It's been a fun ride over here at R/C Modz Full Throttle, with
RC projects, and home life it's been a fast pace. While most
of my own work and R/C projects remains on R/C Modz Full Throttle,
I had a good run with RC Car Action.com and enjoyed
writing editorial articles for the website.
I have since moved after a year at RCCA, to a new corner of
the web called "RCTRUCKSTOP.com" The creator and CEO
of RC Truck Stop is non other than Matt Higgins former editor
in chief of RC Car Action Magazine.
After Matt moved from the Air Age Media group, he embarked
onto his own site. Featuring honest, fair and experienced RC
related information and media related topics. RC Truck Stop is
completely dedicated to the RC community and committed to
providing accurate, quality content that you can trust. RC Truck
Stop only publishes reviews that are based on actual testing.
He believes in truthful, critical reviews provide experienced
hobbyists with the content they seek and enable all enthusiasts
new or veteran—to make confident purchases and better enjoy
the hobby. I've been writing for RC Truck Stop since they started
and it's a great place to get your RC fix.

"I would like to thank everyone, family and friends who have supported me through out the years, helped with projects and always taken interest in the hobby and my website."
-Christopher Oswald

"R/C Modz Full Throttle Website" and "R/C Modz Full Throttle Blogger Home" will be staying the same and updated regularly.

However, due to overwhelming web development and emails and R/C Tech. questions and comments, "ORCCTM-Online Radio Control Car & Truck Mechanic" will be closing down. For any further inquires or questions, you are welcome and invited to submit them to rcmodzwinnipeg@gmail.com or visit and comment on my blog at http://www.rccaraction.com R/C Car Action Magazine

Battery Tab Nightmare

Travis wrote to Online Radio Control Car & Truck Mechanic:

"I had read your blog from a post on Facebook and thought i'd give you an email to see if you had some ideas for me. I've been building my own battery packs latly and running into a problem. I have a Brushless Rustler VXL and Ive been having my battery packs fall part after running and bashing in the park. I have re-soldiered the tabs multiple times and they just don't hold. I've used my soldering iron, and even my friends who told me mine may not be hot enough. I went to the hobby store and they sold me solder with flux in it, and it kinda worked but again.... two out of five packs keep falling apart and I re did them all. What is the deal here? What am I doing wrong??"

Travis, AZ.


This one has plagued many people, and it's often due to a missed step. It seems to me that you have done your homework, used higher heat, and even included the much needed flux into the equation. What you may or may have not done is proper preparation. When you solder a battery tab it's a good idea to lightly sand each matching surface, this includes the battery tab (the side facing the top or bottom of battery) and the top and bottom of the battery itself. Having a rougher surface to bond to will make the solder and flux stick a lot better, rather than to a shiny smooth surface. Along with lightly sanding, use a small amount of cleaning alcohol or electric motor cleaner to cleanly wipe the soldering surfaces. Let dry and apply heat, and then add solder. Some people even "tin" (Tin- pre-applying solder to the tab, and then a small amount to the heads of the battery) before you heat and bond the two together.

Try this, and use some patents when waiting for the solder to dry before flexing the pack around. This will reduce the stress on the hot tabs and more likely hold during a rough landing, or other normal rough driving. Another thing is, are you using a battery jig or some king of battery alignment tool? building packs can be tricky to get all the cells lined up the right way and spaced properly. If you aren't using a battery jig, I strongly recommend it. Makes this process faster and easier.

-ORCCTM Tech.

Double Up

Kevin wrote to Online Radio Control Car & Truck Mechanic:

"I want to put two battery packs in my truck to make it go faster. How do I go about wiring it properly. My friend Aaron says it will only make my runtime longer But I wanted it to go faster. What does he mean two batteries will make me have longer run time??
I want to go FASSSST. Wiring HELP!!
-Kevin Ont,Can."

