R/C cars: try not to say the words "scale speed"

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Automotive Insanity > R/C cars: try not to say the words "scale speed"

Tindjin: Aug 4, 2006; Do not seek death.
Death will find you.
But seek the road
which makes death a fulfillment.

I used to race 1/10 electric (buggy, truck, 4x4 buggy) and some 1/8 gas while I was going to school up in Denver. Went to a couple of regional and national events which were pretty cool. When I moved back to Albuquerque there was ZERO racing here so I sold all my cars and most of my gear to some people up in Denver since it was a shame to have all the racing stuff sitting around just bashing. I picked up flying R/C planes and still do that.

I went to one of the shops a few months ago and started a conversation with one of the car guys and found out that we now have one of the better permanent racing tracks in the US and even hosted a national event. So the bug has gotten me and I am going to be getting back into it but more as just a hobby.

I am also really interested in the rock crawling and thinking about picking up one for some fun especially after I found out there are a couple clubs who do competitions this this area also.

I picked up a AE 1/18th off road truck just to see if I was and ohh boy did it ignite my love of RC again. Yea I quickly put in a brushless system and yes it is stupid, stupid fast.

With the advent of the new radios (gently caress crystals) and lipo batteries the initial cost has gone up but over the long run the cost is more manageable. Having 10-15 different crystals plus when I was racing I probably had 20+ full race battery packs not to mention practice/bashing packs it was stupid costs every few weeks.

Tindjin fucked around with this message at 20:23 on Apr 28, 2009

# ¿ Apr 28, 2009 19:00

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# ¿ May 6, 2024 03:23

Tindjin: Aug 4, 2006; Do not seek death.
Death will find you.
But seek the road
which makes death a fulfillment.

cr0y posted:

hmmm, any idea what i would be looking at for an out of the box ready 4wd setup?

Go to Tower Hobbies and look for the car/truck you want. They have "combo" packages for just about every car. You want one that is RTR or Ready to Run, otherwise you'll have to put it all/some together.

# ¿ Apr 28, 2009 21:25

Tindjin: Aug 4, 2006; Do not seek death.
Death will find you.
But seek the road
which makes death a fulfillment.

I can already feel my bank account hating me. I used to fly a lot (raced cars/offroad also) and stopped for about 7 yrs. Lately I have been feeling some serious itching to start flying again. I've still got some of my planes and gear but will need to upgrade my radios (no more loving pin boards! holy poo poo yes!)

I've got a Kadet LT-40 kit still in box that I'm going to put together to re-learn how to fly. Its the same model that I originally learned how to fly bigger planes with and it held up great. I had originally bought the kit so I could make some modifications to it mostly flattening out the dihedral and giving the bottom of the wing a tiny bit of curve. I'm going to make a second set of wing parts out of the originals so I can keep the original as templates to make those modifications with eventually.

So here goes, time to puchase a bunch of glue and electronics and spend some happy times in the garage building planes again. woohooo!

# ¿ Oct 16, 2010 22:33

Tindjin: Aug 4, 2006; Do not seek death.
Death will find you.
But seek the road
which makes death a fulfillment.

Need some help. I've got the bug again and gonna get back into some RC cars/trucks. I need to get a new radio though, my old one is trashed from sitting around for 10 yrs.

Not to worries about cost as I will use the same one for multiple cars, so it does need multi-vehicle memory (3-4 would be enough, I hope).

I used to use Futaba for both air and cars but should I bother looking at some others like Airtronics or the few others putting out ones? I want to get spread spectrum so I don't have to worry about crystals (one of the best technologies to come up since I raced).

Thanks for any input. There are only 2 hobby shops in my metro area and both only keep futaba in stock so can't put my hands on others.

# ¿ Apr 23, 2011 02:34

Tindjin: Aug 4, 2006; Do not seek death.
Death will find you.
But seek the road
which makes death a fulfillment.

needknees posted:

If you don't have any use for that kind of stuff... I'm actually selling my old Airtronics MX-3 FHSS with two receivers. It's a 3 channel 2.4ghz radio and has been dead nuts reliable while people at our local track have had interference issues (mostly people running M11s with spektrum modules). 18 model memory, all the adjustments you need for most normal surface r/c applications. Shoot me a PM if you're interested or want more info

Yea I think that would be great for getting back into it. PM sent.

# ¿ Apr 27, 2011 05:35

Tindjin: Aug 4, 2006; Do not seek death.
Death will find you.
But seek the road
which makes death a fulfillment.

Z3n posted:

I know that this is the cars thread, but I figured you guys would have some advice about RC Helicopters as well.

I want an RC Helicopter strictly for strapping a GoProHD to it and getting some scenery shots. Any recommendations for the best way to get into RC Helicopters? I'm more practically oriented than anything else. I looked around a bit and saw the recommendation of the Walkera Lama 3 as a decent starter helicopter that could hold the weight of a GoProHD (3.3 ounces).

Thoughts? Should I find something small and cheap to fly around and crash a few times before I go with the bigger one? Does anyone have some good resources for learning how to fly an RC helicopter?

If you want to take flying videos on the "cheap" get a used ipod touch, then get one of the A/R Drones. I am having a loving hoot with mine and with a $3 app you can record the video from the 2 cameras.

