set ups please...

So what's the latest motor/esc setup for this guy? I see Tundra has brushless, but can't tell/find the set up. It would be really cool if people could use this place to report on their latest and greatest set ups. Please include motor/esc batteries and prop. This should be good, I am sure some good stuff has happened in the last year...:popcorn2::popcorn2::thumbup:

Alright, read the other threads, thought I would post this info here. Originally I was on the RCuniverse page before I found this site. Yeah, this is much better! This is a summary of what I posted over there on my fleet of mini-v’s.

My water proofing method:
I have six of these for my family to run. Taping the hatch is not an option when you are trying to keep several of them running with kids. So, I take the cover and put a thin film of vaseline on the sides, in and out with my fingers. I then fill the groove all the way around the hatch with clear silicone. Along the back where there is no groove, I just lay a heavy bead of silicone about 3/16" high.

Then, set the cover in place. Make sure the front is pressed down so it is flush with the deck. make sure the magnet "clickes" into place on the back. Look at it from the back and make sure the lid is level, or about the same amount of gap or space on each side. Let dry for 24 hours.

If you use a straight screw driver you can pop the back off first, then work it up each side. The lid comes off pretty easy due to the vaseline as a release agent on the lid. What you are left with is a seal that is custom made to your cover!

We have run these at the lake in rough water. They have been stuffed through waves, flipped upside down and left floating upside down for several minutes. Never had one sink. In fact, after being upside down and floating into shore after about 5 minutes, there was about 1/4 - 1/2 ounce of water inside the hull. Just pick it up, keep it upside down and pop the lid off to drain the water. Even had one get stuck upside down under the jet ski lift at the lake. The pictures on the web with hull noses sticking out of the water never needs to happen. SEAL THAT HATCH!

I also will put a 1 to 2 inch square of that thin hard sponge material inside the hull. This way any water gets soaked up by the towel and is not left to splash around inside the hull getting everything wet.

I also came up with a easy way to get rid of the U-joints, but you need a lathe! I also wanted to get rid of the u-joints but needed a simple fix. Modifying 6 boats at once can add up in cost. I had a couple of Octura 1/8" shafts for the .093 flex cable and the drive dogs and some 5-40 nuts, so I went that route.

For the motor, I trimmed off the motor shaft where it was stepped for the setscrew. I then ground a new flat for a set screw. This gives you more room for the flex cable for alignment. I then made a coupler from 5/16 aluminum in the lathe. Motor in one end, .093 in the other. Set screw in each end. A collet connector would work great also. But for 6 boats that can be $60!

I took the original drive shaft out, cut off both ends so it is shorter than the stuffing tube and then center drilled it out .093 for the flex cable about .25" deep.

The strut bushing were pulled out and reamed out to 1/8" also to fit the octura hardware. I forget the cost, but it was cheap, under $10 per boat. Of course, you need a lathe......
The other thing you can do is to use a piece of brass tubing, 1/8” id. It slips in the strut nicely, but is just a little loose. Maybe a dab of silicone on one end to hold it in?
I am running it with the octura red plastic prop (x431) right now. Run time went from about 20 minutes to about 15-16 minutes on a 6 cell - 1100 Nimh (stock pack). Speed picked up was nice. From what others are reporting, I would have to ESTIMATE mine at about 7,000 MPH!!!! *your results may vary... OK, how about 20 to 25% faster than stock? It also ran 20-25% shorter time, so that seems about right. The drive train is also very smooth and sounds good running. I added white Teflon spacers that are machined from a piece of round stock.
I got some of the 27mm props from OSE also. I ran those with the modified drivetrain and lipos. It is still faster than a stock mini-v but very conservative on power draw. Kind of a nascar setup. If all the same, it will be fun. Especially on a lake that has any kind of chop or waves!

I ran a 1300-2s Lipo's and it ran fantastic. I forget how long, but it was around 15 minutes. That is around 5 amps max. This is the amazing thing on these, stock they get 18-20 minutes run time from 1100 Mahr battery, or about 3.5 to 4 amps max on motor current. This is a lot of fun for such a low amp draw. I do not want to put in a brushless motor that will blow this thing out of the water and consume 20+ amps. The stock batteries must be pretty cheap. After a 20 minute run, they were pretty warm. Which is odd when they are drawing 3-4 amps!
With the X431 prop and 2s lipo, the motor was very warm after a 15 minute run. Not melting, but if you touched it you said “OUCH!” Now, I see people adding cooling coils to the motor, but I had a different thought I am going to try since I am running such a mild setup. The motor mount is aluminum and clamps all the way around the motor for a nice heat sink. So, why not attach a piece of aluminum tubing to the top of the aluminum motor mount? It will cool that and the whole aluminum mount will try to stay at one temperature. If it works, that would be an easy cooling trick. Others may want to upgrade theirs, but multiply that cost x 6 and YIKES!!!

Alright, this is a blast. Kids were running bone stock. I had one hull that had been modified with my flex drive, an Octura 1/8 drive shaft and the red plastic X431 prop. Just that mod gives you some good speed, but does lower the run time as expected.

