Bought a ProBoat Stealthwake to play with

[arrover]

I've been looking at this funky deep-v for a while now and finally pulled the trigger on it. I've been running my Voracity several times a week lately but once in a while the water is to rough for speed passes. When the water is that rough, it's a blast in the Stealthwake. I run it on 2S Lipo packs through a EC3 to 5.5 bullet adapter I built. The stock motor and electronics seem to work well together but I'm working on a brushless setup for it. Maybe run 3S in it. The stock motor has a cooling coil around it but the ESC is not water cooled. The water pickup is in the bottom of the boat so they can use a solid rudder to save money (I assume). Anyway, here are a few pictures. I'll try to add some more as I mod this thing.

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[arrover]

Here's a video that shows it running in some waves.

[Rafael_Lopez]

I didn't develop this one but I sure enjoyed testing it. It's a very fun boat.

Some personal tips as a boat geek, and not as a Pro Boat Product Developer, if you mod it, definitely add a flex cable and get the prop level. Max motor is 2000kv on 3s. I used our Dynamite 30A ESC, thogh a 60 will give more prop range. More power than that from motor/battery combo and the boat becomes very erratic because of it's narrow beam, especially if you still plan to run in rough water. But boy is it fun in rough water!!

Modding of course is done at your own risk

[arrover]

I agree Rafael. Very fun boat! I actually do have a flex cable setup ordered and a 1800kv motor to test in it. Thanks for the tips. That is very helpful. I really don't want to hurt the rough water fun of the boat. I wonder how a slightly scaled up version would run?

[arrover]

So I've been messing around with this Stealthwake a lot recently. I bought this boat with the intention of building it with a brushless motor setup that was hopefully capable of running 3S. So don't take these modifications as shortcomings of the stock boat. It really is a blast right out of the box. The Stealthwake comes with a 550 size brushed motor and air cooled esc. They come out easily. The water outlet on the stock boat is just the end of the cooling tubing glued into the side of the hull so I swapped that for a Aeromarine stainless outlet for 7/32 tubing.

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[arrover]

The stock rudder and bracket are plastic and there's quite a bit of play in the mount and flex in the rudder. I also wanted to get a rudder with a water intake in it just in case I decide to eliminate the bottom mounted water pickup. I ordered a rudder for a Blackjack 24/Shockwave 26 and it worked out really well. It's the right size and two of the holes in the transom line up almost perfectly. I did have to drill two more holes for the new rudder. The aluminum Blackjack rudder is mounted a little deeper than the stock rudder to hopefully make the boat a little more stable at faster speeds. The steering arm is on the correct side of the rudder but I had to bend the steering rod some in order to hook it up but the stock length worked fine.

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[arrover]

The stock drive is a straight stuffing tube with a 3mm threaded drive shaft. The stuffing tube has a outer diameter close to 9/32 but has reducing bushings in the ends so that the 3mm drive shaft fits tightly. I decided to remove the stuffing tube and install 9/32 tubing so that I could use a liner and .187" flex shaft. The strength is overkill but this way I didn't have to do anything crazy to be able to use 3/16" props. The stuffing tube and flex let the drive shaft be parallel with the bottom of the boat instead of the downward angle of the straight shaft. The install went very smoothly except that the 9/32 tubing was a tight fit. I figured that this would be a good thing but it ended up putting a 1/2" long split in the keel right under the stuffing tube entry. I sealed it with CA glue and I'll keep an eye on it for now. It looks worse than it is I think. If you try this, make sure the stuffing tube slides in easily. Don't stress the plastic hull to much.

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[arrover]

The motor is the 1800kv Dynamite out of my Impulse 31 V2. It's the right size for the mount and I decided to try it before buying anything else. The Seaking 180a ESC is overkill too but I had it sitting around and the bullets were already set up for the motor and my batteries. The side of the ESC says 3S-6S but it works just fine on 2S. The stock ESC bolts onto it's mount so I cut off the threaded nipples and then the ESC fit great. I blocked off the hull water intake with a bolt and tubing for now.

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[arrover]

I had a chance to test it today and it ran well. The prop I used is a plastic Graupner 2317.45 (1.4 pitch, 45mm diameter). The water was rough but the Stealthwake runs much "dryer" now. Before, most of the hull was planted in the water. It's trimmed out much more now. It's probably going to take some tuning to get it running where I want it. Right now it's a little bow high and can trip and stuff in bigger waves. Still, this didn't happen except for a couple times and it ran really well otherwise. Stock the boat ran 19.7mph on 2S the one time that I GPSed it. Today it ran 26.3mph on 2S and 28.3mph on 3S. The water was to rough to do full throttle runs on 3S in it's current state and before I switched to 3S, the plastic prop got chipped on floating debris. Anyway, I've been having fun building this thing.

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[kfxguy]

Nice write up!

[Rafael_Lopez]

Nice to see you doing this. I ended up using smaller diameter stuffing tube and went with no liner, for the same reason you found out; I didn't want to stress the hull and have that happen.

I also snapped off my turn fins in favor of some longer ones. I found the boat would skip now on turns as the added speed finds the turns fins too short to provide the adequate traction. I had a set of Impulse fins that I threw on some generic 90* mounts(Impulse fin mounts wont work). I'll be changing out the tabs too for longer ones to allow for better tuning.

You're right though, the boat runs a lot dryer, but still is capable of rough water handling.

This little hull is proving to be a nice starting point for those who just want to bash when the water is less than favorable.


Whoa! Just noticed you have a 180 in there. I only have a 60, lol.

[arrover]

Thanks guys! Yeah, live and learn I guess. This is my first plastic hulled boat. I may have to eventually epoxy the crack area but I'll figure it out. Thanks for the info on the turn fins. I happen to have a set of spare Impulse fins! I'll never need the capability of the 180. It was just the fastest/easiest way to get the build on the water.

[Tamelesstgr]

Reminds me a lot of my Shockwave trials and tribulations this past spring/summer. Love the look of the Stealth hull. My Shockwave isn't the greatest hull, but has been a great learning platform. 2016 will bring a new powerplant, upgraded flex, new esc, more cooling! Looking for 40mph.

[arrover]

The Shockwave sounds like a fun project! 40mph in the Steathwake would crazy fast. I am interested in speed but not at the sacrifice of the ability to handle rough water. I haven't had any trials and tribulations with this boat. Just the crack due to my own stupidity. I'm hoping to go run it again later today. RC boats are just one more reason why winter is my least favorite season.

[arrover]

I was able to get out after lunch for a tiny bit of run time. The wind and water was calm so I was able to run 3S easily. It turns out that it runs GREAT! I'm really happy. I ran it full throttle for long periods of time with a Graupner 2317.48 plastic prop (1.4pitch, 48mm diameter) and never had any problems. Well except when I went full throttle from a dead stop and it flipped the boat over upside down.... 25.6mph on 2S and a high of 38.8mph on 3S. No spinning out or weird handling issues. I hope to get some more video sometime soon.

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