Spartan, tear it down to build it up

[Jeff Wohlt]

Kevin, your wiredrives shipped today. I will get your a tracking number.

[dag-nabit]

Kevin, your wiredrives shipped today. I will get your a tracking number.

Thanks Jeff, looking forward to giving them a try. I should have a chance to run the .187 cables a bit while I wait on shipping, so that will give me a chance to evaluate which drive system I prefer over the next several weeks.

Kevin

[GeoVW72]

If you are using Jeff's cables you do need a new nut, 10-32. .150 is a drop in fit, .187 you need a new coupler from 5mm to .187, and I would replace the stock brass. I'm not a big fan of what they used and someone on the traxxas forum had an issue, K&S is better stuff.

I've had good luck with Jeff's .150 cable. The big problem that is see the multiple points of alignment or misalignment that can take place over the drive line.

I actually haven't used a thrust bearing with the new motor and it doesn't seem to care as much as the old motor, you have plenty of space though, they're about the thickness of the plastic.


Just ADD Water: haven't done much with the villain, porpoised a lot and I lost the hatch. quite a few people have done twin vxls with the vxl-3s, but there's not any cooling for the escs. the vxl-6s hasn't had an issue with the motors, smaller props would be better though.


It's been pretty warm here, lake almost feels like bath water, 75-90*f has been the air temp.
Motor and esc temps still stay around 100-130*f so the new power system works pretty well, at least with the cooling mods that I've made, don't have the parts to go back to stock.

Still working all the kinks out of the drive line

[GeoVW72]

Can Drive 55

Or close enough

got new 3s cells to replace the old ones

4s - 36mph



6s - 54.3mph



Temps are good, looks like a winner.... after you replace the whole drive line
Also, no trim tabs, no torque roll, no chine walking unless it ran over it's own wake. Prop was a proboat = to a P215 which is close enough to stock.

Trim tabs do add stability, but I wonder if traxxas is using them for more than they should. Page 28 of the manual shows the tabs negative, but all I ever run is neutral or only slightly negative. Most of the knowledge I've gained on here says to play with CG(center of gravity) before trying to trim the hull. That's what I have done and it works for the way I run the boat.

Have to work on a write up for the drive line

[dag-nabit]

George,

As usual, a very informative post.

Is that with the new components, i.e. the 1800kv motor.

Kevin

[GeoVW72]

Thanks Kevin,

It was the V2 components; 1800kv motor without the Castle stamp, "new" traxxas esc.

[Snafujg]

Geo, I'm very interested to hear about this drive line that you've come up with. I had my Spartan out last weekend and I was able to get rid of most of the torque roll I was experiencing by moving the strut up a little bit. Still have chine walking, though. Even with 2 sets of trim tabs she walks when I get to about 3/4 throttle. Because of that, I can't hold WOT for more than a second or two. That's with the bottom 2 trim tabs pretty negative. Maybe I will try moving them back to Neutral. The outer trim tabs have always been at neutral. I will also be switching out my CC1515/Seaking180 combo for the new traxxas/castle combo that I received. Not sure how much that will help. It's basically just a lower KV motor than I was running.

[Jeff Wohlt]

Does the prop shaft go all the way to the hull On these? Can a shorter shaft work? I mean the 5mm part of it.

[GeoVW72]

Snafujg: still working at it, some of the issues take time to arise. I want to make sure that it can work without issue.
I would reset the lower trim tabs and work with the outer ones a little bit. The combo you are running may be too much rpm for the hull to handle. I've been able to get it to torque roll getting on it too fast, you need to ease through the throttle smoothly to get the hull on a level plane.

Jeff: not sure how much you could take off, this is how it looks mounted;

The stub does not enter the transom, but I'm not sure where you could subtract any.




Went back to a series loop, temps stayed the same if not cooler
Put the tabs back on neutral, they do help with high speed stability and in chop.

4s - 36mph


6s - 52


So lost a small amount on the top end, but consistently above 50. Boat was stable with the chop on the lake today, moved the packs an 1" to keep it on the water, there may have been a few more mph left but not the room or the risk. The thing you have to keep in mind is that to get to full speed you need a lot of room to wind it out.

Not sure why everyone has to have the Castle stuff, you're not going to get that much more out of the boat with some programming. The esc was designed to run within a certain demand that I do not believe is that much greater than the traxxas esc.
The only complaint I will make is the low lvc cut off that could damage packs.

Geo

[Snafujg]

Geo, I tend to agree with you on the CC1515 motor. I think it my just be too many rpms for the hull, expecially on 6S where it's pulling 49,280 RPMS. I know there are a couple guys running that motor (Rinksi and Wilsta) and Rinksi hasn't had issues but Wilsta blew up his ESC. I'm hoping that the new Castle/Traxxas will be better suited to the hull and will eliminate some of the issues I'm having. I will go back to neutral on all the trim tabs and go from there. My issue is that I only get to run the boat once a week. I go to my lake cottage on the weekends and get to run on Friday night. Saturday is usually way to choppy due to all the boat traffic on the lake. So I run it once, then come here for more suggestions! Thanks to all you guys for all your continued help. I'm determined to get this baby running fast and stable, even if it only happens once this summer!

[Brushless55]

Geo, I love that you keep posting your runs!
good stuff man..

[Brushless55]

Thanks Kevin,

It was the V2 components; 1800kv motor without the Castle stamp, "new" traxxas esc.

if it does not say Castle chances are its not a true Castle motor...

[GeoVW72]

BL55: I think the first order was a rush, no time for engraving the end bell, the other ones are a carbon copy. I'm just getting started, system runs pretty well, maybe I can get 60 out of it with the right prop.

Jeff: not sure how many collets you make or know the other specs of, but the stock wrenches are 10mm and the collets placement in the hull doesn't make it conducive to working on it with anything other than a fixed open end wrench.

Not sure how people are having issues with the stock one, I've been using the same one this whole time.
You don't have to crank on it like he-man;

A finger on each wrench is all that you need.

Tweaked the outer tabs close to stock settings.

4s - 33mph


6s - 53


Boat was very stable, would still chine walk over it's own wake, but torque roll was pretty much gone. Not sure why the amp draw dropped on 4s, hull still seemed like it has the same attitude
Put another set of adjusters on order for the inner ones, maybe tweaking them a little bit can help.
Time to start playing with props, given the news that the Castle system poped on a x642 I'm going to start with a x640 and go from there.

Geo

[Brushless55]

BL55: I think the first order was a rush, no time for engraving the end bell, the other ones are a carbon copy. I'm just getting started, system runs pretty well, maybe I can get 60 out of it with the right prop.
Tweaked the outer tabs close to stock settings.


Geo

if they were true Castle they would have the Castle wires cuz they put them on their products
I really think someone else is building them, just like the Leopards

[dag-nabit]

if they were true Castle they would have the Castle wires cuz they put them on their products
I really think someone else is building them, just like the Leopards

Not according to this: http://www.rc-monster.com/forum/show...t=30208&page=2

Patrick del Castillo of Castle states the motors are built by Castle Holdings LLC in China, The ESC is built by Castle in the in USA.

The ESC is a new design, the motor is based on an existing platform.

Kevin