The Monster Horsepower Villain IV project ...

Hiya Guy's :tiphat: ,

It's been awhile since I've done a boat build thread here on the board since I put my boats on the back burner and decided to focus on other things for the last couple of years. Well, I decided to pick up a couple more R/C's just to have around 2 play with once in a while.

I ended up picking up a really nice Venom King of Shaves ver.2, then I started looking around for another Traxxas villain IV for a project because I just can't get enough of them apparently and I realized just how scarce and expensive they're getting to be so I decided I better pick one up while I still could. Well, now that I have the boat & the last couple parts I was waiting on showed up in my mailbox today I can finally get another Villlain project started :) ..

Alrighty, here's what I have to start with guys, a 30+ yr old Traxxas Villain IV Chaparrel ABS hull that's already been gutted & is still in nice shape. The only Factory Hardware that I'll be reusing are the 4mm driveshafts, Factory gearing and the twin steerable outdrives which is what makes these boats so awesome, everything else will be filed in the garbage can.

The Villain was originally advertised for something like 17 mph in the late 1980's (86'-87') but you were lucky if you actually saw that speed out of them. The Hull design isn't much good for anything over 35MPH so going brushless is a waste of $ and time, even with the newer updated Traxxas villain EX because they never changed the Hull design. They just threw the Traxxas E-maxx Electronics in it and threw a different set of stickers on it and called it good to go.

My plans for the boat are to run a consistent 30-35mph which isn't hard to do these days even with brushed power not to mention there is a real kick in the butt to drive once you get them setup. I'll be using a few Villain EX upgrades, some nice upgrades from Steven and a few other goodies that look something like this :

Twin Trinity Monster Horsepower motors. 40k rpm's @ 7.4v & 80k @ 14.4 but with the factory gear reduction the props spin at half the speed of the motors.

A Traxxas AEVX2 Aircooled esc w/ lvc that'll handle 4s power. The EVX2 marine doesn't have lvc & their notorious for melting the plastic water cooling blocks and frying.

Traxxas #1575 motor water cooling kit & led silicone hose from Steven.

4mm gold-plated bullet connectors for esc to motor connections.

JX PDI-6221 MG servo rated @ 250oz. Even if it's 1/2 that it's more than enough.

11/32" k&s tubing for oversized stuffing tubes that'll accept flanged bearings reducing rolling resistance in the drives and strain on the motors.

Traxxas #1521R motor mounts / blue aluminum motor plate kit that, aligns the drives & eliminates the torsional stress from the old motor mount design

Traxxas #1577 push rod boots
Traxxas #1539R universal joints (2).
Traxxas #1531villain / blast trim tabs

(8) 4x8x3 metal shielded flanged bearings from RC Boys in salt Lake to replace the oilite bushings in the stuffing tubes & out drives reducing rolling resistance in the drives and outdrives as well as the motors and increasing rpm's.

A nice pair of CNC aluminum 48mm 4814250 counter-rotating props, conversion shafts, Drive dogs, prop nuts and bullet nuts from Steven. These should be lighter then the X447's I usually run on Villains which should reduce the rotating weight & optimize rpm's.

I'll be running my 6000mah 35c 2s Rev-Tech lipos on TRX connectors . In this case I think they should be just fine instead of running the usual 5.5mm gold plated bullets I usually run :biggrin: ...

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I've always regretted not buying one. I'll just hitch a ride on this build thread :cool2:

This is really cool and look forward to how it all comes together.

Early 2000's and mine at the time was eventually modded with a gear drive and 700 motor, you said it right with regards to 35mph being it's peak, that was right where I had it, total blast to run but above that and chine walk was to blame. I think it's neat that you are staying with brushed twins, something about those motors...and their smell and maintenance...kinda like comparing an old small block Chevy to a Tesla...which one has more character? ;-)

I wouldn't mind getting my hands on one but would go the BL route, low Kv single running parallel packs for tons of runtime and no heat...heck I'm sure a $25 BL motor and a 50amp esc would be more than enough.

Good luck with it...watching!

I went through several of those plastic U-joints on my Twinstorm outdrive until I started using these :

https://www.amazon.com/Products-Meta.../dp/B06XK848S7

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Originally Posted by Lone-Wolf

This is really cool and look forward to how it all comes together.