Helicopters are awesome though but much shorter learning curve with the Drone due to the "autopilots" and such built into the software.

# ¿ May 5, 2011 05:01

Tindjin: Aug 4, 2006; Do not seek death.
Death will find you.
But seek the road
which makes death a fulfillment.

Reading this thread makes me miss racing even the stupid parts. I haven't heard of any racing around my city but I am gonna stop by one of the few RC stores we still have this week and see whats out there. I know there is a big crawling group here which I'll probably check out but I loved 1/10 scale off road so hopefully some of that or even 1/5th is happening also. Oh well credit cards are paid off, good time to re-fill them.

# ¿ Feb 12, 2012 18:14

Tindjin: Aug 4, 2006; Do not seek death.
Death will find you.
But seek the road
which makes death a fulfillment.

Carleton posted:

So I have an off topic question here,

Are there any easy to fly planes that could handle the weight of a go pro HD (7 oz) and are capable of 36-70 mph ground speeds? I would love to use them to film guys waterskiing from overhead/behind.

Thanks

Better thread for this..

http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3386779

# ¿ Feb 15, 2012 19:02

Tindjin: Aug 4, 2006; Do not seek death.
Death will find you.
But seek the road
which makes death a fulfillment.

Saw this on Advrider's RC thread.

"Since 1997, A Man Has Been Digging Out His Basement Using Only R/C Scale-Model Construction Equipment"

http://gizmodo.com/5884801/since-1997-a-man-has-been-digging-out-his-basement-using-only-rc-scale+model-construction-equipment

Videos of it..

http://jalopnik.com/5884789/a-basement-excavated-a-video-gallery/gallery/2

I've always wanted to try one of the construction type RC units but this is just drat amazine what he's done with it.

Edited..

Found more information on it..

http://carscoop.blogspot.com/2012/02/meet-joe-man-who-excavated-his-basement.html

Tindjin fucked around with this message at 23:46 on Feb 15, 2012

# ¿ Feb 15, 2012 23:42

Tindjin: Aug 4, 2006; Do not seek death.
Death will find you.
But seek the road
which makes death a fulfillment.

jdfording posted:

Finally done with my Yeti XL.

Pics

Man that looks good. I am so dang close to buying one of these.

# ¿ Apr 12, 2015 03:51

Tindjin: Aug 4, 2006; Do not seek death.
Death will find you.
But seek the road
which makes death a fulfillment.

Okay so I'm going to pick up a SCX10. Should I get a RTR or the Kit? Kits don't scare me, I build planes and used to race RC 1/10 scale. Just wondering if the stuff included in the RTR is worth it for starting out? I sold 90% of my surface stuff but still have a radio and charges, would just need to buy the rest of the electronics if I went kit.

# ¿ Apr 14, 2015 22:57

Tindjin: Aug 4, 2006; Do not seek death.
Death will find you.
But seek the road
which makes death a fulfillment.

bisticles posted:

You don't save a ton of money, but you do get the metal steering and lower links, plus you get an unpainted body that you can personalize.

I forgot that I had read that the kit does have some minor 'upgrades' compared to the RTR and having an unpainted body would be nice. Kit it is. Thanks guys.

Now to figure out an esc/motor combo. I'll be running lipos for the batteries. I'd like to be able to run it around water, does that mean I need to stay with a brushed motor? Are any of the brushless-sensor motors able get the occasional splash? I figure I can use the bag trick on the RX and I have seen it mentioned about using liquid tape or plasti-dip on the electronic parts of the ESC but what about the motors?

# ¿ Apr 15, 2015 16:48

Tindjin: Aug 4, 2006; Do not seek death.
Death will find you.
But seek the road
which makes death a fulfillment.

Ordered my SCX10. Trying to figure out a esc/motor combo. I'd like to go brushless with lipos. What about this setup? Traxxas 3350R Velineon VXL-3s Brushless Power System I like that it is supposed to be at least water resistant. What about a combo from Castle like the sidewinder 3 or is there another good option for a brushless? Thanks.

# ¿ Apr 24, 2015 22:41

Tindjin: Aug 4, 2006; Do not seek death.
Death will find you.
But seek the road
which makes death a fulfillment.

powderific posted:

Are you going to want to do any crawling with it? If so you're going to need to go sensored and they're not generally waterproof and also are tend to be even more expensive. I really think for a truck like the SCX10 brushed motors are perfect.

Some crawling yea. humm maybe starting out brushed wouldn't be a bad idea. I'm just so used to brushless motors on planes that I thought I would go that route.

# ¿ Apr 27, 2015 17:38

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# ¿ May 6, 2024 03:23

Tindjin: Aug 4, 2006; Do not seek death.
Death will find you.
But seek the road
which makes death a fulfillment.

Siochain posted:

But, that being said, I'm looking for input/advice. Has anyone here built their own crawler/scaling course? I've got massive back yard, and permission to build something. I've found all kinds of ideas for short-track courses, but not a ton for a more crawler/scale oriented type of track. If you guys have any resources/ideas/etc, please share!

I'm starting to do something similar in my back yard.

I got a bunch of ideas from this guy's youtube videos. He even has some on crawler course design and shows his setups.

https://www.youtube.com/user/djmedic2008/

# ¿ May 8, 2015 20:31

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Automotive Insanity > R/C cars: try not to say the words "scale speed"