ducati777
04-25-2005, 11:39 AM
Hey all.
Some of you may recall that I recently purchased a mamba 5400, but haven't run it on the lipo pack yet. Well I did last night, and here's the story.
I went to San Francisco for my sister's 30th birthday. There's a whole nother story that isn't family oriented behind that one. San Francisco rocks. Anyway its sunday and I start the long drive home, and as I'm cruising through San Jose I figure I'll stop by Sheldon's Hobbies.
Sheldon's is probably the best LHS I've ever seen. If its RC, they got it. They've got stuff I've never heard of in there. They also had a E Flite Celectra Lipo charger that I picked up for $48 out the door. No shipping, no waiting, just the long drive to SLO to think about it.
I got home, put a deans on the pack, grabbed my 12 volt starterbox battery, a regulated 12vdc adapter, the celectra, the pack, the 959, and the charge guard, phew. It was a string of electronics across the garage floor, the pack sitting in the middle on the concrete. I hit the charger and went to take a nap, I woke up to the charger beeping away. Its go time.
My 18T is in sorry shape right now. Broken front shock, didn't shim the front diff, no brass fittings on the outdrives, no spur cover on the bottom... I really shouldn't even be driving, but I had to know. I set the mamba to 50% brake, normal starting power, 9 volt cutoff, and the slowest timing setting. It chirped and beeped to life. I set it on the carpet and drove outside, its suprised me how controlled it was at low speed.
With the 6 cell stock pack, I had to set the start power high, so the car would lurch off the line, or cog badly. With 11.1 volts of Lipo, its completely tame. I got outside and gave it a squeeze. Instant wheelspin, and looped it around. Whoops, try that again.
Probably took 3 or 4 tries to get up to speed. I would listen for the wheelspin on pavement and try to adjust the throttle. Too much and I risk spinning out or coming off my line. This thing is sick fast. Top speed is probably 30 ish, maybe more. It was way more top speed than I figure I'll ever need. If not, I can always regear. I'm running 15/60 right now.
The cool part is the torque, and the ability to give it just a squeeze of the trigger to have more power than needed at any time. Even doing 20 down the street a squeeze on the trigger and all 4 wheels will light up.
I ran for about 20 minutes before it got too cold outside. I came in, the front diff seems in bad shape, but I'll open it up and see whats going on. The rear diff held fine, so did the outdrives. I'll still shim it, brass fitting it, and seal the diffs with RTV.
Probably the only downside is I tore up the tires on the first run. The rears have bald strips down the middle. The fronts are better, so I'll probably just rotate for now. In the future I think touring car tires are the way to go. They're built to hold up to 50 mph runs on bigger cars, so hopefully they'll withstand the mamba.
All in all well worth it. After some more upgrades I think I'll finally be setup. Its a spendy process, but that truck sure does fly.
Some of you may recall that I recently purchased a mamba 5400, but haven't run it on the lipo pack yet. Well I did last night, and here's the story.
I went to San Francisco for my sister's 30th birthday. There's a whole nother story that isn't family oriented behind that one. San Francisco rocks. Anyway its sunday and I start the long drive home, and as I'm cruising through San Jose I figure I'll stop by Sheldon's Hobbies.
Sheldon's is probably the best LHS I've ever seen. If its RC, they got it. They've got stuff I've never heard of in there. They also had a E Flite Celectra Lipo charger that I picked up for $48 out the door. No shipping, no waiting, just the long drive to SLO to think about it.
I got home, put a deans on the pack, grabbed my 12 volt starterbox battery, a regulated 12vdc adapter, the celectra, the pack, the 959, and the charge guard, phew. It was a string of electronics across the garage floor, the pack sitting in the middle on the concrete. I hit the charger and went to take a nap, I woke up to the charger beeping away. Its go time.
My 18T is in sorry shape right now. Broken front shock, didn't shim the front diff, no brass fittings on the outdrives, no spur cover on the bottom... I really shouldn't even be driving, but I had to know. I set the mamba to 50% brake, normal starting power, 9 volt cutoff, and the slowest timing setting. It chirped and beeped to life. I set it on the carpet and drove outside, its suprised me how controlled it was at low speed.
With the 6 cell stock pack, I had to set the start power high, so the car would lurch off the line, or cog badly. With 11.1 volts of Lipo, its completely tame. I got outside and gave it a squeeze. Instant wheelspin, and looped it around. Whoops, try that again.
Probably took 3 or 4 tries to get up to speed. I would listen for the wheelspin on pavement and try to adjust the throttle. Too much and I risk spinning out or coming off my line. This thing is sick fast. Top speed is probably 30 ish, maybe more. It was way more top speed than I figure I'll ever need. If not, I can always regear. I'm running 15/60 right now.
The cool part is the torque, and the ability to give it just a squeeze of the trigger to have more power than needed at any time. Even doing 20 down the street a squeeze on the trigger and all 4 wheels will light up.
I ran for about 20 minutes before it got too cold outside. I came in, the front diff seems in bad shape, but I'll open it up and see whats going on. The rear diff held fine, so did the outdrives. I'll still shim it, brass fitting it, and seal the diffs with RTV.
Probably the only downside is I tore up the tires on the first run. The rears have bald strips down the middle. The fronts are better, so I'll probably just rotate for now. In the future I think touring car tires are the way to go. They're built to hold up to 50 mph runs on bigger cars, so hopefully they'll withstand the mamba.
All in all well worth it. After some more upgrades I think I'll finally be setup. Its a spendy process, but that truck sure does fly.