Early 2000's and mine at the time was eventually modded with a gear drive and 700 motor, you said it right with regards to 35mph being it's peak, that was right where I had it, total blast to run but above that and chine walk was to blame. I think it's neat that you are staying with brushed twins, something about those motors...and their smell and maintenance...kinda like comparing an old small block Chevy to a Tesla...which one has more character? ;-)

I wouldn't mind getting my hands on one but would go the BL route, low Kv single running parallel packs for tons of runtime and no heat...heck I'm sure a $25 BL motor and a 50amp esc would be more than enough.

Good luck with it...watching!

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Thanks :biggrin: I've done several villain builds here on the board a few years back, I just decided it was time to do another one. Here's one that I done with twin HPI GT-550 ESavage motors on the X447 prop kit that I ordered from fun RC boats. Naturally there will be similarities between that build and this one only this boat will be lighter and should be a little faster :tiphat:

https://forums.offshoreelectrics.com...per&highlight=

Well hello once again old friend. Glad to see you into another Villian

Cool, thanks for the link!

Keep us updated.

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Originally Posted by srislash

Well hello once again old friend. Glad to see you into another Villian

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Howdy Shawn :tiphat: , it's definitely been a while but you know me, I just can't get enough of these old Dylan boats :biggrin: ...

Ok , I finally got a little time this evening to get some work done on this thing. I started by using a graduated drill bit or step bit as I called them to ream out the holes in the rear transom to accept the new oversize stuffing tubes after I chopped that length of 11/32 k&s brass tube in half. I renamed the holes out with the drill bit by hand because you never want to use a drill on these things because you're only taking off a little bit of material and you want to keep the fit around the stuffing tubes as snug as possible so they still up nice and support the tubes.

Then I chucked a 1/4" drill bit in my drill and very carefully used it to ream out the new motor mounts to accept the oversize stuffing tubes. I did the majority of the work by hand turning the motor mounts on the bit by hand to slowly rename it out enough to get the stuffing tubes two-seat where they should be and I used the drill mostly in Reverse to clear out the little pieces and smooth them out. With that finally done I got the aluminum motor mount plate bolted to the motor mounts that will eliminate the torsional stress that the factory motor mounts cause without a plate on them, then I did a dry fit of the stuffing tubes in the motor mounts to see how much I need to trim off of them to even them up before installing the bearings and drive shafts.

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Originally Posted by properchopper

I went through several of those plastic U-joints on my Twinstorm outdrive until I started using these :

https://www.amazon.com/Products-Meta.../dp/B06XK848S7

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Thanks Tony :tiphat: . I might just have to order a pair of those if I have trouble with these. Surprisingly I've never had any trouble with the factory Traxxas U-joints on villain boats, even with 4S power. I tried the Graupner U-Joints but the carbon fiber or whatever they were made from was too hard and riddle and broke easily which is probably why they quit making them. These are the new upgraded heavy duty Traxxas U joints but I've never run them before so I'll wait and see how they do. Too bad no one makes 4 mm bore Spur Gears to replace the nylon gears in these. The closest that I found is either 3.175 or 5mm bore. I almost bought a couple sets of the 3.175 bore Spur Gears that I found but I think I'd have a real hard time squeezing them onto 4mm drive shafta?? ..

https://m.ebay.com/itm/GoolRC-48DP-2...19.m1438.l2649

Note to self : next time I rename out a set of these motor mounts to accept the larger oversized stuffing tubes, DO NOT use the 1/4" bit on the left, it's way too aggressive does nothing but hang up in The motor mount and it's a huge pain in the butt. Instead use the 1/4" woodworking bit on the right. It's a lot less aggressive, much faster and much easier.

With that being said, I used one of the original motor mounts that I took out of this boat and used my angle grinder with a metal cutting disc and cut the back section of the motor mount off to eliminate the stuffing tube clamp because it just gets in the way of things. Then I used a 5/32" drill bit to Rheem out the hole in the motor mount where the grease zerk goes for greasing the drive shaft stuffing tube and turned the motor mount into a drill guide for drilling the stuffing tubes where the grease zerts go. Now to move on to getting the stuffing tubes trimmed then getting the bearings and driveshafts set up :biggrin: ...

I got the stuffing tubes trimmed appropriately then got the flanged bearings and drive shafts installed in them and got the tubes installed back in the boat and threw the spur gears on.

With that done I grabbed one of the unibits from my unibit set that I picked up at Harbor Freight and used it to remap out the outdrives and get rid of the ridge that the factory oilite bushings seat against to make room for the larger flanged bearings, then I got the props and prop shafts installed in the outdrives with the new bearings :biggrin: ..

