Yes, another Catamaran Build!

[CircusCircus]

LOL, Ahhhhhh the joys of being a father.

[gni5002]

ace i just want to say that i have been thinking about building a mini cat for some time now and i just started looking on here for a build and this one is by far the best and most detailed i am very impressed. One of the sweetest boats i have seen in a long time. and it makes me even more pumped to start building mine this summer

[peells]

Well ther e is only about 5 of this exact Mini being built right now, Jump on in the water is fine ace and I will be keeping very close photos of these ones we are doing right now. Enjoy the threads

[ace028]

ace i just want to say that i have been thinking about building a mini cat for some time now and i just started looking on here for a build and this one is by far the best and most detailed i am very impressed. One of the sweetest boats i have seen in a long time. and it makes me even more pumped to start building mine this summer

Thanks, I appreciate your comments. My whole idea when I set out to build this boat was to help inspire others to build wooden scratch build boats, after all I was inspired to build this and a couple other boats by people on this great forum, after looking at other peoples work and ideas really helps me. I was also hoping to create intrest in this size catamaran in hopes of vendors or manufactures or someone would create and make hardware that is more accurate for this size of boat, no such luck yet, but you can make due with the hardware that is out there.

Never the less this is quite a fun boat to build, you should have a great time building it, please start your build and post us up some pictures and jump in on the fun! You can follow my new build that will be comencing here pretty soon along with my dads (peells) and a few other builds.

[ace028]

Oh btw, soon I will post some completed pictures of this boat with hardware, and then we will sort out the proper wiring and battery setup which differs from the original setup and test run.

My new build thead
http://forums.offshoreelectrics.com/...ad.php?t=12842

[ace028]

Well here is the assembly after paint. I started by cleaning the overspray off the tub floor, and off the carbon fiber motor mounts. Then I installed the motors and polished the motor couplers and put them on. Thats pretty much it for now, more later. I am trying to warp the hatch back, it got a little funny after the paint work so hopefully that works out, I got a few tricks up my sleeve for that. Will post more later.

[peells]

Man I figured you would have that thing re assembled by now!! slow poke

[peells]

Uhh, any up dates yet?

[ace028]

Not much to update, I am waiting till the weekend mostly. I am however modifying the ESC's for shorter tx leads and removing all motor wires so that the bullets are soldered to the esc board, less wire = less resistance and less clutter. I will be working on mounting the escs, I know where I want them, just need to figure out how to keep them in place. I am also going to shorten the servo lead aswell. I need to get a different soldering iron, like a pencil type for smaller wires. I will post some pictures when I get a chance.

[ace028]

Here is a pic of what I am talking about on the ESC, don't worry I will make the bullet connectors even, I just put them on there real quick. You can also see how long the Tx lead is on the esc. Also the heat sink plates were held on with double sidded tape, wonder how well that works I may get some heat paste, then reshrink wrap them.

[peells]

you may want to put some epoxy around those connectors to toughen up that area for when you take apart the connectors because you know how hard they are to pull out at times.

[ace028]

Ok, soldering done on 1st esc, now I need to add some thermal compound the the fets and the wimpy heat sinks back on and shrink wrap it. I could prob upgrade the cooling plates, but I don't think I will, the thermal compound is prob a ton times better then double sided tape lol, and they didn't over heat before.

[ace028]

well, I finished up the escs, and was testing them out to check them. One was acting funny, so I was testing it out by swaping it to a different motor and then it cought on fire, so now I am down a esc. I think I will order 2 so I have a extra one for just in case.

Any recomendations for something a little better then the el cheapo escs? I was thinking castle stuff, but i'm not really sure becasue of the expense, but then again you pay for what you get.

[ace028]

Replaced the servo lead, also made it shorter.


Finished ESCs before one caught on fire


After fire


My place of intention for escs

[peells]

Well it sucks to be that esc!! I wonder if your modification got something too hot? notice the fet's are all burned right over the connectors you soldered on.