Bill’s Nostalgia Corner

Part 2

I’ll start out in part two talking about batteries, motors, chargers/charging, and gears. First we’ll start out with batteries. Back in the beginning, there was no such thing as a matched pack of batteries. All the cars all used stick battery packs.

 The first things we would hear through the grape-vine was the date codes of the battery packs. Certain months were better than others.  Also the Sanyo was the best pack out there. Sure there were other brands out there but for many-many years Sanyo was the batteries to have. We’re talking about are 1200sc’s.

 The 1983 Race sponsored by Bolink “The Spring Championship Race” in Atlanta came around. Yes the same race with the water dipped motors I mentioned in the first article. GE had a new battery they were coming out with. This was going to be their big push. But it never materialized. Sanyo(1200’s) were still the battery to have.

 You have to realize that there were only two types of r/c cars 1/8th gas and 1/12th electric. In 1/12th we always ran 8 minutes with the  6-7 minute mark was always the critical mark as if you were off – you dumped(Game Over). Here’s where the charging our batteries comes in. This was very interesting in the beginning. I blew up so many packs and I had plenty of company during the early years. Let’s see there was the standard Associated Charger with a 15 minute timer. We all know the batteries don’t charge in 15 minutes but that was the majority of chargers being sold at the time. Then there was Leisure and they were the only company to include a digital meter on their charger with the 15 minute timer.

Otherwise with the Associated and everyone else, you had to get a volt meter to read the voltage. The volt meters weren’t cheap like they are today. I’ve still got my $80.00 Fluke digital volt meter I used and it still works. Now you ask why the batteries would blow up. There was no cut-off for the chargers just timers. They just kept charging until the timer cut it off. So you had to watch the volt meter and when it starting going in reverse you unplugged and you’re ready to go. Now the other version was the one that came in every Associated kit- “the charge cord” you would hook it up to your car battery. This was supposed to give you the best charge possible. You did this by feel of the battery. When it got very warm it was done. Or if it got too warm; “boom.”

There were no generators back then. Everyone charged off your car battery. The smart guys got the marine deep cycle battery and charger and used it to charge your batteries. There was always someone that charged too much off their car battery and needed a jump to go home after the races.

Even the early days going to the big races carrying those heavy marine batteries up in the hotel room was fun. Then bringing them back down in the morning got old quick. But again generators were not around for many years. Having a room on the first floor was always a priority. The excuses we gave to get a first floor room. Especially if you were the one that had to go up the stairs lugging that big battery. You also had to put something down on the ground for the battery to sit on. Otherwise the battery would drain quicker- so we were told.

Now the chargers did improve to no more timers and they were the “delta” peak system (Kevin Ortin - Delta/Tekin). You could always tell the new guys as the hobby shops would sell the timer chargers and tell everyone they would charge in 15 minutes. You could see the new racers show up at their first race to dump in 4-5 minutes and wonder why. This was the cheapest form of chargers and that’s what it took to get the new racers out there. We would then show them what they needed to do and went from there.

Now we come to the motors. The original motors were the sealed Mabuchi 540 motors for stock and the adjustable timing modifieds.  I’ve still got my original first motor. There were no changing brushes. Maybe a different end bell for the mod’s but that was it. You could bend the metal brush holder on the mod’s. In stock, if you cranked the timing it was illegal and if was easy to bust the wires. Now it was done, but you took the chance of ruining a motor at a big race and getting caught.

Now during my first year Leisure (the company I raced for) had an electric airplane motor with removable brushes and springs. This is where my good friend and team captain came in (Rocky Hagan). Both he and Roland of Leisure came up with the idea of using this motor. The only problem was we could not get replacement brushes. Talk about fast there was nothing out there that could touch it. But it was not ROAR legal and I could only run my motor in practice or after the days racing. Now the second motors they sent me were not like the original- it was slower. Again it wasn’t Roar legal either. It would be several years later with the Kyosho Lemans(240) motors before we would have removable brushes.

Was there such a thing as getting your com cut- NO. When the com was worn out that was it. Com cutters came into being after the Lemans motors were available. The few out there were hard to find and rather expensive when they first came out. On of the first that I can remember was the Twister Lathe by Mike Walker.

It was also during this time the motor guys were just getting started. They would rebuild your motors (cut the coms and put in new brushes and springs). Everyone in Florida knows Paul Wynn but it was his dad Jerry Wynn that was the man at our Florida races “Redline Modifieds”. If you needed your motor worked on he was the man.

 Another one of the tricks for the Mabuchi’s motors was a magnet zapper. If you were lucky to be friends with the few guys that had a magnet zapper that was the thing to do to our motors. These were mostly home made.

After the Lemans type of motors came out someone made a magnet zapper commercially (which I bought). We were supposed to be able to advance the timing by adjusting the magnet strength off center. It did ruin the motors we tried it on. This was a waste of money .
Now for gearing and your big choices. There weren’t any to speak of. Everyone ran 32 pitch gears. Stock had a 48 spur and mod ran 46 (if you had a good trigger finger). There was no such thing as 48 pitch or 64 pitch gears in the beginning. It would have been a big improvement if they were out but they weren’t. Now you remember I mentioned the first cars came out without a diff that was an option. It did not take anyone long to put the option in there car.

Now it was Delta that came out with the Delta diff.  It also came with a 48 pitch and later the 64 pitch gears. This was great on some surfaces. It was a Spur gear with three small gears (Gear diff) – something like the Japanese diffs you see in a lot of there cars even today. That’s not a good description but it’s the best I can give you. Now when delta came out it also took a special axle. Again the race in Atlanta was the first big race we tried it out at. There was a big problem, they were just a tad to long and would not fit in the tech box. We did manage to get them to work sort of and they passed tech. They made new axles after the race and that fixed the problem.

Now it was during this time the 48 and 64 pitched gears came out. Most of the people chose the 48 pitch. The 64 pitched gears seemed to strip easier. At least they did for me. Now as a recap we were “still” running 1200 Sanyo batteries. Before I forget at many of the big races back then you would always see the Sanyo rep at the races. They were the king of the hill of batteries.
The next part will be the next generation of batteries- Sanyo and other battery companies (1400scr’s and 1700’s). Track prep for local and big races. Track side pits and lap counting. I hope you’re having fun reading about my racing experiences.