Straight to the point, OK I can deal with that. Kevin... you can actually put two battery packs in your truck one of two ways. Series, and Parallel. Let me show you.
First you should check if your vehicle can even hold two battery packs. Some vehicles are designed with dual batteries in mind, such as an HPI E-Savage or Traxxas' E-Maxx. Other vehicles may be designed around one battery pack, but you can easily find room for a pair of battery packs in a lot of other cars. Since you didn't enclosed what R/C you are running I can't give you more specific info on how to do this (for YOUR truck) but you can use your imagination on where one extra battery would fit in your car. Maybe piggy back onto the other? or on each side of the chassis.
Before you do ANYTHING! Check the Specs for the ESC you are using!!! You'll need to find the manufacturer documentation stating the maximum input voltage that it can handle. For two 7.2v 6-cell packs, you'll need an ESC rated at least 14.4 volts. (wired in series) For two 7.2v 6-cell packs (in Parallel), you'll need at least an input of 7.2V volts. but most sport ESC will have a max of 8.4v. If you run LIPO batteries, I would NOT ADVISE you to run more than one lipo in your car. One lipo is often better and more capable then two NIMH dry cell battery packs no matter the configuration. These methods are typically for non-lipo batteries. Besides, one draw back to these methods are twice the weight in your car. The lipo's are lighter and can offer you simular performance. If you can't afford new lipo's and a charger for yourself, this is always the cheap way to speed and run-time on a budget. But effective. Let's take a look at a diagram to see what all this is talk is about.



* Note: you may have to make a wiring harness to accommodate these type of battery configurations. If you make one of each you always have something on hand to bash around with.
Finally I need to tell you about one more bit of information. Not only does an extra battery make the car heaver and may not always increase performance, but in the "series" setup your run-time will go down faster than the single battery, and the parallel setup will give you a longer run-time than just the one battery. It's the give and take mentality. Hope this helps.

PS. Let me know what car/truck you want to do this in, and I'll be glad to give you some pointers.

-ORCCTM Tech.

Basic R/C Vehicle Maintenance

Basic R/C Vehicle Maintenance
Tips and Suggestions
by: Chris Oswald - R/C Modz Full Throttle; ORCCTM Tech.


Hello ORCCTM Blog followers. You may recognize the following write up on the recently "New Project" released GM Performance Parts Corvette. Based on a very popular Tamiya TT-01. This articles tips and suggestion can be made for any vehicle, but because of an up coming indoor season around the corner I thought I would show you a few things that I consider Basic Electric R/C Vehicle Maintenance.R/C Modz Full Throttle and my ORCCTM Blog will come together for this write up for the first time. Here are some basic steps to consider when starting to rebuild and maintain your Electric R/C vehicle.

What you will need: (other than your tools)
- Instruction booklet/diagrams* ~If available~ (in case you get stuck)
- Clean rags
- Old toothbrush
- Bearing lubricant
- Electric motor/ bearing cleaner
- Small clean dry plastic container
- Differential and gear grease/lube
- Shock oil (weight depends on preference; see owners manual for details)


First, you want to tear down the whole vehicle. This may seem like over kill to some, but with my experience this method covers all the basis and you'd be surprised what you find sometimes once you get into a tear down. You might find a bearing that is seized. Maybe you'll come across a worn out component like a tie rod end, or maybe some extra play in a wheel bearing/bushing. I don't expect you to do this every time your car gets dirty. I do however do this myself every spring and fall. With seasons changing the terrain you drive on does too. So why not prepare your vehicle properly for whatever you want to throw at it. Besides, most indoor carpet tracks want you to have a clean sedan to drive. They would prefer you not to bring in something that had bad road rash and dust and gravel from last year all over it.



A quik look at these differential's and you can see that it's a bit dirty. It was cleaner when the differential's first went together. I had cleaned the outer ring gear and pinion, like some would stop at this point. By why not rebuild the differential's?? Your already there. Plus, you know then it's going to run nice and smooth after all that work.




