Thunder Tiger Victoria Sailboat

[R/Cbum4life]

Hey lets try to get a forum rolling for the Victoria. I know this is about cars but they dont have a boat forum yet so shoot away you all.

[R/Cbum4life]

This is the place guys... Lets go!!

[hpiguy]

I have one of those.

[sailinginct]

Hello R/Cbum4life,
I followed your link to this site and was inspired to write the following message to the webmaster for Radio Control Zone.

Hello,

I am writing this note to request assistance in setting up a section in your forums for radio control boats. Yahoo Clubs! has recently converted their forums to Yahoo Groups! and many of the forum members are not happy with the flood of ads between messages. The first message addressing this issue can be found here: RadioControlZone Forums > Radio Control Zone > RC Cars > General R/C Forums > General Discussion > Thunder Tiger Victoria Sailboat originally from http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Victoriaforum/message/119.

I am currently a member of 8 groups within Yahoo! Groups all dealing with radio control sailboats. I find the Yahoo! Message format to be a sequential list of messages posted to the site but there are no threads or sections within the messages for different topics of discussion. MSN communities offers threaded messages for different discussions but you still have to find the community of interest by using their search option. What Yahoo! and MSN seem to be good at is the photo albums where members can post their pictures for others to view. However the photo albums are tied to the individual group / community.

The main website for radio control sailing is at www.amya.org. This site provides vast information about all the different classes of radio control sailboats but is lacking a forum suitable for all of it members to interact. There are many clubs related to model yacht sailing listed in the AMYA website. This list will provide an idea of the presence that radio control sailing has on the internet.

All that is missing now is a way to bring it all together in one place.

[R/Cbum4life]

I agree one hundred percent. Once they get the boat section built I think this would be a good place for the victoria club to move to. Spread the word.

[R/Cbum4life]

hpiguy im glad to see someone saw this. I am trying to get something started here instead of the yahoo discussion groups or whatever they are. If you know anyone else with one tell them this site and get things going. I cant wait to start sailing my boat I just painted the deck and it is ready to go!

[Fafnir]

If anyone from the Edina Model Yacht Club is on this board could you PM me, I have some questions about the club.

--Chad

[hpiguy]

I haven't even built mine yet.

The instructions act like it is soooo easy but even though I've built dozens of plane and car kits, this rigging stuff is confusing the heck out of me. The knots alone are enough to make alarge fingered person like me pull their hair out.

AND I still can't find a long metric ruler to check my positions of the different mast pieces and rigging.

Oh well.

[sailinginct]

It isn't easy to build one of these sailboats. The thunder tiger victoria at least comes as a complete kit. I just finished a Victor Model Products Soling 1 Meter and that was quite a challenge. Even before you begin assembly, it is recommended to build an assembly fixture to get a good keel alignment. The parts you get don't quite fit together as they come and there is a lot of assembly where the instructions are very vague or plain missing. But I should not complain, there are many people out there building their boats from scratch without any instructions whatsoever. That is the challenge. The reward is when you finally get it to the pond and see it sail.
You can see pictures that I posted about my Soling 1 Meter assembly at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/solingonemeter/?yguid=101829353 and then selecting the photos section. You will need to establish a membership in order to view the pictures. You might also see some of the complaint posts about Yahoo! groups.

[sailinginct]

I noticed on the "home Page" for RC Zone at http://www.radiocontrolzone.com/index.asp that a boats section is shown "under construction". The Boats section may well be on its way.

[R/Cbum4life]

Yeah when thats gets movin we can start one there. Though it may be hard to build and i'll be honest it doesnt sail very well stock but once you do some upgrades (sails, servos, etc.) It is a blast to sail. Spring is coming, SAIL!!!

[R/Cbum4life]

[R/Cbum4life]

ANyone like this boat or wat????

[RickE]

The Victoria is a very popular boat. Checkout the American Model Yacht Association (AMYA) website under their suppliers section-you'll see a handfull of Victoria-related sellers that can set you up with a race-ready Vic, as this sailboat has it's own class in AMYA.

Most Victoria racers strip-off all of the deck-mounted details and just go for the "bare" look on their boats, plus you'll find a bunch of websites dedicated to modifying the Vic on the AMYA 'site as well.

