OK, so I bought my son a car at Christmas and now I need one to race him with. I’ve bought a s/h Tamiya Mad Bull as it ticks all the boxes of keeping up with his Wild Dagger without getting squashed and breaking too easily.

I’ve got bearings and will be doing the shocks as well before thats suggested but I need some help with the electrics………

I need a ESC and I also need to be faster so fancy a Sports Tuned motor as well. Do I need to go brushless or should I stick with cheap and simple Tamiya ESC and motor?

I don’t want to get geeky about it, I just want plug and play fun and will NEVER race. Waterproof ESC seems a sensible choice but are they necessary? Cash is tight so cheaper options that work are better than pimpy top end kit.

Advice please :O)

thanks

Tim

To be fair, you should get the same as your son, so your greater driving skill can be demonstrated.

To be fair, you should get the same as your son, and secretly hop it up, so your greater driving skill can be demonstrated.

Brushless all the way

The cheapest thing to do is to change the motor for a race type one. Standard tamiya kits come with motors around 27 turn, but a ‘propper’ 27 turn will be quicker. I’ve got a standard tamiya ESC running a 19 turn motor and it gets warm but hasn’t blown up yet. IIRC the standard ESC is only rated officially for 27 turn motors.

Pleanty of motors on eBay, the team Orion ones are pretty good for the money.

If you want to completely destroy him have a look at a 3.5 turn brush less system, that would need a lipo battery though

Can’t get the same but can hop up something fun :O)

Come on, give me links to good shizzle!

Lipo batteries are approx 50% cheaper than NIMH and better in every respect so get an ESC and charger that can run those. Changing motors from a 20 turn brushed to a 15 turn made a big difference on my lads one and at some point I’ll also go brushless but that will mean upgrading gears, clutch, drive shafts etc etc etc. For now dropping 5 turns was plenty and didn’t cause any undue side effects.

I am in shock i did not think anyone was using brushed motors for anything these days.

meh he’s 9

LOL – mines not even 8 yet!

Oh, and he’s bust it. New chassis and front gearbox needed! £28 on eBay. hey ho

If you want something fun and cheap then I’d go with one of These motors (something in the 15T-27T range depending how fast you want it) and one of These as an ESC. Should get you going for around £35 and then if you want to upgrade to Lipos and brushless in the future then you haven’t lost much.

Thanks DR – thats the sort of advice I was after.