Advice for a newbie. Which V hull should I buy? Sonicwake, Dominator

[MATTTEAKLE]

Hi all.
Just joined the forum and recently found myself enjoying RC boats. Not new to RC been around bashers and crawlers for many years now and organise/run the UKs largest crawler event.

Started with a Joysway Rocket V2 and an Atomic SR85 a month back and I'm really enjoying them but well aware they are very basic entry level boats and in all honesty pretty rubbish. Now looking to move on to a much better quality and performance V hull. Recommendations please as I'm only really finding the Sonicwake or Dominator which seems stupidly priced to be honest especially for me I the UK. Any others I'm overlooking?

Thanks all.

[1coopgt]

Just my opinion, I think I'd go with the Sonicwake . It's got a flood chamber so its self righting which makes life a little easier if you flip the boat. If you're ready to go all in then maybe the Dominator. You'll need some way to recover the boat . Swimming to the boat isn't advised. I have a feeling the Dominator is probably a bit faster.

I've never owned a Mono so my opinion you can take with a grain of salt. All of my boats are Cats and one Hydro.

[Panchothedog]

If you are looking for a ready to run boat the TFL pursuit gives you a great
bang for your buck. It handles well and can be easily hopped up to be a very fast mono. It is sold through OSE the website you are currently on.

[NativePaul]

What size or cell count are you looking for?
You say hull in the title, but mention 2x RTRs as considerations, are you after a hull to fit out yourself or an RTR to buy?
Is the posibility of racing in your future or are you sure you will be running alonefor the forseable future?

As far as Hulls go, for a mini 2/3s I would get a Mini Mono from Tenshock, for a 2/3s I would get a Slider from Ecomater, and for a 4/6s I would get a Hulk from RCSails.

If you might race at some point in the future the only thing I can recommend off the shelf is the Tenshock Mini Mono, all the others I know of like the ones already mentioned have at best vinylester unstepped hulls, flex drives, bushings in the struts, low end motors, and aren't competitive in Eurasia. If you want a full size boat RTR at a decent price I would buy a used ex race boat that someone else has built, even if it is a few seasons old it will be much more competitive than anying mentioned above, alternatively you could commision one of the race hull makers to build you a RTR, but that is an expensive endevor.

If you are sure you won't ever race, then all those mentioned above are a good step up from your Joysway, and without any direct comparison you may be very happy with one for years.

[MATTTEAKLE]

Thanks for the replys and suggestions so far. I'm not looking to race its more for fun and looking for a larger size boat to what I already have. RTR or ARTR would be good but not against learning how to piece one together. I have stumbled across these Hydra 850 which are availble in the UK so obviously that's easier for me to get hold of. Anyone have any input with these?

https://www.prestwich.ndirect.co.uk/fastelectrics.htm

[NativePaul]

As a racer it pisses me off that he calls it a race boat when it isnt, as we do get people coming to the races that havent done enough research and have "race boats" that they have been suckered into buying, that are totally uncompetitive and/or dont fit the rules, sometimes after spending more than what an actual race boat would have cost; Sometimes they teat it as a learing season and are content to finish a few laps down while they pick up the knowledge to do a really good race boat build over winter, sometimes they ask around and come to the next race with either a used or comissined race boat, but often they are disillusioned and we never see them again. As you already know that you never wanna race, that won't affect you.

Dave Marles who runs Prestwich Marine has been racing IC boats since Moses was a boy, and while he doesnt know FE specifically very well he knows fast model boats like the back of his hand, and I think that putting the money into the hull as he does, and fitting it with budget hardware and electrics is the right way to go, as the quality of budget hardware and electrics can be much better than that of budget hulls.

Dave uses TFL hardware which is the goto for cheap chinese hardware, sure there is much better stuff out there, but not at that price point, TFL hardware is also used on both the Persuit and the Dominator. I rate TFL hardware much higher than Proboat's, and while I wouldn't use one of their struts stock on a race boat, I have modded them for ball bearings and used them, and have used their stock rudders and engine mounts on race boats.

Likewise the TFL SSS motors Dave (and the Persuit)uses are a great value proposition, I would rate them at the low side of mid range performance while being at the high side of low end pricing. Conversely I would rate the proboat motors at the high side of low end performance at the high side of mid range pricing.

The only thing I would realy knock that boat for is the ESC, I have never used one so can't comment on its quality, but for a boat that size it is worryingly lowly rated at 90A, and for the ?20 price difference I would upgrade to the 150A in a heartbeat.