Hope this helps,
RickE

[R/Cbum4life]

Yeah I am well aware of the VRC (www.victoriarc.org) But I thought we could get some good discussion going on here also!

[SS Pede]

Has anyone had issues with their rudder servo glitching on the Victoria? My friend and I both have Victorias and we both have experienced problems with the rudder servo. It twitches and does not move smoothly at all. It seems to settle down enough after a few minutes so I can sail the boat, but its annoying. Maybe a new servo would fix it? The sail winch servo is also pretty weak. Any recommendations?

[SS Pede]

anyone?

[R/Cbum4life]

Try moving your antenna further away from any of the electronics, the aluminum mast, and anything else metal. I put mine in a straw and stick it in the front of the boat. It is also possible your servo got wet and is now glitching. I have had that happen. Seal the bottom of them with silicone next time!

[losiXXXman]

Well it looks like I'm getting one for Christmas... Cannot wait to get started. I plan to do several of the ideas from VRC during the initial build... Anyone got any new building/setup tips?

[FoMo]

[QUOTE=SS Pede]anyone?

There is life out here although very sparse ... I'm new, that's why the late reply.

FoMo ;)

[Austinlake]

I've had a Victoria for the past 3 years and enjoy it tremendously. I eventually replaced all of the thread rigging with 40 lb test black fishing line. I used material from the deck cut-out to replace most of the black plastic bowsies included in the kit (put larger holes in them.) Added a single rigging line to the front of the boat where there wasn't one. I also used heat-forming fuel line to help the sail tightening line make the 90 degree turn at the back of the boat before it enters into the servo area. I also found that a larger servo was needed to help tighten the sail in a brisk wind. IT MAY NOT BE THE FASTEST BOAT ON THE WATER-- BUT IS IS A LOT OF FUN ON A NICE DAY!

[SS Pede]

If I were to buy a stronger sail winch servo, would this one (http://www2.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/wti0001p?&W=000298801&I=LXGZU1&P=K) work?

I'll have to move the antenna around and see if the glitching goes away. But if the rudder servo got wet, then I guess I'll have to buy another one! I don't think I've ever gotten much water inside the hull, however. Plus, the servo is elevated a little in the radio box. Hmmm.

[RickE]

You'd have to do some cutting/modifying of the Victoria's servo tray to fit that bigger Hitec servo. There'd also likely be a tinkering needed to get the sail arm to swing right inside the yacht as well. If you're using a standard-output servo now to control the sails (say around 50 oz./in. of torque) you could upgrade to one of the newer high-torque servos used on R/C cars/trucks that have the same outer dimensions as the standard servo. Both Hitec and Futaba have over 100 oz./in. torque units that should work in your sailboat and sell for under $50.00.
RickE

[SS Pede]

If you're using a standard-output servo now to control the sails (say around 50 oz./in. of torque) you could upgrade to one of the newer high-torque servos used on R/C cars/trucks that have the same outer dimensions as the standard servo. Both Hitec and Futaba have over 100 oz./in. torque units that should work in your sailboat and sell for under $50.00.
That is a good point, I guess the Victoria does use standard "car" servos. I could buy a stronger one of those. Thanks. :)

[SS Pede]

Guys, I have done some more testing with my servo twitching/glitching problem, and I need your help! I will try to explain the problem as well as I can. Here goes!

Using the Tx and Rx from my Stampede, and my boat's stock radio equipment, I was able to test out my Victoria's servos with multiple combinations of electronics. I was able to switch receivers, transmitters, and crystals around to see what happened. This is what I found out (as best as I can explain it):

With ANY COMBINATION of Tx/Rx/crystals, the rudder servo twitches constantly whether it is plugged into channel 1 or 2 on the receiver. Turning on the boat's electronics alone has no effect, but the INSTANT I turn on the transmitter (any transmitter on the right frequency) the rudder servo starts twitching constantly. Occasionally it will stop, but as soon as I give it input with the transmitter it starts twitching out of control again. Again, this ONLY happens when there is a Tx operating on the boat's channel. When the Tx is off and only the onboard electronics are on, the servo does not move at all. This glitching happened with BOTH test transmitters, BOTH test receivers, BOTH sets of crystals, and BOTH channels of either receiver, in ANY combination of the above items.

