previous dataset, and started a new one for updated track.
During that time I also acquired the TLR22 buggy, and sold off the AE B4 (took less than 2 hours to sell, yip!).
So, without yammering on, here is the graph from that dataset.
Right at the tail end, I was experimenting with some new setup strategies, and it’s clear that they were NOT helping out at all. The upper graph shows the upward blip in times during the heat races.
However the main events, which are the ones that matter, show that I continued to lay down fast times, when I went back to my ‘standard’ setup.
More to follow, including a different way of looking at the numbers. Those should be posted soon. I want to wait for a decent dataset (showing a trend of 2 days is not very useful) before I start trying out the new metrics methods and crunch the numbers.
Ah.. YES! Months of waiting. Reading the press releases. Seeing the sneak-peek spy photos, hearing the team drivers talk about this amazing new car. This (r)evolution in 2wd 1/10th scale RC Racing. Innovation, engineering, a radical remake.
The Hype surrounding this new (model / toy) car was intense! Just read this little blurb from Team Losi Racing (TLR) about the brand new TLR22!
The Team Losi Racing 1/10-scale 22 2WD Electric Race Buggy Kit is an entirely new racing platform. Without a doubt, it will reignite 1/10-scale electric racing throughout the world. The TLR 22s innovative design takes full advantage of envelope-pushing Li-Po and brushless power. It is the only platform of its kind to offer all the hardware needed in a single kit to build a rear- or mid-motor configured chassis. The 22 is about to change all the rules.
So.. I, of course, had to order one. And on April 1st, it arrived at the local Hobby shop (along with 11 others) for a bunch of the local racers. Mine, was #7 (at our shop, 1533 worldwide, based on it’s serial number), so the body of the car carries that number.
Without further reading, here are some pictures of the new TLR22, along with the older Associated Factory Team B4 I’ve been racing for about a month now. As you will see, the 8 year old AE design is really showing it’s age. AE FT b4 (left), TLR 22 (right). The difference in body is astounding.
The side view of the car exemplifies it’s sleek new design. TLR22 In Profile
Compare it to the ‘current’ B4 class buggy from Associated. It’s a bit like comparing a runner, to a bowler. Current offering from Team Associated (AE), the B4 (and B4.1)
Here they are with their bodies off. Both are fitted with Stock Club Racing 17.5T brushless power systems, SAVOX high-speed servos, and the new 96mm compact 60C LiPo, which was designed specifically for the TLR22 by Losi’s battery division.
AE B4 is on the left. You can see that positioning of the electronics is a lot further off the center line, increasing the tendency for the vehicle to roll over in turns. Compare that to the compact, down the middle design of the TLR22. But the differences go far beyond that. If you notice, the older B4 is a rear engine design. By contrast the new TLR22 can be built either rear motor, OR, as I have done here, mid-motor! I’m aware of only one other off-road 2wd mid-motor buggy currently available. But this is the only kit that was designed to be built either way, and comes with all the parts to do it right in the box. The guts, that bring the glory. (B4 left, TLR22 right)
In mid-motor configuration, the power controller (ESC) is located on a bracket right above the motor and transmission. Space is VERY limited so wiring must be compact and tidy. No room for sloppy just wire it up work (which I never do anyway). It was a challenge to get it even this tidy. Others have produced even cleaner looking installations by using all the same color wire. I decided to stick with the stock multi-color wiring supplied with the ESC, and power leads from the battery manufacture. You can’t hardly go wrong doing that. Speed controller and battery wiring.
Here you can see the motor, it’s wiring, transmission (to the left of the motor) and receiver antenna. Even with the smallest 2s battery in the RC off-road industry, space is at a premium! Motor wiring and installation.
Servo and receiver location was no picnic either. Here I’m running a 3/4 length Titanium geared .07 ms high-torque servo (yes, yes.. it’s as expensive as it sounds, and without a servo-saver in the design, it’s also in a fair degree of peril!). Just behind the SAVOX SH-1257TG servo, is the Futaba sport 3-channel 2.4GHz FHSS receiver. The control center for all that is fun and right in the buggy. One of the many advantages of the 2.4GHz system (aside from eliminating the need for crystals and frequency pins or flags) is the very show length antenna. Running an old 75 or 27 MHz antenna (about 11″ long) would just ruin the look of this car. And I’m sure you understand how important it is to look good!.
Just behind (to the right) of that is the 7.4V 3800mAh 2S2P 60C 96mm LiPo. It’s the battery that makes all of this possible.
Finally, one last photo of just the TLR22, wired and ready for racing: TLR22
I also said there would be a post about about what I planned to use that in. Well, so maybe I didn’t post up soon, but I am posting about it now.