I put in a 7.4v - 1700 lipo and this really woke it up. The hull skips across the water, nice and stable but mostly out of the water. A little porpoising, but mostly air under the hull. It was about as fast as I think this hull can go and be very stable. Boats set up this way have to be driven constently. Cut the throttle and work it through a turn and then lay into it again. It bounces around a bit, but it was a blast.

Then I tried a 11.1v-1300 lipo. this was a bit scary. Really didn't run much faster than the 7.4 as the hull would lay over on one side from the torque. The prop was audilbly cavitating. I ran this only for a couple of minutes, then brought it back in. I tried this another day and ended up frying the speed control for it with the x431 prop on it. So be careful!
Shot a short video while my son piloted the 7.4 volt version, will have to upload it and figure out how to post it.

So, for me it is a stock boat with the following mods:
Flex drive to get rid of u-joints. Mine is not full flex as I use the original driveshaft, just flex were the ujoints were. Works great if you have the tools.
Octura hardware on the outdrive. 1/8" shaft, drive dog and the x431 red plastic prop. 7.4 volt lipo. Trying to fit in some 2200’s from HK. A bit heavy, but it does seat the rear end! Upgraded to deans connectors also.
silicone the hatch as I described earlier.
I am also going to still add some type of cooling to the motors.

Another thing I found out today. I pulled to much antenae out of the boat. It was hanging down out of the top of the tube and touching the water. Terrible glitching and control. Need to work on the antanae and gettign longer liners.

So, until I get all of them going at this performance level, I think I am very happy!

Brian

Cool idea on the hatch. Any chance of pictures?

OK, here are a few pictures of the fleet.

The mini-v's all have this done to them. I should have numbered the hulls and hatches, as they are now swapped around and some fit better than others. I am guessing not to many people here have six of the same boat.....:doh:

The 24" carbon/kevlar mono is one I started building over a decade ago, going to get it running now. It was sitting next to the mini's. I used clear silicone and it is difficult to see. It is not water proof, but it works pretty good for trying to keep a bunch of boats running. I think it will waterproof thier Rc.ESC better also.

Brian

OK, here is the pic of the driveshaft. Since these were made, I redid them. The flux for the silver solder took all the grease out of the shaft and I didn't relube it quick enough. Rotted and rusted right up. so I replaced it and glued them in. that works great, thanks OSE!

Original driveshaft, new propshaft, drive dog, and prop from OSE.

Brian

Thanks for sharing the pictures. I'm going to give the sealing method a try.
They are fun little boats. We played with them more than any other boat this summer.

Here are a couple of things I have tried on my mini-v for cooling both the motor & esc. I have used a cooling coil on the the motor, but I always though that could be better. I found on Mega Motors site a finned motor mount that will fit in place of the top band. I attached some pieces of 1/8" brass tubing on the fins. Then I drilled a hole in the finned heatsink from the stock esc and put aluminum tubing through the hole. I hooked all this up from the pickup I made from brass tubing. The motor will run cooler with this finned water cooled mount on it. The esc runs a full 10deg cooler even when running on 3s lipo.

With all the different stuff out now from hobby king, hobby wing and everywhere else, are there any new setups out there people have ran and had good success with? I'm about to start a mini v build. Thanks, T.

Here's what I've done. Forgot I started this thread, thanks for postin yer setups.

Mods:
1) removed straight drive with u-joints but kept the steerable outdrive. Insert .098" flex to 1/8" stub. Shim motor shaft to fit 1/8 - 1/8" coupler. Add Octura prop (I will post the size when I check it again).
2) removed stock esc/radio - add electrifly 25A w/BEC 2-3S lipo - water cooled and water proofed (I went over this process in my micro scratch cat thread).
3) trimmed off the ridges in the tray so battery and rx can be moved around.
3.5) remove stock servo and add futaba micro but high torque servo - shim well so it is firm.
3.75) get a grommet for a drain, I used a proboat one, and make a little piece of plexi glass or some water proof material that will cover the servo rod hole in the transom. Drill the appropriate size hole for the grommet and glue in place. This will reduce the hole and permit a more waterproof servo rod exit. I then took some antenna tubing, the stock servo rod and a bit of small shrink wrap, silicone lubed the rod, added the shrink wrap, heated and slid these into the antenna tube. This fit snugly into the drain plug, leaving only the rod to slide and no watah enter.
4) add turnfin/trimtab combo (the one for the turbovee). Be sure to sharpen fins and flatten tabs.
5) get 1300 mah 3S 20c lipo and place just behind where stock battery was supposed to be.
6) COG was probably 33% - will make a little vid showing the insides, rear and where COG was for the run.
7) my final step (curing at the moment) is to run a bead of clear silicone seal around the hatch groove, take hatch and lube up the base where it will fit into the groove with silicone LUBE and then nestle it down in. When seal cures, you should be able to remove the hatch from a very tight little sealed up groove. The idea is to eliminate the need for hatch tape.
8) I used one of my many tactic receivers that I have waterproofed - this also eliminates the need for antenna wire and another hole in the boat.

One comment, I think I need to trim back the turn fins, it is super stable, but no want to turn at speed, then it spins out once the drive catches. I will run some more batteries through her to see. I am curious to run some stock Mini Rio battery packs through to see how it will do.

check mine out i just posted it is titled "brushless mini v and hardware setup".