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RC Boats Electric vs Gas

Old 12-26-2003, 09:38 AM
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Default RC Boats Electric vs Gas

I got an electric RC boat for Christmas, complete with charger for AC and DC. I'm mostly going to run this from my boat for the most part...

What are your thoughts... electric, maintenance free, no hassle other than a short run time between charges... or

trade up to Gas... more headaches with maintenance, but longer run time, more performance, more expensive...

Girlfiend spent over two hundred on this... if I go to gas... can I get something good for under $500??

Or just quit while I'm ahead and keep my mind on the real boat!!!!

Looking for advice from those of you that have been through this... Thanks for your time!!!!
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Old 12-26-2003, 09:48 AM
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Gas, maintenance free,

Electric... more headaches with maintenance, short run time.

Remember, gas, you just refil the tank. Electric, you need to give the battery 15 or more minutes between a run, and charging. Electric is the biggest hassle. My old electric had twin stock 550's, and normally ran 12 cells (saw 18 cells once or twice...), I had over 700$ invested, meaning about 500 was fixing broken stuff.

Bought a 2 stroke weed wacker boat. Ran the devil out of it, and then some, hasnt broke.

Find a Fiberglass 40 or so inch hull on ebay
Find a weed wacker in the garbage somewhere, put it in, go with Octura hardware, and you can get a Futaba radio for under 50$ (plus HD steering servo). You will be done for under 300.

If you do decide to stay electric, I would reccomend getting a ESC not the 2 step (crap) I broke 3 or 4 of them in my electric. Plus, the ESC you have infinite speeds. I have a Novak Reactor Reversible, works great, used 3 times, (then I bought a gas boat) paid 90, will sell for 60.

Tommy
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Old 12-26-2003, 06:50 PM
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Can't run your gas (alcohol/nitro) boat from the swim platform of your "real' boat. Greasy nasty nasty greasy.

When you flip your gas boat, you will have to pull the glow plug and spin it over with the starter for ten seconds with and then thumb the intake to pull the wet fuel out of it - this action will spew castor oil based alcohol all over the @ss of your "real" boat. When you start it and warm it up, you will be spewing nitro oily exhaust all over the place. They are great and are fast, but you gotta run them off the shore and have a little "catch boat".

Electrics are very very clean. A good charger and two spare battery packs and you can run till you are tired of it.

Now, as Tommy says, a BIG rc boat with a weedeater motor is much cleaner than a nitro boat. They are also LARGE. This is cool, but not as handy.

(an upgraded speed control will extend your battery life and will have a "low battery" mode where it will let you run at slow speed back to the boat/shore before the cells fall over the edge - the cells used these days will just all of a sudden fall off to zipola).
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Old 12-26-2003, 06:57 PM
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I've had one of each....

The electric was my first. It was fun, but slow and the batteries never seemed to last.

After that I had a tunnel with a 7.5cc outboard. It was pretty fast for its size (~45mph). There was some maint, but it wasn't too expensive.

Next I bought a weedeater boat. It was about 40" and had a (I think) 23cc motor in it. It wasn't as fast as the tunnel, but the gas was alot cheaper (and I didn't have to go a hobby store to buy it). Also with the larger hull I didn't have to worry about flipping it. Oh yeah, with a centrifugal weedeater motor you have a "nuetral". With the tunnel it was always moving.

Chris
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Old 12-26-2003, 07:05 PM
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I started looking at the nitro's... one by Traxxas...


the weedeaters sound good though, they get big and expensive.... any sites that sell a 40" weedwacker???
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Old 12-26-2003, 07:15 PM
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I started looking at the nitro's... one by Traxxas...

http://www.ehobbies.com/1000-0620.html

the weedeaters sound good though, they get big and expensive.... any sites that sell a 40" weedwacker???
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Old 12-26-2003, 07:34 PM
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everyone posting here is correct.
Gas can run longer
nitro does make a mess
battery upkeep can be time consuming, but so can rebuilds on a nitro motor. I would rather just buy new electric motors then rebuild a nitro
yes you flip your boat and yo uhave to purge the motor
but yo uflip an electric and you have to buy who knows what
I would stay with the electric, play to your hearts content, keep your lady happy that you are using her present

Then, when you realize how slow the little electric boat runs, upgrade to one on this site
http://www.aeromarinerc.com/

However, if you do research on R/C boats there is a record holder of 100mph pass on an electric custom
But that is also a fast few seconds with NO control

I am looking at the Avenger 44" from Aeromarine
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Old 12-26-2003, 09:39 PM
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We raced a .21 in a Force 22. That sob ran like the devil. As long as you didnt back off, it was fast, but when you did, it was always running horrible. Their *****y little race motors.

Buy a 40 inch hull on ebay, go to home depot, buy a weed wacker motor, and ebay for OCTURA hardware.

Weed eaters arent expensive when you look at cos of running. Plugs are 1/2 the price of glow, gas is 1.5 a gallon (compared to what, 15?). GO GAS.
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Old 12-27-2003, 01:29 AM
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I have a gas boat. and it has an echo weedeater in it. The thing is unbreakable. I had some movies up on the net. If you go with a gas boat don't mess with that nitro crap. Go with a stock weedeater engine, all my hardware and mounts are one off customs. But they do make gas boats ready to run.

Ernie
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Old 12-27-2003, 03:12 AM
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Electric you have to charge batts, cover up the esc and all really well as well as water proofing the boat as im sure you know, I think nitro is better for water however..

If your running straight out of your boat you can always go pick it up if it shuts off or whatever, but nitro you just gas up and go basically only maitnence you really have to do is change glow plugs and take care of the engine tuning on it and all!
But my friend has an electric boat and its pretty fun to run around the lake area he lives by, but its also very risky because of what the water damage can do to the engine parts and esc parts etc...His is messed up right now because of the water that got on his motor, I think its like a 20 turn...
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