I Guess I Blew It - Looking For Some Guidance Please

[highflyerbill]

I will give you the down and dirty of it . It's plastic and will never handle much speed or power . Plastic hulls flex and warp to much they are just not worth the trouble . Have a look at the pursuit deep v it can be found in the for sale items this forum .It comes complete , except for radio and batt . It is very fast and handles as if it's on rails . Also a pretty good rough water boat . Just my 2 cents .

[searay skipper]

All of the suggestions to scrap this thing and go for something else will be looked at in the future I suspect.....after I get this thing running and hand it down to my Grandson.

But for now.....I'm embarking on an experiment to get this thing at least operable...as cheaply as I can. I'm not interested at this point in time to put out another $300 - $400 - $500 for something new and just walk away from the $258.00 I have sunk into this thing already.....and it's only been run once. When I get it doing something.....and then hand it down to my Grandson....THEN I'll consider looking at some of the better units that have been recommended to me.

Update on Banana Hobby:

They phoned me last night. They have accepted my proposal for a resolution and they are sending me something else. If I get what they said they will send me.....I'm satisfied. I've read lots of negative stories about them....some positive ones. If/when I get what they're supposed to send me....add me to the positive list. We'll see.

[searay skipper]

Back to the battery question for a second......

I know most if not all of you have gone the Lipo route....but what are the benefits you see over the Nicads?

[madmorgan]

searay i was actually pondering on redoing my fathers but he gave it away and got kinda bummed cuz he got screwed. what i was going to do with his was firstly remove the middle motor altogether and replace the 2 outer motors with some 500 sized outrunners or maybe a few 2200ish inrunners. all the electronics would need replaced as the "speed control" was just a curcuit board with the rx and everything integrated. theres a big differance between lipos and nicads/ nimhs. imagine it like your kitchen sink and flow where nimhs/nicads can only let so much water exit the faucet lipos are "depending on the packs c ratings etc double and or triple that output. you do have to take special care with lipos and theres plenty of reading on it. your best bet if you have paypal is to start looking at hobbyking and you can get it running for a cheaper price than most . as far as props with a submerged drive i have no idea others / old schoolers would probably be able to direct you with a good setup that wont break the bank and get it moving decently.

[ozzie-crawl]

Good to hear you may get something better. least you may have spare motors etc.
I know you are probably sick of hearing "scrap it" but guys have gone threw the same thing and know what there talking about trying to save you time,money and frustration.

As far as batteries go unless the esc has LVC (low voltage cutoff) forget lipos unless you add a external LVC.
Lipos deliver more power and for longer.Have a much longer life span.
I see you have been trying to figure the whole battery lingo thing so just a quick heads up.
The C rating is basically how much a lipo can be discharged in amps, the higher the C rating the more amps it can deliver.Always look at constant C rating not burst.
This is also Dependant on capacity (mah).
most lipos are around 20c and up. so a 20c 5000mah (or 5 amp hours) battery would give you 100 amps (20c x 5 =100) its generaly a good idea not to exceed 75-80% of the batteries constant discharge capabilities.
A typical nimh has a C rating around 5-6 C. very low
Lipos need a bit of respect as not used properly can catch fire. nimh are a bit more fool hardy but can explode.

[searay skipper]

thanks Ozzie.....digesting all this battery stuff here.

I saw some vids of lipos blowing up and burning up. looks like they definitely require some respect......don't need any of that stuff happening on my workbench in my shop. kinda like my house the way it is. LOL

"I know you are probably sick of hearing "scrap it" but guys have gone threw the same thing and know what there talking about trying to save you time,money and frustration."

Oh I fully understand where they're coming from and appreciate the input. But I'm just doing the math here and if I can put maybe a $100 or so into this thing and get it going with Shawn's esc....another servo and radio.....then I'd have something running for my Grandson to play with. I'd have $350 - $400 total into it. THEN...perhaps put out another $400 or so for something better for myself. At least then I'd have 2 operating boats.

Just walking away from my current $258 investment and buying something else.....I'd have somewhere around $650 - $700 total invested.......one good operating boat....and a big green piece of junk just sitting here.

PLUS....this is an experiment that will hopefully help me through the learning curve a bit as I start to get deeper into a new hobby.