The kit was ordered from TQRacing in Southern California and it arrived in 3 days! They shipped it within hours and the USPS had it on my door step in plenty of time to get it all sorted out before the next race! Package of goodies from TQRacing
What’s in the package? 3 things. A Speed Passion ESC (aka speed controller), Speed Passion 17.5T Club Spec motor, and the required mini programmer. And the thing at the top is a well worn Team Associated Factory Team B4 buggy, circa 2007. If there was a VIN on thing thing it would show many, many owners, me just being the most recent. In fact it’s quite amusing to run it at the track. Already two different people have come up to me and mentioned that they used to own my buggy at one point. So it’s not the freshest horse in the race, but it was well maintained by the previous owners, so it was a very worthy purchase:
B4 Factory Team Roller: $90
SAVOX High-speed Servo: $25
Speed Passion 17.5T (Club Spec Stock) kit: $90
Futaba 603FG 2.4 GHz FHHS receiver: $45
3 full tire and wheel sets: Included Total Cost:$250
Quite a savings over the $260 cost of just the factory kit alone. Parts for next race class - 2wd Stock Buggy.
Only one problem with this kit. The sensor wire is WAY too short! This kit is designed for on-road vehicles primarily which use mid-mounted motors, as opposed to the off-road designs that use the rear-engine (ala VW Bug) mounting. This was the only problem I had getting the buggy running that night. Time was short and I didn’t get to the track / hobby shop in time to get a longer sensor wire until race night.
Speed Passion 17.5T motor and sensor wire loom
This little hitch was not enough to keep me from getting everything else mounted up in the buggy. It’s a nice thing that the ESC is so small, the dimensions of the buggy are pretty tight! Assembled B4 2wd Race Buggy
You may notice that the batty wire leads are still bare. That was the 2nd thing I need to complete, was purchase of a male DEAN’s connector and adapter cable. Or, at least that was the plan! It turns out the deans connector costs $4.00. The adapter cable for my batteries cost another $12. BUT, for only $8.00 I could get an 8-pack of 4mm plated bullet connectors (good enough to do two vehicles) and eliminate the 2nd connection resistance in the DEANS, and go direct from ESC to battery. And that’s exactly how I solved the problem. Sorry, no photo of that at this time. I’ll try to add one later.
So.. finally, here it is. Ready for action. Most of the guys said I should practice my first few hours with the tires as is, before I go ahead and convert the to slicks, which our off-road cray track is best suited for. So, you see the worn Panthers in this photo. B4 built up, and almost ready to go (sensor and battery soldering would be completed later)
Here it is ready for action, with it’s bigger team mate, the might SC10. SC10 and B4 ready to run.
More to follow about buggies. I won’t say exactly what I have in store next, but it’s going to be one trick kit. I just hope the rumors of shipping to the hobby stores before the months’ end is true!
It didn’t take long for me to figure out that I had A LONG way to go before I belonged running Open Short Course trucks. Even though I had the monster motor in the class with a 7.5T Novak (most other racers were running 10.5T or 13.5T – lower the turns, the faster it spins up and higher the max RPM, more akin to 2-stroke, as opposed to the torque motors in the 17.5T and higher windings, which are more akin to a big displacement thumper).
Even with quite a power advantage… I was.. well.. toast. 5 laps down on the leader. This is no place for a rookie.
Open Short Course Racing
Still being fairly new to the hobby, I was a little light on motor options, having only a 13.5T Novak and the 7.5T Novak I was already running. Having been kicked up form novice, I was either stuck racing Open class with those motors, or I’d have to spend about $100 on a new 17.5T motor. And in stock class you can’t afford to skimp on the motor, you need the best 17.5T motor you can afford. Add that to the fact I HATE THE NOVAK GTB speed controller. It’s so complex to program with the little push-buttons and lights. And it never seemed to really take the programming, even though the status lights clearly showed that I’d done it right. It was frustrating to say the least. So, in a state of excitement, frustration and resignation to my own personal quirks (let’s just call them imperfections, shall we, at least I’ve learned to recognize them, if not yet fully control them), I knew I’d stew over the purchase for weeks and weeks, eventually it would become the source of anxiety and finally depression, after which I would spend the money. So, I saved myself the 5 states of loss and took the $270 medicine up front: Tekin RS + 17.5T Kit
Thus, I set about removing my Novak GTB system and installing the RS. However, I had one unresolved matter I had to attend to first. My last race with at the wheel of the uber-powered truck, had really done a number on it: Serious damage to chasis. Trucks are not supposed to be 'Two Piece' afairs.
The cost of a new chassis is not really a consideration (under $30), however, it’s the chassis! That means everything mounts to it. To replace this part would require a 50% rebuild of the entire truck. That’s potentially hours of effort. Effort that would have to be duplicated again if I have just one really bad landing, or under-dump and lawn dart the thing.
