Castle Creations – deguno – tools, RC cars, gadgets and consumer electronics

August 30, 2015August 30, 2015

Building a Losi 5ive-T Brushless (part 3) – Fitting the parts and testing the truck

When building this Losi 5ive-T brushless truck I had a set of criteria that I wanted to respect:

The car should have around 15-20 minutes of run time
I would prefer to have motor break and reverse option enabled
The steering servo should be capable = powerful and fast
All parts should be a-grade and have been put through their paces by other drivers (and with positive reviews)

I therefore decided on ordering the following goodies:

ZIPPY Flightmax 8000mAh 4S1P 30C batteries from HobbyKing
Hitec HS-1000SGT High Voltage Giant Torque Servo Conversion Kit for Losi 5ive. This beast deliver over 1500oz of torque!!
Killer RC Super Power Switch
RC Madness BL5 Version 2 Conversion

Here a few pics of the parts and mounting them:

RC Madness Version 2 Brushless Conversion Kit for the Losi 5IVE-T

RC Madness Version 2 Brushless Conversion Kit for the Losi 5IVE-TRC Madness Version 2 Brushless Conversion Kit for the Losi 5IVE-T — RC Madness Version 2 Brushless Conversion Kit for the Losi 5IVE-T

RC Madness Version 2 Brushless Conversion Kit for the Losi 5IVE-T - Battery tray — RC Madness Version 2 Brushless Conversion Kit for the Losi 5IVE-T – Battery tray

RC Madness Version 2 Brushless Conversion Kit for the Losi 5IVE-T - Motor mount — RC Madness Version 2 Brushless Conversion Kit for the Losi 5IVE-T – Motor mount

Hitec HS-1000SGT High Voltage Giant Torque Servo Conversion Kit for Losi 5ive-T

Hitec HS-1000SGT High Voltage Giant Torque Servo

Killer RC Super Power Switch Installed In The Losi 5ive-T

Killer RC Servo-Max voltage regulator and 14.8v 4S 3600mAh LiPo battery installed in the Losi 5ive-T

The results

Before starting the project I had read tons of forum posts and seen many YouTube videos. I have followed most of the advice and chosen components that were all of high quality. Most however recommended the use of the Lehner/MGM combo and mechanical brakes but as you can see in Part 2 of this series I chose differently.

So how did it all go?

Well so far I can safely say that I am all satisfied with my truck and the decisions made. Batteries, ESC and motor have all been running smoothly with good temps and great runtimes. I have not timed it but I would think that I get at least 18-20 minutes run time on one set of 8S batteries.

The motor brakes (and reverse) have worked great. It may very well be that if you are a super competitive and very skilful driver there may be something to gain by having the (some say) better control using the mechanical brakes but I have had no issues whatsoever and love the setup as it is now. I have the control that I need when braking and love the fact that I can reverse whenever needed.

So for now I have had a ton of fun – building this vehicle has been a blast and driving it even more so.

If you have the funds and want to experience a brushless version of the largest 4WD RC truck on the market then you can’t go wrong with the Losi 5ive-T and I can definitely recommend the setup I have gone for here.

Have fun and drive safely 😉

Final weight of the Losi 5-ive T Brushless with batteries

January 20, 2015January 20, 2015

Traxxas E-Revo Brushless – The best all-round RC car money can buy!

Traxxas E-Revo Brushless 4WD Monster Truck

Through the years I have tried racing on tarmac, sand and gravel with everything from buggies to trucks and monster trucks. I have tried 2WD and 4WD vehicles powered by gasoline, brushed and brushless motors. All has been great fun and I have always enjoyed the great selection and thereby the versatility of this hobby.

A few years back I bought a Traxxas E-revo brushless car. My main purpose was to have something that was the “ultimate bashing vehicle” to be used in gravel pits. I had a long list of requirements:

It should be durable and capable of taking a solid beating when landing after big jumps
Spare parts should be readily available and not overly expensive
It should be 4WD in order for it to climb the big gravel piles and still make it to the top
It should come with a decent transmitter and not need a heap of up-grades before being ready to race
It should be fairly powerful but still have enough runtime to do bashing for at around 20 minutes on one set of batteries

Before the purchase I did a lot of research and found that all the boxes seemed to be ticked.

I had the car for around 12 months and drove it extensively over that timespan. Never have I put a car through so much and still had a car that just kept on going. Most of the time it was used in the gravel pit but I also tried it out on a 1/8 scale track and on tarmac only changing the tires to suit the surface. It stood out most when doing bashing on gravel but was aways a solid performer on other surfaces

But most importantly… I can’t recall I having had so much fun with as with the Traxxas E-Revo Brushless Edition. It is just THAT good and therefore I went along and bought one again after being away from RC cars for 2-3 years. A thing worth mentioning is that the car has had a few good upgrades in that timespan – the ESC has been made waterproof which was as a bit of a painpoint in the previous version and now it also features pretty solid telemetry if the transmitter is coupled with a smartphone using the Traxxas Link app via bluetooth. I have briefly tried out the telemetry and it seems to work well giving data such as speed, battery voltage, temperature and RPM.

