New guy with a new boat

[sft2]

Hello guys/girls/other, I'm yet another new guy that's sure to annoy the locals with a ton of irritating questions and other typical noob things. First a little about me so everyone fully appreciates the depths of my insanity. First, I've been involved in RC models for... wow, I'm old... 25 years. It started with planes, then cars, then more planes, helis, and so on. I've attempted boats a couple of times, but never got one on the water. That was back in the days before the internet where information, both good and bad, could be had with a click of a mouse.

Work, wife, and kids got in the way for a few years, but in '09 I blew up my spine, which ended my law enforcement career. While attempting to recover and cope with extreme boredom, I decided to go back to RC. My meds mess with my reflexes and depth perception, so no flying, surface only. After few cars and trucks, lots and LOTS of mods since I really prefer building and tinkering to driving, I'm running out of things to do and need a project.

I've been a fan of Traxxas since getting a Slash 4x4 and modding everything under the sun, then a Slayer Pro and blinging it out with a bunch of aluminum, an OS .21, and remote start, then a 4Tec that's getting remote start, with the starter module on a slick little aluminum mount I machined yesterday. Naturally, I fully intended to buy a Spartan. I love the looks, but I'm not so sure a plastic hull is a good plan and I really didn't want to pay for a radio, batteries, and charger that I'll never use (I'm a Futaba guy. 3PKS, 4PKS, and 8UAFS.) So I sold the Slash to fund the project and bribed a friend with lunch for a ride to the hobby shop. I really did plan on getting the Spartan and selling off the stuff I didn't need, but if I'd gone that way I wouldn't be posting in this section...

Sitting just above the Spartan was a Mystic 29 PNP. Done deal. Gave my usual crack dealer... err, hobby shop clerk a wad of cash and headed home with a big box of boat, some water line, and a gizmo that claims to balance a pair of 2s packs like they're a single 4s. A couple of packs are on the charger now, and it seems to be working, so it's $5 well spent (lipos still scare the hell out of me, so they're in a nomex bag right now).

Before I went to the police academy I spend quite a few years as a prototype machinist, and I have a decent size lathe on the workbench, so I made a little aluminum thing last night:

water_pickup.jpg

Still need to drill it for the aluminum tubing I picked up today and find some 10-24 screws and setscrews (yeah, I know, faulty thread design, but much easier to find in stainless), then onto the transom it goes. I also need to make a pair of water outlets. The stock outlet is perfectly fine, but I'm a perfectionist and want them to match. Fortunately the water jacket on the motor is aluminum, so I don't have to make one of those. That's more boring than I'm excited to do. The plan is rudder pickup to ESC to left outlet and new pickup to motor to right outlet. That way I can tell if either cooling system is plugged up.

That brings me to a question: where should a transom mounted pickup be mounted on a cat? Would it be better to put it near the bottom of one of the hulls, or near the center, ahead of the prop?

I think I've written enough of a book now, so I'm off to read as much as I can find about the Mystic, then I'll install a tiny little Futaba R603FF, assuming I can find a balloon to stuff it in (hey, it's a $90 receiver, I'm a bit paranoid about it and water in the same place and the same time), program the transmitter, and see how she sits in the pool.

[Make-a-Wake]

Glad you're here................that was a pleasant post to read. Since you seem to have time and like to tinker, be prepared to tinker on the many more boats you will obtain now that you pushed the snowball over the edge!

Firstly, the boat in stock form is very good and is basically RTR.........other then the usual screw/nut tightening, water line flow checks, flex drive alignment etc............ so when they built it they felt that one pickup was enough, and it really is. All you will do is add more drag and even worse you will add it to one sponson sort of throwin the whole chemistry off in the design. If you must mod.....and you must apparently, go for a bigger motor.................lower kv and 6s..............bigger amp ESC..............new paint scheme................etc................ BTW, an Octura x642 really wakes that boat up.

[sft2]

Yup, more time than I know what to do with since I can barely walk, much less drive. Fortunately I have a good friend that hauls me around when I need to go somewhere, like the hobby shop :D

I was really wanting to build a boat from scratch. Not a bare hull, I mean a roll of glass. But then my brain kicked in. I figure it's probably a pretty decent idea to start with something I know works and use that to figure out how to do it. I'm hoping to start on the new hull in the next couple of weeks so I don't have to attempt to lay up glass in the Texas heat. Being more or less totally insane the new hull will be a 72" deep vee, and I'd like 3 props on it. The local lake is in the middle of a few dozen thousand tree hugging yuppie types, so nitro/gas are out of the question. Electric it is... with lots of batteries.