However, I did have a solution. One that requires the purchase of a $19 aftermarket front bumper kit, of which 2/3 are discarded, and the other 1/3 requires modifications to perform the job of taking the place of the broken chassis nose.
RPM to the rescue! RPM SC10 Heavy Duty Front Bumper Kit (only lower section is retained)
Following the Frankenstein repair to the front clip, the next order of business was a complete rebuild of the front shocks including a re-valve, new springs and silicon oil change. Here is the final setup: Rebuilt SC10 Shocks. Rear (l.) & Front (r.)
Front Dampers
Rear Dampers
Valve Piston:
#3
#2
Shock Oil:
40 wt.
30 wt.
Spring:
Red (3.90 lb./in.)
Silver (2.10 lb./in.)
Down Stops
4 (.120″)
7(.210″)
Mounting the motor was very mostly straight forward. However, there was not enough adjustment in the motor mount plates to get the 29T pinion gear I needed to fit with my 84T spur, so I bought a new gear set with a 75T spur gear and 27T pinion. With the 15 degrees of physical motor timing (see photo) I have on pretty quick stock truck. Sure I’m topped out on speed by the end of the straight compared to the Mod trucks, but I have gobs of low-end torque that gets me up and over the jumps with almost no run-up. 6′ of air time is no problem at all with this setup. I can easily clear the 4-hump rhythm section with a quick punch of the throttle.
Some of you new or simply unfamiliar with surface brushless systems might wonder what the extra cable bundle is near the bottom of the motor. That’s the sensor harness. This measures the inrunner’s RPM, feeding back position and speed to the ESC, which allows it to automatically detected cogging at low RPM, and smooth the pulses, giving the driver very smooth and easy to control power compared to non-sensored systems. Having had both, I can say first had that this *DOES* make a difference. You lose some of the potential torque of the motor, since some magnet space is given up to the sensor, but power is nothing if you can’t get it all to the ground. The sensor provides the ability to do just that. Tekin 17.5T mounted.
Mounting of the speed controller was simpler than the big and bulky Novak I was replacing. The profile is so low it barely extends above the sides of the chassis. The solder posts on the controller are also a thing of beauty. Vastly superior to the solder points on my Novak and most other ESCs I’ve seen so far. Easy to heat, plenty of post length, and slotted so you can mount wires horizontal (as I did) or vertical, depending on whim. The three wires on the left control the motor, the two on the right (with capacitor) are the battery power leads. Sensor harness plugs into side of ESC (right). Another bonus on the Tekin is the topside status LED bar, not on the side like the Novak and XP I’ve had in other vehicles. Another example of learning from racing. Put it where people can see it! Seems simple, yet.. so difficult for some companies to ‘get’ Tekin RS Speed Controller
The last two updates made with this conversion, was the witch to the light-weigh 2/3 height SAVOX SC-1251 Metal Gear Digital Servo. This is a lot smaller than the stock XP (sloooooow) or the black body SAVOX I was running before. Also in this photo is my personal truck transponder. Other than the ESC, this was the single most expensive part in the entire truck. This is the newest RC4 compatible hybrid transponder from MyLaps. A lot of tracks (including the one that I use) had track transponders available to borrow for a race. They are basically free. So why buy my own at such great expense? 3 reasons: 1) I can get my practice day times logged for analysis 2) the RC4 hybrid is about 2/3 the size of the others and also lighter 3) I can permanently mount it anywhere I need for best signal. SAVOX 1251 and MyLaps Transponder
I’ll say this right now, the position in the photos is good, but not ideal. The metal gear servo interferes with the transponder (another advantage to owning your own, you can test transponder positions to find the optimal signal). I have since found a better position for the transponder. However, it’s exact position is now a closely held secret and an advantage I have on the track.. so.. don’t expect me to spill the beans on the net, you’ll have to join me at the track to see what I’ve since done.
It’s official. I’ve been kicked up from NOVICE class to MOD SHORT COURSE.
Monday night was my last Novice racing event (more on that in another post). With the demise of the old body, timing is perfect for finishing up the new body, trimming it up and getting it ready for racing tonight.
Ah.. it’s good to win. 🙂 SC10 Factory Team - in pit at BRCR So, it’s still in Novice class, but it was not an easy win. There was one competitor (also named Dave) that was really giving me a run for my money, in fact he was just ahead of me when his truck broke on lap 5. He had qualified just ahead of me in the first two rounds, but not by much!