Hiya Guys :tiphat:

I just got the struts mounted up to the rear transom then mounted up the loaded drives, then got the new push rod boots popped into place in the rear transom. For some silly reason I no longer have the correct size Allen wrench to put the new u-joints on. I have one size too small and one size too large so it looks like I need to buy a new set of metric Allen wrenches so I can get the driveshafts coupled to the prop shafts. Until then, movin' on to other things ...

That's gonna be a good drive angle for the rough water! (kidding) Looks good and nice to see it coming together so quickly...those shiny props look nice!

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Originally Posted by Lone-Wolf

That's gonna be a good drive angle for the rough water! (kidding) Looks good and nice to see it coming together so quickly...those shiny props look nice!

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A Thanks :tiphat: , I have pretty much all the parts I need and plenty of time to kill since I'm laid up so I may as well work on it to keep myself busy :biggrin: ...

Alrighty , She's really coming together nicely and she's starting to look like a nice little Hot Rod :biggrin: . I used some Shoe Goo to seal up the stuffing tubes @ the rear transom, then I got the inner rear deck plate screwed down and got the new Servo In-Place. I bought some new tips for my 60 watt hobbico soldering iron so I thought I'd put it to good use and I soldered up the leads on the motors then used it to solder 4 mm gold plated male bullet connectors on the motor leads and it worked beautifully. I was going to solder the gold-plated female bullet connectors on the speed control but it still has the factory female bullets on it and there 4 millimeter and even though they're not gold plated bullet connectors I decided to leave them on and run it as is because I don't think it will make much of a difference either way, then I moved on to the monster horsepower motors and got them mounted up to the aluminum motor plate on the new motor mounts which is a first for me because I've never used this villain motor mount system before.

I also got the steering linkage fished through the push rod boots and connected to the servo, but when I went to connect the steering linkage rods to the drives I realized that I had the drives on the wrong sides. Needless to say I had to pull the props off the propshafts and pull the drives off the struts and get everything switched around to the opposite sides that they were on. After getting that done I threw my Rev-Tech lipos in it and called it good for today.

Ummm, laid up?? WTH! Boat is Looking good

OK, when you heading to the lake to shoot us a vid?

Nice work, think that's a record for the Villain in terms of build time!

Hiya Guy's :biggrin:

We had a few errands to run earlier this afternoon so while we were out and about we stopped at Big Lots and while we were there I picked up a new set of Allen wrenches so I could get the drives on this villain squared away. I couldn't get the broken half of the U joint off of the Driveline because the grub screw was stripped out so I had to pull the Driveline and cut it off with my angle grinder and a metal cutting disc, thankfully I never hit the Driveline with the cutting disc. I got the drive lines and Prop Shops hook together with the new universal joints and then finished up by connecting the steering linkage's to the outdrive's. Time to move on to the water cooling system and a couple other things and get this villain project buttoned-up :tiphat: ...

Okay, I just got the water cooling system installed for the most part. While drilling out the rear transom, for some unknown reason the drill bit blew a bigger hole in the rear transom than I wanted or needed for one of the mounting screws :doh: , so I filled the hole with a little Shoe Goo then I put the screw for that side through the water pickup and put a nice layer of Shoe Goo across the back of the water pickup and around the screw and stuck the pickup in place on the rear transom, then I put the other screw through the water pickup to secure it. Since everything below the rear deck plate is submerged on these boats I wanted to make sure it was sealed up and water tight and Shoe Goo should definitely take care of that. With that being done I drilled another hole through the rear transom just big enough to squeeze the water line through to the inside of the boat above and between the steering linkage boots and fished the water line through it into the boat and got it connected to the cooling coils for the motor.

On my last villain boat I drilled a hole through the starboard side of it to Port the water out but this time around I really don't want to do that again because these are a double hulled boat with an inner and an outer Hull & it's just a pain in the butt and I definitely don't want to drill yet another hole through the rear transom especially below the duck plate. I was thinking about getting something like a windshield squirter nozzle for a car and putting it on the rear center section of the canopy and running the water Outlet line to that instead but I don't think a squirter nozzle will flow enough water to get the job done. So maybe I can find something like a 45° water Outlet to use instead or something similar there for two that would get the job done. Other than that the water cooling system is installed. I still need to get the speed control mounted and plugged in and I also need to get a receiver set up as well. Ice still have some skill details I would like to address like some kind of deck railings and air horns and a couple other things for Aesthetics because they do look nice with them, and I also need to find an unlimited class style spoiler and a couple struts for it to put it on the back of the boat. Maybe something like an 8th scale truggy spoiler, idk ? ...