After cleaning out the differential's and the cases, I wanted to inspect them for any sign of damage or unusual wear and tear inside the differential cup. You also may want to take a good look at the internal differential gears. Make sure they are looking alright and able to be reused and not scared or have pits or chucks in the face of the gears. This has happen and is often caused by anything fine and course that you pick up on the road outside.



Once your satisfied with the cleaning and inspection of all internal components it's time for reassembly and some lubrication. NOTE: While I am showing a very simple drive train on a 4WD shaft driven touring car, this maintenance is also good for any gear drive train of most electric vehicles.




Now the main chassis and drive train components are clean and ready for re-assembly. I need to point out that not everyone cleans the bearings you find along the way during a rebuild. While is the hobby store seine I had met a few people that never did such a thing and just did cleaning "around" the vehicle. They said "blow it off with an air compressor and call it a day." This is good for carpet racing and light outside driving on clean surfaces. But lets face it. 90% of the vehicles I had seen first hand were not of clean surfaces. I too run in some dusty conditions sometimes, which is why these maintenance tips and ideas are good to have. After you clean the bearings with the approved bearing cleaner available at any hobby store. YOU MUST remember to re-lubricate the bearings. You don't want to have a dry bearing. Seen here, soaking the bearings in bearing lube will help to further the performance of these wonderful little upgrade that didn't come stock on this TT-01 kit, but every vehicle should have them. If you don't want to soak and like getting your hands dirty, by all means go ahead and do each bearing by hand. If you want..... :) :)



TIP: use a magnetic tool to extract the bearings from the container leaving more lubricant in the container and not all over yourself or your work table.



Don't forget the shocks and electric motor. These are also some over looked items as well. Make sure the shocks aren't leaking fluid or damaged in anyway. The caps are tight, they shafts are straight and not bent. If they are damaged, you might need to invest a little cash in a rebuild kit. If they check alright then at the very least check the level of the shock oil inside the shocks. If they are low or the fluid is dirty it's time to change it. Rebuild kit's very in cost depending on the manufacturer. However shock oil can usually be picked up at your LHS for under $10.00
You can also pick up electric motor cleaner. This is important because unless your running a brushless motor that requires less maintenance other than lubricating the bearings. The standard brush motor stock or not needs to be cleaned and serviced as well. If you would like more detail on motor cleaning and shock rebuilding stay tuned to the ORCCTM blog for future detailed articles. In the mean time a nice quick spray of the motor cleaner inside either end of the motor will do wonders. NOTE: don't forget to add a little bit of bearing/bushing lube to either end of the motor where the shaft rides on the bushing/bearing.



Your bearings, chassis/suspension components and other drive train components are ready for re-assembly. With everything clean and what needs to be lubricated lubed up, your next rebuild will go smoothly and the vehicle will run like new.


As the R/C vehicles get more advance and more innovative one thing will never change, Basic R/C Vehicle Maintenance. It's necessary for all R/C vehicles to last and perform for a long time. It's becoming even more necessary lately with the higher demand of speed and durability that we come to expect from the latest R/C vehicles out there. While this is a personal preference Basic R/C Vehicle Maintenance guide, it does work for myself and the others that I have helped in the past. I see no need to make it too complicated for some so they never touch or repair their own r/c. I like how hobby stores offer "R/C Vehicle Repair" and some do "Cleanings" But from a personal stand point the main reason for getting into the hobby is to experience the entire responsibility of owning a higher grade R/C vehicle. I like tinkering and modify things to make them better, faster and more exciting in some cases. I know there is others like me out there. While we go full speed into the "Ready-To-Run" phenomenon that the industry has created. I often met some people at the hobby store that when they bought an RTR vehicle they didn't put the truck together. Now some manufactures have great instructions, others don't. How will this individual know how to repair the car/truck they just bought and then broke? You could pay the hobby store to fix it... that's an option, But I say get in there, take it apart and do the basic maintenance yourself. The only way your going to know if something went wrong and what to do about it is if you try it yourself.