So.. here are the results… in all their ugly glory. It was a hard fought race, and I crashed many times, many more times that I should have. But I was victorious none the less. One more Novice win and they’ll kick me up to the big-boys. Which, I’m not that worried about since I raced them heads-up on Monday and came in 3rd. 🙂
Bremerton R/C Raceway
Novice A Main Round# 3, Race# 2
9:16:02 PM 02/09/2011
________________________Driver___Car#____Laps____RaceTime____Fast Lap___Behind_
Demartini, David #3 17 8:03.504 24.370
A, Steve #5 16 8:11.161 27.822
O, Johny #2 15 8:20.383 28.348
F, Jeff #7 14 8:24.719 25.223
T, Garrett #1 13 8:06.876 24.525
R, Dave #6 5 1:58.614 25.758
Unfortunately, this will likely be the last race for this truck’s body. There are now parts of it missing, and one crack that extends from the front wheel well all the way into the windshield. She’s just about dead, Jim. I did keep it together by drilling 6 holes along the crack and using zip-ties to keep it from breaking completely in half. It looks pretty rough. The paint touch-up I did this morning is really of no consequence now. I already have a new body ready to go, but I’ve come up with a brand new concept I want to debut for this Saturdays race (it will be my first Saturday night race with the big crowds). But first I need to get some vinyl graphics cut for the truck, and even before that, I need to design them!
This hobby is not cheap (but not that expensive in the grand scheme), but it’s good clean fun, lots of great people to meet and talk too. I’ve even run across a number of people racing R/C that I used to race with when I was running my Porsches with Bremerton Sports Car Club. Some people are just gear-heads, and I’m one of them.
Wow, it was a challenging night at BRCR on Monday. Turnout was a little down so Alex (race director) combined what is typically 4-6 racing classes down into two.
Class 1 – Novice, Stock and Open Class Short Course Trucks.
Class 2 – Stock Stadium Truck, Stock Buggy, Open Stadium Truck, Open Buggy.
So, instead of racing just Novices (we are allowed to basically run ANY set-up in our Short Course trucks), I was racing against Stock, Modified and Open class Short Course as well. Field was 8 entries deep:
Demartini, David #1 (novice)
Kuiphoff, Chris #2 (novice)
Arns, Zach #3
Hansen, Dylan #4
Livingston, Wes #5 (open)
Wirtanen, Tony #6 (open 4x4)
Pergam, Ewan #7 (open)
Cigledy, Mike #8
Still sorting out some handling issues from last week, I was not running at my best, yet, I managed to complete the two qualifier rounds and start in the 4th grid position for the final A-Main!
The race itself was a little chaotic. With the fast drivers and fast trucks picking their way through the slower traffic. Again, I had problems getting my track rythem until the last few laps. Really not my best work at all. I was really concentrating on getting good laps in and not paying any attention at all to my position in the pack. I knew I’d been lapped at least twice by someone, but when the 10minute race was over, I was VERY happy with the results!!
Racing against some of the best Short Course competitors in the area, I managed to pull off a podium finish. I even turned my 2nd fastest lap so far! I think that if I’d not spent the first 15 laps crashing and lawn-darting the jumps I could have been right up there with the top 2 guys on the lead lap.
There’s always Wednesday Night Short Course racing! 🙂
While checking on the RC10.com site for blank setup sheets (I want to record the current tuning of my Factory Team SC10), I am faced with this: NEW Team Associated SC10 4x4
Experience the thrill of four-wheel-drive action and performance with the SC10 4×4!
* Unique dual gearbox drive train coupled together with a 5mm heavy duty belt system with external tension adjustment
* 32 pitch front and rear gearboxes with sealed fluid filled differentials
* Decoupled center slipper clutch allows for front and rear wheel drive to slip independently, resulting in more traction and stability on bumpy track conditions
* CVAs with captured drive pins and heavy duty 6mm alloy axles
* 12mm hex drive KMC® replica wheels front and rear with aggressive short course racing tires
* Championship short course racing body (clear), with Team Associated decal sheet
* 13mm blue aluminum big-bore threaded shocks with low friction X-ring seals
* Composite modular tub chassis with Low-CG and Low Polar Moment design
* Enclosed water-resistant receiver box, and removable ESC tray for easy clean up and maintenance
* Ball bearing steering system with adjustable steering stops
* All metric hardware and ball bearings throughout
* Uses most 540 and 550 brushless motors
Video preview of the upcoming truck. Looks slick, and it looks like they addressed a few of the remaining issues in the 2WD SC10 (like the shocks, which are now being dwarfed in size and performance by competition, such as LOSI). Having just sheared my Factory Team truck in half tonight during practice (more on that in another post), this updated truck seems like a must have? But, is it? I don’t know. Yet!
Kyosho Ultima SC-R is a nearly unstoppable machine. In fact the series points leader is also running a Kyosho SC, which seriously mitigates any advantage in running the best short course R/C truck money can buy. Regardless, it was a worthwhile change out from the SC-10. By changing trucks I went (virtually overnight) from a back of the pack running to a consitant podium finisher, and have a handful of wins, something that seemed impossible for me to accomplish with the SC-10. 