I didn't even think about asymmetrical drag. Suppose the best plan is to run it hard and stick the temp gun on it every couple of minutes. For the time being I want to stick with a pair of 2s packs. Mostly because that's what I have, but my speed goal is only 45, so I'm hoping it won't need a giant motor and 6 cells. I'm looking for an x642 ready to mount now. One thing that always bugs me is being down with broken toys, so I'm ESC shopping. I'll need it for the 36" version of the monster I mentioned before anyway.

Now I'm off to make sure everything is tight, aligned, and waterproof so I can try to sneak off to the pond tomorrow.

Edit- Had a thought suddenly. I have a spare Traxxas Rx box around here somewhere, so I think I'm going to use that to keep the receiver dry. Beats trying to cram a receiver into a balloon, at least!

[sft2]

And I've discovered that this boat was a mistake. ESC doesn't have reverse and is a nightmare to set up, and both battery trays broke out of the hull before she even saw water. Yep, should have bought the Spartan.

[Doby]

Reverse on a FE boat is a waste of time, and perhaps you should read the Spartan forums before making rash decisions. Could save some MAJOR headaches.

[i2oadsweepei2]

Hello everyone :)

I have a proboat Stiletto and the Mystic. The mystic is my favorite thus far. I had issues with my battery trays as well. I fixed them up with a little bit of fiberglass resin. They are pretty solid now. I've never really had the use for reverse personally. It's a great handling boat and fairly quick out of the box. I also stuffed the sponsons with carefully carved pool noodles. Just enough to hold them in firmly and not push up or distort the hull. The only other thing I did was sharpen and balance the prop. This made a big difference in speed and runtimes. Almost forgot I upgraded the bullet connectors between the motor and esc to castle 6.5mm (had them already). There are a few things on the checklist before putting it in the water and thanks to the vast knowledge here on this forum it ran solid for me for four months before the waters froze. I would recommend it to anyone based on my experience.

I have since bought a spartan too. I got tired of sitting on the sidelines when the water was too rough while my friends with v-hulls were ripping it up. I took the electronics out already and replaced them with a castle 1515 1y 2200kv and a Seaking 180 to run on 4s. Funny enough I just put the castle electronics in the mystic to run on 4s lipo in hopes of swinging a bigger prop than stock.

I hope you keep the mystic. This is a great forum for info.


Kev

[sft2]

Reverse on a FE boat is a waste of time, and perhaps you should read the Spartan forums before making rash decisions. Could save some MAJOR headaches.

From where I'm sitting, this Mystic is a major headache. I just finished attempting to bond the trays back in with some seriously nasty looking West epoxy. Did you know that West hardener turns brown over time? Looks like the aftermath of a night of Taco Bell and cheap beer in there. If this doesn't hold it I'll get some carbon tape. If THAT doesn't hold it, nothing will.

Next boat is going to start with a bare hull. At least then I'll have some idea that things bonded to the hull are done right. The "epoxy," assuming that's what they intended to use, in this Mystic hull is so brittle that it just cracks cleanly off the hull. Makes me suspect every other joint in there and the quality of the hull layup itself.

[Make-a-Wake]

sft2, you'll find that there is no such thing as "RTR". There is always tightening, aligning and refastening. Mass produced boats will always have issues, i have a Mystic and rerouted the cooling, repositioned the ESC and re-epoxied the batt trays. The mystic is of much higher quality than the ABS Spartan. If you want a Vee hull get a Pursuit.

[sft2]

I understand that things need to be checked over, but bad bonding in major structural parts is a bit beyond an adjustment IMHO. Anyway, the epoxy has cured and poking at the parts in question resulted in no movement, so maybe it'll work. If not, 1/2" carbon tape is my friend. The next part isn't really a complaint against ProBoat, more of a gripe about the various radio standards. Futaba receivers connected to other than Futaba servos always result in my having to crank in a ton of subtrim to straighten things out. Somewhere in the low 50s in this case. Centered is right between two splines. I desperately need to find an adjustable horn that won't slip, but I'll wait until I get another Savox servo in there. I'm thinking 1256TG or 1257TG should do. The stock servo is unbelievably slow.