[ozzie-crawl]

thanks Ozzie.....digesting all this battery stuff here.

I saw some vids of lipos blowing up and burning up. looks like they definitely require some respect......don't need any of that stuff happening on my workbench in my shop. kinda like my house the way it is. LOL

Yep lipos deserve some respect but dont let the you tube videos put you off.
i personally have never had a lipo fire (touch wood) and i have run them for about 7 years in boats,on-road cars,off-road cars etc. (except for the ones i stuck screw drivers threw. not recommended)
i usually charge in a lipo sack that sits on a 1/4" thick 18" square tile on its own shelf.

[highflyerbill]

Lipo's have come a long way in the last 3 yrs. and are much,much more reliable to the point where if you use a good charger and balancer with some common sense you'll have no problems . The lipo and brush less motors are what put the fast in FE boats . Read the safty tips and proper handling of lipo's in this forum and several orthers and you'll be good to go .

[BHChieftain]

Hi Searay skipper,
If the objective is to keep costs down, use existing motors, and give to your grandson, I would skip the lipos...

First, they are dangerous unless you know what you are doing
Second, you need a high end charger to charge them safely (more $$)
Third, if you discharge them too much you can kill them, so you need an ESC with LVC else you must time your runs
Fourth, if your goal is longer runtime vs. extra speed, then the extra voltage and higher discharge ability does not matter for you
Fifth, extra weight of nihms does not really matter for such a large (and slow) boat

If you stick to nimhs, your grandson (not sure how old he is) can charge the packs himself, and run it without a stopwatch...


Somebody recently posted this overview on lipos-- if new to these batteries this is a good overview of them

http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=209187

Now for your next boat after you finish this project, then lipos are a must...
With proper equimpent in the boat, a proper lipo charger, and safe charging/storage practice, the benefits are worth it.

Chief

[searay skipper]

AH HA...thanks Chief....good info and I will certainly consider all you've said when the time comes to buy.

I've read through that link you provided....will likely be reading it again.....as well as other stuff on batteries.

My Grandson is fairly young......I don't allow him yet to go anywhere near the batteries and chargers for anything....his rc cars...monsters trucks or anything else. I am the ONLY one charging batteries.

Thanks.

[rc2266]

Sooo, what was the settlement with Bananahobby?

[Visual Perfection]

ya, did you end up getting one of those boats that was suggested from banana hobby earlier in this thread? If so, you will have yourself another candidate for upgrades, and a much better one at that...that boat is a surface drive, single motor, steerable outdrive...you could get one brushless motor and one esc..makes it so much cheaper and an easier project with layout of the internals on that one. The steerable outdrive people will say is not the best for fast boats, but my shockwave has a steerable outdrive and it works just fine, never had an issue, and that boat runs around 28-30mph...I would still run it as-is just so you have a running boat, but once something breaks...upgrade time!!

[ejimbo4]

Nobody has mentioned this but you could turn the green plastic piece into a rescue rig! More sooner than later you are going to have to retrieve a flipped or disabled craft and there are a few options but another rc boat is used by many! Never swim for a boat!

[searay skipper]

"ya, did you end up getting one of those boats that was suggested from banana hobby earlier in this thread?"

Yup.....2 of 'em. The wife wants to play as well.

And a spare battery as well.

The total package they agreed to send me...2 boats plus spare battery... ended up totalling $3.00 less than I originally paid for this thing I have here. And they don't want it back.

Soooooooo........if/when I get everything from them.....I'll praise their customer service. At least in so far as how they treated me anyway. I know many others have claimed to have had bad luck with them and that's unfortunate.....but they seemed to have made a more than acceptable effort to satisfy me. So now I wait for a couple big packages to show up at my mailbox.

As for this thing becoming a "rescue" boat......someone already suggested that here and it may very well become that. The Grandson said he'd prefer a monster truck anyway. LOL We'll see.

Already started wheeling and dealing on an esc with someone here...and I'll likely soon begin shopping for other components to get this big green thing working.

Unfortunately...more time is being spent right now trying to get my REAL boat ready for launch in 2 weeks. Couple issues to sort out on it before playing too much with this rc thing. Not enough hours in the day.

[searay skipper]

"steerable outdrive"

what would your definition of this be??