Mad Rat = Good comeback?
 

Hey M8s. I have realy been looking at the Mad Rat and I must say I like how it looks. I have been driving B4, BK2 CR for a few years but bin off from the hobby for a while and want to get back in to it but have a smaller budget now then back then.
Would the Mad Rat be a good choice?

I have B4 chocks laying around and som other bit and bobs that I could use for the car.

Sorry if this has been asked befor :blush:.

Thanks

/Fredrik

the madrat is a very good chassis for the money. just need to add ballraces for about 7-8 quid. The kit now comes with a stronger t-piece so reliability is far better.

As you may have read, the kit shocks are terrible, so if you have B4 ones knocking around put them straight on, it makes a huge difference.

It is basically a quarter price RB5, and is quite capable on the track when the shocks are changed. Spares are pretty cheap too.

Thanks for your replay jim76. I thought of buying bearings for it and a hobbywing 60amp sensord system. Put some weights up front to keep it on the track.

I think i will place my order realy soon =)

I managed to put mine in the B-final in the mid south regional at the PDA last Sunday.They are good for the money. Decent shocks are an absolute must.
If you are racing for fun like me its a good choice.And its always nice to beat the more expensive chassis that are around. :)

yeah, get some little sticky lead weights, or wheel balance weights from kwikfit etc. I stuck around 150g of weight around the steering rack and servo in mine to keep the front end down and improve the steering on power. Apart from the lead and the shocks it's a standard car, and goes really well.

Sounds realy nice, so nice I just orderd one :thumbsup:

Yeah I thought of the lead weights but allso was thinking of maby making a bulkhead i stainles steel at work. Gues we will se when I get the car.

Thanks M8s.

/Fredrik

if you have the skills and equipment to make one then that is definitely the way to go. My old man made me a brass one for the RB5, much more convenient than adding a load of weights.

Team C do make an ali bulkhead, but it adds no weight what so ever, so isn;t worth the expense

A couple people on here have mentioned that the stock hex hubs don't tighten well (push on the bearing) which is true, you can't tighten the wheel on the stock ones, so they are running Kyosho part LA218 (ZX-5 Drive Washer). Also if you are using the bearings from the bearing shop in the UK then when you put the clip on the front axels assemble it so that the smooth side of the clip goes to the inside otherwise it can catch on the bearing and be notchy.

Also keep an eye on what TeamC America are doing as they have some better parts almost ready that will bring the car right up to the best cars

Well, I think the Mad Rat is a very good car to begin with. Very cheap, good reliability and with some little mod the car could be very competitive. The spares are cheap in the TCmodels.net hong kong shop, the hop up are very interesting and the car looks good.

If interested, see what I've done with mine on my blog : losi shock, carbon fiber shock tower and another weight distribution.

New Mad Rat owner B-)
 

Hi everybody! :)
I have just ordered my Mad Rat:thumbsup: Tomorrow I will have it and will begin to assemble it :woot: I hardly can wait till tomorrow....
Seen it in a friends hands last weekend, was surprised how tough it is and couldn't believe how cheap!! Not much time passed and I've seen myself putting it into the cart :p
It will be my first kit. Also my second EVER RC car. I also have a Torche Pro brushless monster truck. Bought it because there I haven't seen buggys, nobody had one, and I liked how the people was bashing with them.
Came in another city, here the guys have been more advanced in RC cars and they have allready known what a buggy means. Of course I've felt in love with buggys. Planned to buy an Associated B4.1 but for low budget couldn't yet. And then lightning hits! Mad Rat! :drool:
I have read threads here and realised what a bargain it is and quickly ordered it.
I will use my brushless sistem from the monster for the beginning. It's a HSP 70A ESC and a motor(dunno what motor 'cas nothing is written on it) but I've heard that it would be a 3300kv something...:eh?: It pulls pretty good with a 11.1V lipo :p
Planning to buy a Turnigy 60A ESC and an EZrun 9T motor (is that 9T any good?..... )
Sorry for the loong post, but I am sooooo enthusiastic :lol:

I hope you'll enjoy your car zagonielod !
A 9T sounds good, is it for use on track or just bashing ?

Thanks for all the positive feedback M8s. Like zagonielod I cant wait to get my hands on my kit.

Realy nice blog kedal!. Alldo I dont understand a word French the pictures sais allot. I will be getting back to that one when I build my kit.

/Fredrik

I wouldn't kill this car with bashing :) If bashing, than there is my monster truck. I would use the Mad Rat for tracks. Unfortunately, we don't have professional race tracks here, and what we have is quite rough. But hopefully we will make progresses and who knows :)
Anyway, tomorrow is the BIG DAY :D Hope that it will be soon for you too SilentBob! ;)

I see that many people is using external BECs.... Is it so important? (I have to repeat that I am quite new to all this)

Thanks ! If you need/want some translation, just ask :)

It's Arriiiiiiived! :D
 

Yesssss!!! It's arrived! :woot:
Of course I've unpacked it and I'm starting right now to assembly at least the front. (I don't have more time than that :(...)
Gooood it's lovely! :thumbsup:

Hehe good to know kedal :D

Great to hear zagonielod!. Hope you get more time soon then.

/Fredrik

Hehe! I've allready built some parts of the front section. Servo saver included. Unfortunately I have to stop building important parts because another MAd Rat owner told me not to continue untill I have bought the bearings.
But I can say that I am really surprised by its quality.... Strong,rigid parts.
I have also a question: how should I glue the tires? I have never done that before so I don't know how much superglue is needed.

This is easy then writing it. Here is a link to a youtube video by HorizonRc.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ux4JP_BiS0

Carl

Thanks! I like this kind of responses :) Even if I wouldn't understand some words, I can see there everything with my eyes :)
Thanks again!