I wish I could find the pics.

Back in 2005 at the nats we had a guy show with a Villian. He was a machinist by trade. Ran twin Lehner Nasic 4200's. Everything was custom. Hand made gear boxes hardware. Everything but the props.

Looks great, so cool keeping it old school, keeping it alive thanks to you!

Looking forward to hearing how she Maiden's...

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Originally Posted by T.S.Davis

I wish I could find the pics.

Back in 2005 at the nats we had a guy show with a Villian. He was a machinist by trade. Ran twin Lehner Nasic 4200's. Everything was custom. Hand made gear boxes hardware. Everything but the props.

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Ha ha, now that you mention it I've seen that boat, that damn thing was awesome :biggrin: . What I really liked about it where the extended aluminum outdrives that he made for it. It makes me wish I had a milling machine because the best upgrade you can do to these Villain's other than props would be aluminum out drives :biggrin: ...
I was looking at the back of the Blackjack 26 that I bought last night thinking it might be cool to add some turn fins to the villain but I really don't want to drill any more holes in the rear transom than I have to :frusty: ...

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Originally Posted by Lone-Wolf

Looks great, so cool keeping it old school, keeping it alive thanks to you!

Looking forward to hearing how she Maiden's...

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Thanks :tiphat: . I wish Make-a-Wake was still active on the board. He was a hard core old school RC boat motor kind of like DiegoBoy, but since he and I both got out of the hobby I decided to continue dabbling in it just to keep the cool old school boats alive :biggrin: .

I'm in Namba dist 12 & RC boating was really huge here in the valley and they had several major races every year @ Park Center pond in Boise until someone w/ an rc boat hit a damn duck & everyone lost their damn Minds over it. I'm fairly certain it was an unintentional accident because I've had ducks come in for a landing on the water while I've had my boat out running around and they've landed right in front of the thing and there were several occasions where I was barely able to avoid hitting them myself. Before anyone knew what was happening the Boise city council and some of the idiots in the Boise State House effectively outlawed RC boats and killed the hobby here in the valley overnight, all because someone hit a damn duck :frusty: ...

After that anyone caught with a boat in the water pretty much anywhere in Ada County got a butt chewing and got ran off and/or got a ticket in the process. Well, that was a few years ago and a lot of people have forgotten about it, and little by little we've had some renewed interest in the RC Boat Hobby thanks to my friends Tim and Stacy at our local hobby shop spreading the word and helping to get people interested in the hobby, but I still prefer to keep things low-key and stay off the local constabulary's radar with my boats, because I was still being run off regularly for running my boats @ Kleiner Park prior to being laid up. I've found that one of the best ways to do that is to enjoy the old school boats instead of trying to be a Speed Demon and trying to set speed records with GPS runs and such that tends to draw a lot of attention most of which is unwanted by other folks that are trying to use the water wherever you're trying to run. They don't pay much attention to the older slower boats as long as you're trying to mind your own business especially since they don't require as much real estate to run them which is fine with me :biggrin: ...

You make a valid case for running the much slower "old school" boats with regards to annoying people or potentially causing an injury to anything living. I've got a beautiful lake 5 minutes away but it's heavily used through the warmer months by everything from National level Rowing to casual swimmers, the ones I have to really watch out for are the Triathlete's that swim across the lake, I have to really scan the water to make sure nobody is anywhere out there and if there is I may as well just go home. Best time of year is through the cooler months and I have full access but then the issue is the screaming noise of 100+mph SAW boats, the almighty high-pitched shriek of them (that I personally love!), doesn't help that there are a ton rotten millionaires within earshot but c'mon, the boats run for less than a few minutes total! So what I'm trying to say is I feel your pain, running fast boats is stressful on so many levels but maybe that's part of the draw, because you can't run them all the time or it would become boring?...but probably not! One last thing, I do mind my own business when at the lake but as you may know, these things seem to draw people in, yeah it's a good thing for the hobby but I'm thinking of getting a custom t-shirt made that answers the three basic newb questions; 1) How much does it cost? (more than the car that drove it here) 2) How far does it go? (out of sight) 3) Can I have a try? (NO!)

Maybe what I really need is Villain again and issues solved...but they ain't cheap LOL!