I think I've worked out the goofiness with the ESC. I set the throttle mode to 70/30 and it seems to have started behaving. I'd still like reverse so I can be cool and back off the beach, but I'll deal with it.

I think I've decided on a DF35 for the next hull. My local pond is small enough that low 40s will work nicely, but a deep vee will run on the shallow, choppy glorified pond in yuppieland (yes, it's related to zombieland), which is MUCH bigger than my little redneck puddle, so 55 for that one. I think I'm gonna need more batteries...

Oh yeah, I changed out the Spektrum stickers on the hatch for Futaba. That'll make her run better, right?

[sft2]

Got out to the pond today, finally. There was a bit of a breeze, but the water was still smooth. Apparently I got the CG and rudder trim right since she ran straight and stable. Fast, too. Almost too fast for this pond. I'm thinking someone else has run a boat there in the past since the ducks immediately got out of the water and waited. I did discover one more thing I don't like about this ESC. The low voltage cutoff is sudden and total. No reduced power, no idle, no nothing, just rudder... in the middle of the pond. Fortunately it's a small pond and there was that breeze I mentioned before, so I didn't have to go home to fetch a fishing pole. Motor was around 96°, ESC and batteries around 86°, plenty of water flowing, and only a few drops of water in the bottom of the sponsons. I'll leave the cooling system alone.

Last night I attempted to clock the servo to get the arm centered without subtrim, but the stock Proboat servo's pot is driven off the output gear, so that won't work. I can't find any angle adjustable arms, but I did find some Great Planes arms with interchangable inserts for different spline patterns. The inserts are square, so rotating the insert 90° will change the orientation. I'll see if I can pick one up this weekend. Unfortunately neither of my local shops carry Savox, so I'll have to wait a bit to order a 1257TG. I'm going to see if the shop has the Proboat ESC programming card, too. Hopefully that'll let me change the LVC to something less abrupt. I'm also adding a cleat to the deck so I can cast a line and fish her out.

I'm not entirely satisfied with the velcro battery attachment setup. It's a pain to get the packs (Gens Ace 5ah 40c 2s) out of the sponsons, especially with the bullet connectors into the packs themselves. I'm thinking over an arrangement that'll make that easier. Maybe some G10 plates that stick on the velcro with a velcro strap around the packs and blocks at each end to restrain them. That way the trays can be pried out to change the CG, but packs can be stuffed in and strapped down fast and easy.

So, in summary, boat did great, battery tray repair did great, ducks fled, got home with everything reusable, day was good. Next boat: Fightercat Fantasm

[Make-a-Wake]

Glad it went well.................sounds like you really enjoyed it. Got the boat bug yet???????

[sft2]

Yup, seems like a good hull. Gets on plane easy, holds turns well, sails half decent when the batteries die...

I've had the bug, just haven't been able to do anything about it. Now I'm going to thin out my car collection and add boats.

After waiting for the Mystic to blow to shore I got to thinking. I'm pretty sure I have enough stuff sitting around to build an airboat. Just need to fetch a kickboard for a hull and a Pelican case for a radio box. Then I'll have to turn a prop adapter (half hour job). With a notch cut out of the kickboard it'll make shoving dead boats back to shore fairly easy.

[Make-a-Wake]

I have a new system where i just hook a fishing line to the rudder of another boat(different radio of course), then drive it around the stalled one as it pulls out line, and pull 'em both back in.

[sft2]

Sounds like a pretty good plan, actually. I'm going with my plan due to not having another boat to go fetch the first boat with, and needing something to build to keep myself out of trouble. I'm thinking a boogie board will be a good place to start since the motor I have in mind is a 12 turn 550. A kickboard will likely be massively overpowered with that motor.

[sft2]

Note to self: Do not go to Hobbypartz.com while medicated. Wound up with an empty paypal account and a Seaking 120a ESC and programmer. Fortunately I had some Castle bullets sitting around so I pulled out the motor and ESC, soldered some stuff up, and put it all back together. Spent all day at the neurologist, so I didn't have time to go to the pond today. Hopefully tomorrow will work out. I think I set the timing to 11.5, 3.2v LVC, 4 cells, and turned on reverse. Yeah, I know, not very useful, but I'm hoping to be able to back off the shore after beaching her to change stuff in the transmitter. And with 120 amps available there should be plenty of headroom for playing with props.