Good choice with the bearings, if you use the bushings that come with it you will damage the shafts they spin on and that's no good

bearings, but where from?....
 

Hi guys! I know that I have to buy bearings, but do anybody know a place where to buy them cheap? Here I have a place where I can buy bearings for about € 0.1 a piece. Is there any site where they are so cheap that it is worth order from there?

There's a couple guys on ebay that sell them, I got mine from here

http://cgi.ebay.com.au/ws/eBayISAPI....0#ht_500wt_750

And there's another add here, both in the UK

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Ansmann-Macnum...b#ht_795wt_734

i got mine from rc bearings they are £8 for the set and rubber sealed not metal

and are rubber sealed better than those metal sealed?

There is no real diferance in rubber vs metal seald bearings except that the rubber seald bearings are easyer to cleen because you can take out the rubber seal easyer then the metal seal, witch is to recomend for RC were its dirty, sandy and grasy.

I took a cheap route by buying bearings from a source on Ebay for our 2 rats and now regret it - Loads of play in them; I'm now replacing some with a set of bearings straight out of an X-Pro kit and will be sourcing the remainder from, probabely, RC Bearings as mentioned.... so beware.

so you don't really recommend to buy from ebay?... rc bearings looks pretty good to me as well.... I reallly wouldn't like to get bad quality bearings, even less, because I have to buy 2 sets, one for me and one for a friend.

I bought my bearing ball set at RC Bearing too, and it's really cheap and good service !

bearings
 

Well, I've placed an order for 2 sets of bearings on RcBearings. Thanks for the tips anyway! I'll see now how fast it will arrive :) I'm desperately waiting for them, cas untill they arrive, I cannot do much on the assembling process. I've glued the tires today (they might fall apart as I didn't use too much glue on the first few moves ) They are my first handglued tires :D

Hi everyone!
I am slowly assembling the Mad Rat. Slowly, because I have ordered the bearing sets from rcbrearings yesterday, and today I got the comfirmation from them. (have to mention that it really looks like a nice shop! ... if there is somebody from them than Congratulations! :P )
I think I've put together everything I could without without the bearings. Today I have filled the shocks (even thou they are plastic shocks, they are pretty good! Even better than the aluminium ones on my Torche Pro monster truck :confused: )
Also installed the servo (the one the monster came with, cas I have changed the servo in it with a Tower Pro metal gear MG995. I think the monster needs more torquee servo than a buggy does :) )
The fitting for the body are also mounted, as well as the battery tray fittings.
what else....? :confused:
Rear suspention and tail spoiler horn installed last night :P (that's when you have broke it up with your girlfriend :P )
I have to buy some tools for the next time... I have only a small L shape hex driver as on the Monster I have star headed screws. This came with them all hex :P My fingers are destroyed from putting all those screws into place with that small hex.
What's new by the others?
cheers guys!

You should be so impatient !!
You can built everything but the transmission part, so you have some work to do :)

If you live in UK, you should receive the bearing soon.

Would be nice if I would live in the UK :)
I live in Dracula's country my friend :P Don't know when will those bearings get here. the good part is that they are on their way.
Unfortunately, also the drive train needs those bearings. 2/each wheel
One question thou... after the instructions manual, in point 22, there is only 1 nylon washer/side? cas there are 4. Only 2 are needed?

Ok roumania mate ;)

You only need 1 nylon washer per side, so you have 2 as spares... or you can use this washer to set up your car geometry.

Sorry, what do you mean by "car geometry" ?

Motor
 

Hey gusy!
Is there a big difference between az EZrun of 8,5T and on of 9T ?
I don't really see a good offer for a 8,5T and on the Hobbyking they have EZrun 9T for about 25 dollars. Is a 9T so bad or what??:bored:

I've seen videos of the 9T and it looks plenty fast enough.

I was driving my madrat for the first time yesterday and it handled pretty good for a first drive. I need to tighten the diff a bit and adjust the front end I think since I found it whipped around a a little TOO sharp on my bumpy track. I was driving it with the stock motor it comes with and a 1991 Novak speed controller and a 2 cell Lipo and even like that the performance is good. I'll be using a 13T brushless motor next week which should be fast enough for me. I'm using cheap 3 racing shocks which with the plastic shock internals and shafts with some travel limiters on the bottom of the shaft. I didn't think they were going to be any good, but it's actually pretty good.

Now I need to work on the track, smooth it all out, get rid of the grass and add some technical sections so it's fun. I'm racing against a Tamiya Dark Impact 4wd in the backyard championship and so far the Madrat is a lot faster and much much more nimble, but lets see what happens in a couple weeks when they are both brushless :p, the Dark Impact will actually have the 9T EZrun.

Edit: Got that 9T EZrun and it goes fast :)

I Still have the Team C stadium truck I haven't used yet, the shocks on that are awesome so it should be even better again.

Next time I build one of these I'll defiantly use a 3mm tap or use one of the long ball cups in every hole first, I've worn off the ends on a lot of 2 mm allen keys and stuffed up a few of the hex screws during the building :)

Nice to here about you and your "precious" :) I'm glad to hear that, even as I am a bit gelous :P Last night while watching Forrest Gump, I've installed the shocks. Again,I have to say that they are surprisingly good!
Regarding to the EZrun 9T... I still can't decide about to buy it or not. On hobbyking they write nice reviews about it. For shure I will start running the Mad Rat with the BL sistem I'll take out of the Torche Pro. I've heard that it would be a 3300kv motor.

Another question: are the screws on the Mad Rat metric size? I have to buy a set of hex drives. Probably a set of Fastrax Interchangeable Hex Drivers. A local shop has of those.

yes they are all you really need is a good 2mm driver to sort it all out