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Originally Posted by Lone-Wolf

You make a valid case for running the much slower "old school" boats with regards to annoying people or potentially causing an injury to anything living. I've got a beautiful lake 5 minutes away but it's heavily used through the warmer months by everything from National level Rowing to casual swimmers, the ones I have to really watch out for are the Triathlete's that swim across the lake, I have to really scan the water to make sure nobody is anywhere out there and if there is I may as well just go home. Best time of year is through the cooler months and I have full access but then the issue is the screaming noise of 100+mph SAW boats, the almighty high-pitched shriek of them (that I personally love!), doesn't help that there are a ton rotten millionaires within earshot but c'mon, the boats run for less than a few minutes total! So what I'm trying to say is I feel your pain, running fast boats is stressful on so many levels but maybe that's part of the draw, because you can't run them all the time or it would become boring?...but probably not! One last thing, I do mind my own business when at the lake but as you may know, these things seem to draw people in, yeah it's a good thing for the hobby but I'm thinking of getting a custom t-shirt made that answers the three basic newb questions; 1) How much does it cost? (more than the car that drove it here) 2) How far does it go? (out of sight) 3) Can I have a try? (NO!)

Maybe what I really need is Villain again and issues solved...but they ain't cheap LOL!

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Oh I know Right? :sarcasm1: ...

We have a lot of water here in the valley but I avoid all the really popular heavily-used places like the rivers, lakes, reservoirs and dams like the plague with my boats, it's just too much of a hassle and too much trouble to deal with trying to avoid all the problems that come with it because there are just too many people using them for too many things, with the exception of the rivers. I don't put my boats on the rivers because if something goes wrong for some unknown reason you have a pretty good chance of losing your boat all together because it's going to float away before you can get to it :scared: ...

I prefer the smaller but outta the way ponds that aren't as heavily used as all of the really popular spots. Some of them are big enough you could almost consider them a small Lake and they're big enough you can get some really good high speed runs on them but they're still small enough that they don't create their own waves like the big reservoirs and big lakes do and that's one thing I really look for because I don't like dealing with waves & whitecaps with the boats I run (36" or less). I prefer calm water and in the early morning and late afternoon early evening, glass water if it all possible :banana: . I agree that the best time to run boats is in the cooler months when not too many people are taking advantage of the water and you can pretty much have them to yourself. With that being said, sometimes it makes me wonder why I like RC boat's so much with all the time and $ I put into them in comparison to how much runtime I actually get out of them. With most of my boats whether I'm running 2s - 6s I get an average of 4-6 min's of run time on 5000mah packs. It takes me longer to pack everything up, get where I'm going and get everything unpacked just to get a few minutes of runtime (8-12) with one or two of my boats before it's time to pack up and head out again & nothing sucks more than getting your gear loaded up and heading out only to find that your favorite two or three boat holes had too many ducks geese and people fishing or what not to even bother with trying :blink: but, I do it anyway...

On a side note at least with the cool old school boats, even when you're running some fast brushed motors and turning a nice set of aluminum or beryllium props you get much better run times out of them and you can usually find a nice little corner of a pond somewhere that's not being used and have a little fun running them without cutting anyone's fishing lines or whatever and getting yelled at in the process :tt2: ...

Howdy & Mornin' Guy's :tiphat:

I know it's been awhile and with things being what they are as of late some things got put on the back burner for a bit but as promised he finally came together Now That I Found a set of water Outlets that I really like rather than the run-of-the-mill thru transome outlets that add to the scale look of the Chapparel boats. I searched every place I could come up with trying to come up with something like I had in mind but wasn't having much luck until a friend messaged me and suggested checking out RC boat Bitz in Australia, so I did and sure as haydes they had exactly what I was after. Speed boat stlye exhaust tip h20 outlets :biggrin: they are anodized in chrome blue and red and look really nice and I wasn't sure what size would be better so I ordered a set of large Blue tips and a set of medium chrome's. Granted there was a snafu in shipping which was a pain in the butt as the tips wound up at my local post office but I didn't get the notice that my mildewed body left in my box for me so they wound up getting shipped back to Boat Bitz so I had to reorder them but he got them back out to me via priority toot sweet and it didn't take long before they were in my mailbox here at home.

I decided to finish off this boat with the blue tips and save the chromies for the Reedy X-press and Id say they look pretty good and the water will roll right off the back of the boat with nothing to worry about. I'll Plum them both with a Y fitting so they're both functional and to speed up h20 flow but I'm also going to make a couple bases for them that'll tilt them back a bit more & finish them off. Overall I like it & I'm glad she's done :tiphat:

sorry guys, I was using a new HTC blade x max Android phone that I recently picked up and wound up having an issue loading pics from it so I had to transfer the pics via Bluetooth to my tablet and then upload them from there but they're done