Traxxas Villain IV questions

[dontrinko]

I bought a villain IV and I have a few questions. It has a 27mhz controller on channel 4.
1. did all of the IV's come with mechanical speed control?
2. If it comes with the stinger motors are the 12T a direct replacment without any mods? I do know I need to have one motor of the reverse type.
3. I have seen a " timing belt drive mod." Anyone sell the parts for this? Is it worth doing?
Any suggestions? Thanks; Don

[gsbuickman]

Hiya Don . The Traxxas Villaim IV is a vintage boat from the mid 80's. It may be 30+ yrs old but its still fun to upgrade a little bit and play with.

There are several Traxxas villain build threads in the boat building area from our friend Make-a-Wake & a few build threads that I have done as well. To answer your questions.

No not all Traxxas villains came with mechanical speed controls, they actually came with the Traxxas xl-q esc as well. The stinger motors are the correct stock motors that came with them and the factory upgrade motors from Traxxas that are in the new model of the villain are the Titan motors, although there are better choices for motors out there.

I'm not sure how confident you are when it comes to tearing a boat apart and rebuilding it but I would suggest upgrading it with the out drive and prop set from fun rc boats, but in doing so you will need to replace the bushings with flanged bearings, slightly larger stuffing tubes, and ream out the outdrives to accept the flanged bearings instead of bushings and new prop shafts for the beryllium props instead of the stock plastic junk props.

in one of the last two villains that I built I used speed gems 2 platinum motors. In the other villain i used motors from a stock HPI e-savage instead of the Titan motors from a Traxxas e-maxx,. Both ran the Octura 447 props from fun RC boats and would cruise at 35 miles an hour which is the sweet spot for the villain.

[gsbuickman]

here is the villain search results from fun RC boats. I don't see the counter rotating prop and prop shaft sets anymore but you can still buy the props and propshafts separately. Remember, the props are counter rotating spinning in opposite directions to the outsides of the boat

http://www.funrcboats.com/Search.aspx?Keyword=villain

Here's my Villain X build, this goes into a lot of detail and will answer a lot of your questions

http://forums.offshoreelectrics.com/...hlight=villain

Here's my old school twist villain. I didn't go into all the detail I did the other one but after reading my first build thread you'll understand this one. the setup is the same except for the speed gem's motors and a different speed controller...

http://forums.offshoreelectrics.com/...hlight=villain

[gsbuickman]

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9JrGvWYOChM. ....

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=EAHXOsFu_5g

[dontrinko]

Thanks for all the information! I have other rc stuff and am reasonable skilled but I intend to keep it near stock.
It is supposed to come Monday. If it has the ESC and good props I will probably use it as is with liop's.
Eventually I will probably have to replace the motors. I normally look on Ebay. I am not finding the 12T"R" motors or many other reverse motors.
Thanks; Don

[Fluid]

Be careful switching this boat to LiPo power, the motors, wiring and speed control will get hotter. Even cheap LiPos will deliver a lot more power at a higher voltage than the best 20th century round cells this boat was designed for.

if you use motors with zero timing advance you can use the same motor for L and R rotation.



.

[dontrinko]

Thanks; I have not had any heat problems with other rc on Lipo's, probably because i have a infra red thermometer and a timer. When i first get any rc vehicle I check the motor temp every couple minutes and keep track of the max run time to be below 160 f motor temp.
With the boats I typically run for 3 minutes and am nowhere near max motor temp.
What motors have zero timing is the question. I think the Titan 12 T's and stingers are not zero timing. On my rc cars when a Stinger goes bad I replace it with a 12T and it runs a little cooler and a little faster. Thanks; Don

[gsbuickman]

I ran Speed Gems 2, Platinum and onyx Motors on 4s w/ an astroflight 212D esc with no problem. I also ran these HPI GT-550 mills with no problem, and they're designed for 14.4v power. Try the Traxxas EVX esc, they work great.

The rerelease Villain EX came with the EVX esc & The Titan motors, but they don't hold a candle to the HPI GT mills, the gt's are better motors and faster too...