Advice for a guy that hasn't raced cars for a long time.

[The Chef]

I've been out of this for a while, I'm going to look at the taplow club on Friday night and am interested in the club also that Dudder is talking about as it is much closer for me.

I'm looking to buy the SX3 as I've always had good results with schumacher and like there products. so,

My questions are the following:-

I have a 40mhz hand set and receiver, will this work with Lipo batteries?

Will my sanwa servo work with the new batteries?

To be competitive once i have got my driving head on can you guys reccomend me a motor and batteries to start with I guess I'm going to need 3 to 4 battery packs, Also what charger's, power packs speed controllers are good. I only want to buy this stuff once and buy good. I under stand that nothing lasts for ever but what I mean is I don't want basic stuff that I'll wish that I had bought better in 6 months time.

Brands and models would be a great help.


Many thanks In advance.

The Chef

[mattybucks]

Originally Posted by The Chef

I've been out of this for a while, I'm going to look at the taplow club on Friday night and am interested in the club also that Dudder is talking about as it is much closer for me.

I'm looking to buy the SX3 as I've always had good results with schumacher and like there products. so,

My questions are the following:-

I have a 40mhz hand set and receiver, will this work with Lipo batteries?

Will my sanwa servo work with the new batteries?

To be competitive once i have got my driving head on can you guys reccomend me a motor and batteries to start with I guess I'm going to need 3 to 4 battery packs, Also what charger's, power packs speed controllers are good. I only want to buy this stuff once and buy good. I under stand that nothing lasts for ever but what I mean is I don't want basic stuff that I'll wish that I had bought better in 6 months time.

Brands and models would be a great help.


Many thanks In advance.

The Chef

Your radio gear will be fine. 1 set of lipos for the car, a £20 mystery B6 charger from ebay will be fine.

I use the speed passion brushless speedos both the LPF and the Pro, either would be fine. Speed Passion motors again 5.5 and 6.5.

Cells - I run intellect 50c's, I would recommend getting the highest C rating you can afford and make sure there on the BRCA list.

[Shaun 'TheSheep' Atkinson]

Out of personal choice I would go for the Core R/C balance charger, as it has all the functions you could possibly need and is compatible with all battery types you could want:

http://www.racing-cars.com/pp/Produc...ist/CR104.html

40-50c LiPo batteries are perfectly adequate.

[The Chef]

Thank you. What is the C rating and do amh matter any more? Do you have a link to the legal barratries for club/nationals?

[The Chef]

How long are heats these days? And I guess it depends on what motor and gearing one uses but do these packs easily last the heats/rounds? Ad just another Q, does ever one need there own transponder?

[Shaun 'TheSheep' Atkinson]

Here is the link for the BRCA 2011 battery lists:

http://www.racing-cars.com/pp/Produc...ist/CR104.html

[mattybucks]

Originally Posted by Shaun 'TheSheep' Atkinson

Out of personal choice I would go for the Core R/C balance charger, as it has all the functions you could possibly need and is compatible with all battery types you could want:

http://www.racing-cars.com/pp/Produc...ist/CR104.html

40-50c LiPo batteries are perfectly adequate.

Are they not the same charger re-branded, but a third of the price?

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/B6-18-5v-11-1v...item45f964f50a

[mattybucks]

Originally Posted by The Chef

How long are heats these days? And I guess it depends on what motor and gearing one uses but do these packs easily last the heats/rounds? Ad just another Q, does ever one need there own transponder?

5 mins although Taplow has run 7 min finals before.

1 Lipo will last a race and then some, you never dump, and just topthem up after each run.

Yes get your own PT, AMB/Mylaps

[Shaun 'TheSheep' Atkinson]

Originally Posted by The Chef

How long are heats these days? And I guess it depends on what motor and gearing one uses but do these packs easily last the heats/rounds? Ad just another Q, does ever one need there own transponder?

The heats are still 5 minute, on the odd occasion they may run 6 minute finals but very rare I think, the battery's now would easily run for 20 minutes on a single charge (although not recommended)

The only thing with LiPo's is you cant let them dump as this is not good for battery health, and also never leave them stored at full charge.

[Shaun 'TheSheep' Atkinson]

Originally Posted by mattybucks

Are they not the same charger re-branded, but a third of the price?

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/B6-18-5v-11-1v...item45f964f50a

I don't know if they are THE same charger but I get where your coming from, as I said It was a personal preference thing, as I know the Schumacher/Core rc stuff is good quality

[The Chef]

Originally Posted by Shaun 'TheSheep' Atkinson

Here is the link for the BRCA 2011 battery lists:

http://www.racing-cars.com/pp/Produc...ist/CR104.html

Thank you is this link the correct one it stil goes to the charger.

Thank you guys. Next question is How many packs do you have for an evening? Is it still 3 heats and a final? And how long does a top up charge take?

[mattybucks]

I have 1 pack per car. It takes about 25 mins. As long as the cells get upto 8.4v then it'll be ok to run a round.

[Shaun 'TheSheep' Atkinson]

Originally Posted by The Chef

Thank you is this link the correct one it stil goes to the charger.

Thank you guys. Next question is How many packs do you have for an evening? Is it still 3 heats and a final? And how long does a top up charge take?

4 Qualifying rounds and 1 final, oops sorry heres the one you need lol

http://www.brca.org/?q=content/homol...1-updates/1402

Down the list are the legal batteries for stick packs and saddle packs

And same here i run 1 pack in my 4WD and 1 pack for my 2WD and even running both classes on the same day you still have ample time to charge to 8.4V only using 1 charger

[The Chef]

Thank you. How do you choose a good battery? it looks like one needs to spend £75 to £100 each. is it best to go 50c 60c 90c or go for a high amh ratng?How long do they take to top up on charge?

[mattybucks]

Originally Posted by The Chef

Thank you. How do you choose a good battery? it looks like one needs to spend £75 to £100 each. is it best to go 50c 60c 90c or go for a high amh ratng?How long do they take to top up on charge?

Anything from 40 to 60c, you can get brca legal cells for £40-50+ but as we say you only need 1 pack rather than 5 packs of NIMH's

[The Chef]

1 Pack for the whole evening? Wow thats not so bad after all I think I'm going to apex models on saturday for a chat. Does any one have experience with them?

[mdb_75]

Just one lipo's ok for an all day meeting when you're only racing once per hour, but on a busy club night where you race four times in under two hours you'll struggle to cope with a single pack, get two!

[The Chef]

2 Packs still isn't bad Back in the day I'd spend all day charging nicads and have a couple of old ones for pratice and 4 or 5 for the evening. so two's really not that bad!

[Shaun 'TheSheep' Atkinson]

I will try and explain the C rating for you just for future refence then you can obviously go from there:

The C rating means how much a cell or pack can discharge in amps. C always equals the capacity of a cell or pack. For example. Let use a 3100 2S pack rated for 12C. In this case C=3100mah. the number before the "C" is the multiplier. so 12 x 3100 = 37200mah. to get amps we simply divide by 1000. 37200/1000 = 37.2 amps. 1000mah = 1amp.

So for the above pack (3100 2S) rated @ 12c we now know the max discharge rating is 37.2 amps.

If you consistently discharge at the C rating you can expect very poor service from the pack, probably under 50 cycles.

I hope this helps for future reference

[mattybucks]

Originally Posted by mdb_75

Just one lipo's ok for an all day meeting when you're only racing once per hour, but on a busy club night where you race four times in under two hours you'll struggle to cope with a single pack, get two!

I've never had a problem charging at taplow in between rounds.

I've never been to apex, however as long as you get a brca legal pack you'll be fine.