As you can see from the pictures below I have bought the Traxxas Rustler VXL for my son who is 7 years old and I am also building a Losi 5ive-T brushless car that I plan to finish over the coming 4-6 weeks (waiting for parts to arrive from multiple hobby shops).

So all in all – this vehicle comes with the best of recommendations from my side and I look forward to having as much fun again with it as I did in the past!

Traxxas E-Revo Brushless Waterproof 4WD Monster Truck

Traxxas E-revo brushless and waterproof underneath

The Traxxas E-Revo and Traxxas Rustler VXL compared

The Traxxas E-Revo and Losi 5ive-T compared

January 15, 2015August 30, 2015

Building a Losi 5ive-T Brushless (part 2) – Choosing the motor and ESC

Castle Creations 2028 Extreme 800kv brushless motor

Back in 2010 long before HPI released their HPI Baja 5B Flux 1/5 scale brushless car I made a Baja 5B brushless conversion using a big Schulze ESC and tested two different motors – one being a Neu 2230 and the other a Lehner 3060. This was a very capable setup and even though I really enjoyed the build and had fun driving it a few times I must admit that the setup was just too powerful for the car to put down the immense power to the ground.

Now with the Losi 5ive-T and 4WD it should be easier to get proper traction instead of the 2WD on the HPI Baja 5B that I ended up crashing. So in choosing the motor and ESC I made five decisions:

Start out with something that can be upgraded to more cells if I need more power but don’t start out like last time and “overdo” it
Build a car that works well on the track and for bashing – I will not be doing speedruns or something similar
Even though it will put pressure on the ESC I have decided to use the motor and ESC for breaking
Get something where there is a reasonable balance between price and quality/performance
Get something that has been on the market for a while and has been tested thoroughly (no cheap stuff from HobbyKing or similar)

The motor for the Losi 5ive-T

Having looked at the options today I got it narrowed down to three options for the Motor. The Lehner 3080, the Neu 2230 or the Castle Creations 2028 (which is basically a Neu motor just mass produced). My priority list would be the Lehner 3080 as the preferred choice but I ended up with the Castle Creations 2028 instead for two reasons. It has had great reviews on many forums, it is by far the best bang for the buck and I could run the car on a range from 8-12 cells which is what I would prefer to start out with (more on that later).

It is also worth mentioning that Castle Creations recently made some performance-enhancing updates to this massive motor:

Revised stator and magnet shapes provide lower cogging torque for improved starting performance
The new 800Kv rating will make the setup faster
Rated at a higher RPM (45,000) due to improved manufacturing processes
Capable of operating on 12S

Here some photos of the unit as it comes right out of the box including a shot with the motor on a scale and a size comparison to a Castle Creations motor in a 1/10 Traxxas E-Revo:

The ESC for the Losi 5ive-T

Finding the ESC turned out to be a choice between two manufacturers and both options had its pros and cons. One option was going with the highly praised MGM controller lineup. From what I can gather going over tons of YouTube videos and forums the TMM 25063-3 for Cars X2-SERIES PRO should be a solid performer and I have yet to find anyone stating that this has caused them issues or that has complained about performance. This ESC is capable of handling 15S and 250amps continous. The only downside is the price tag at around 610EUR with a few necessary optionals (fan, on/off switch, water protection, wiring).

The second option was the Castle Creations Mamba XL2 ESC. This speed controller is an excellent partner for the 2028 motor and is fairly priced at 171USD. This has also been on the market for a few years but with that said there has been issues with the unit and many have experienced that it went up in smoke. Furthermore there is an issue with the warranty and the fact that the Losi 5ive-T will probably weigh around 35lbs. Castle Creations write the following on their website:

“The Mamba XL 2 and 2028 motor are recommended and warrantied in vehicles weighing less than 25lbs for 4WD and 30lbs for 2WD. Any use outside of these recommendations may lead to an ESC and/or motor failure that is not covered by the manufacturer’s warranty.”

Also the Mamba XL2 ESC is only capable of taking up to 8S batteries but going back to my wish to start out and then be able to upgrade I decided that with the affordable price tag, the fact that they should have fixed most issues by now and that I have seen a few videos on YouTube where this setup is tested made me confident that this was the right place to start. This would also allow me to upgrade to the MGM controller if and when this should ever become relevant.

Videos of the Losi 5ive-T with the Mamba XL2 ESC and 2028 motor

The following is a two videos show a) a car with the same setup running and b) a video review of the Losi 5ive-T and the Castle Creations motor/ESC combo:

Continue to part 3 of the Losi 5ive-T build series http://deguno.com/rc-cars/building-a-losi-5ive-t-brushless-part-3-fitting-the-parts-and-testing-the-truck