As for the sail winch servo, it is much better. HOWEVER, there is a little bit of glitching. Sometimes it glitches back and forth when the servo tries to tighten the sails past the neutral point. With the stock Tx and Rx, this happens ONLY when the servo is plugged into channel 2 (the stock position). It happens whether the rudder servo is plugged in next to it or not. With the stock Hitec Tx, the winch servo does the exact same thing when plugged into channels 1 or 2 of the Traxxas receiver as well. Here's the key thing: the sail winch servo NEVER glitches on EITHER channel with EITHER receiver when I am using the Traxxas transmitter.

Let my try to sum things up, since this is a complicated post. The rudder servo glitches all the time, no matter where it's plugged in or what electronics I'm using. The sail servo glitches only when it's plugged into channel 2 (either receiver) and only when I'm using the stock Hitec Tx. There's a slight difference in the glitching between the two servos. The rudder servo glitches constantly as long as there's a Tx turned on. The sail winch servo, however, only glitches when I try to winch in the sails with it. At neutral, and when it's letting out the sails, it works perfectly.

As a side note, I've untaped the antenna from the inside of the hull and it is now just hanging loose outside the boat. Changing the antenna's position had no noticeable effect on glitching.

So the big question is: what exactly is wrong with my radio system? I guess the rudder servo is totally fried. Maybe water did it (although I'm not sure how). Now, I don't know about the sail servo. Since it only is totally glitch-free when using the Traxxas Tx, perhaps the Hitec Tx is all messed up and is sending bad signals on channel 2 (remember, channel 1 is fine with the sail servo. Maybe I also got the Tx wet at some point.

So what do you guys think? I know it seems like I've answered my own questions, but I'd like some more opinions. From where I stand, it seems like I've independently messed up the rudder servo and the transmitter, maybe by getting them wet. So do I need to just buy a new servo and a new Tx, or is there something I'm missing? Enlighten me! :confused:

Thanks. :)

[SS Pede]

Well, I fixed my servo glitching problem! I will share with you how I did this in case it helps anyone out.

I had determined that I had 2 separate problems. The major one was that the rudder servo fluttered uncontrollably whenever I turned the radio system on. The second problem was that the sail servo twitched in a similar fashion for half of its travel (in my case, only when winching the sails in past the center point). Read my post above for a detailed description of my tests and experiences.

The cause of BOTH problems was dirty potentiometers! After a bit of research on the web, I discovered this site (http://www.m3sc.org/glitching.htm). Based on the info on this site and my own tests, I decided to clean the potentiometer in my rudder servo, and the potentiometer of my transmitter's channel 2 stick. I couldn't get at the servo's potentiometer like they show on the site (the Hitec HS-303's circuit board is permanently attached to the inside of the case and cannot be moved out of the way), but I was able to disassemble the servo enough to spray some motor cleaner (Duratrax Power Shot is safe on electronics) on the pot. I guess the motor spray penetrated the pot all right, because the twitching is now completely gone!

Since the sail servo only glitched when using the stock transmitter, I had a hunch that the channel 2 potentiometer needed to be cleaned. I followed the instructions from the above site (it was extremely convenient that the pot-cleaning tutorial used my exact transmitter as the example!). A bit of motor cleaner in the correct location (once again I didn't have to disassemble the pot completely), and the channel 2 glitching was solved!

I assume that neither potentiometer was exactly "dirty." More likely, they both got wet at some point and became corroded. To guard against this, I spread some grease along the edges of each piece of the rudder servo's case. Ideally, the grease filled most of the little gaps in the case when I screwed the case back together. Also, I'm hoping that this quick little fix will be more or less permanent. Hopefully the Power Shot did its job! We'll see what happens.

I hope my experience helps out someone else with twitchy/glitchy/fluttering servos!

BTW, anyone know how to stop sails from curling inward at the edges? My Vic's jib is rolling itself up, and I'm losing valuable surface area!

Take care,
-SS