-Christopher Oswald
[R/C Modz Full Throttle]
[ORCCTM Tech.]

Getting through it

Hey look, I know sometimes getting that little tiny antenna wire through that tiny hole in the antenna tube can be a real pain. Some antenna tubes come in different colors and believe it or not, diffident sizes. Yes, I know they come in different lengths. But did you ever stop to REALLY look at one from the other? The inside diameter is sometimes diffident making it hard to get that little wire in some tubes. Here is a helpful hint to help you get through this without getting too frustrated.

Frame 1) Illustrated different colors and perhaps wire types.

Frame 2) No sense in trying to get this wire through the way it is.

Frame 3) Gently work the wire through your fingers while pulling on the wire and give it a "little" stretch back into shape. Don't pull too hard, just enough to feel the wire getting less kinked.

Frame 4)Once you have the wire straight, feed through the antenna tube.

Frame 5) This one is the winner folks, if you still have a problem here, wait... don't give up. Use a small amount of bearing lube or WD-40 and get some down the end of the tube.

Frame 6) With a little lubrication the wire will feed in a lot easier and you'll be glad you did, especially when you start getting to the other end of the antenna tube. Without some kind of lubrication on the wire in some tubes, you may find the wire "kink" and then get stuck. Once this happens, your going to have to start again. Forcing the wire further could break the insulation and cause further damage to that receiver wire.

Connector Meltdown

"Hello ORCCTM, my name is Damion and I have been doing the rc thing for a couple of years. I don't have a lot of experience, but when I had a problem with a couple of my cars, I was told about you guys from your facebook group page. I a wondering if you can shed some light on my problem. I have a Tamiya Night Hauler and a Traxxas Rustler along side a older Kyosho USA-1. I have 3, 3300mah battery packs. I rotated the packs for even draw and charging, BUT on my usa-1 I have had the positive lead of the connectors get really hot and fuse together. I use players to break them apart, the battery connector is trashed but the truck side connector seems ok. I have had this happen to 2 out of 3 packs on my usa-1. I am running stock motors and a Novak Rooster ESC. My LHS said the esc is fine, and that they don't know what this is happening. They said it happens to guys with the old rotatory type, but not electric controlled systems. They think I'm over charging the batteries, what can I do???
Damion, ND."


Damion, first...... if you do anything, stop what your doing and read this. Melting connectors is a cause of high heat, as a result from high resistance in the connector. Tamiya type connectors are known for this. They work well for a while, but after time they wear out. The round metal tabs inside the connector get weak and start to spread apart. This space (however small to the naked eye) is enough to cause high resistance and then a lot of heat. I too had a USA-1 that did this, keep in mind... the USA-1 is a duel motor truck. The rustler and tamiya semi and single motor. The duel motor setup is in parallel meaning with both motors running off each other they a drawing twice as much current. I could tell you to try and repair the connector on the USA-1, but if I was you and had to go to all that work, I would invest on some higher quality connectors. Upgrading to a connector such as "Deans", "Power Pole" and even "Traxxas" type connectors. This will help in a few ways. 1) Less resistance means less heat, and less heat means no more meltdown. 2) Better current flow equals to more and longer power. You need a much power as you can get these days, duel motor trucks need a decent amount of power to perform the way we want them too. Changing over all your cars to these types of connectors will help you in the long run too, as the batteries get higher in MAH levels, and if you want to upgrade the motors later on, you at least have the connectors to do so. Why the LHS didn't suggest this I don't know. But either way we are glad to help. I myself have changed over to "Power Pole" type connectors and never looked back. As far as over charging, if you are using a auto-dectect peak charger.... im sure how you would do this without hitting the "charge" button more once on each full change. Besides, even if you did, that wouldn't cause your melt down. Take a good look at the connector on the USA-1 and compare it to the other two trucks. I think you'll see a difference. In any case, like I said... this upgrade is worth it no matter which way you go.
Hope this helps you out.

ORCCTM Tech.