Revo - v1

Revo - v1

(date: Febuary 02, 2008)

I started off with Revo 2.5 that I bought from craigslist for $180. This Revo came RTR with the stock radio and 2.5 engine. It also came with a few extras like: roto starter, 30% fuel, Hobbico charger, glow heater, extra bodies, glow plugs and parts.

In  the picture below is my first attempt on converting this Revo to a brushless. I wanted to follow one of the articles that I read online. Keep most of the stock components on the truck and just add on the brushless electronics. And that is what I did exactly. I did not want to use Tekno’s brushless conversion kit because I wanted to save some money and make my own.

Here is another shot from the front, as you can see most of it is still stock.

The only difference is the brushless motor replaced the 2.5 engine and the fuel tank is replaced by the Novak HV Electronic speed control.

The ESC Mounted on where the gas tank use to be.

I just took some 90 degree angle aluminum and made the motor mounts. I milled a slot where the screws hold the motor down so I can adjust the motor to the various pinion sizes. If you look carefully you will noticed I have changed the pitch of the gears to 48. Because that is all I could find that would fit on the traxxas slipper clutch assembly.

Here is a closer look at the motor mount that I made. It pretty heavy duty but I was going to make is lighter after everything was tested and in good working order.

This is a really simple angled piece of aluminum where I mounted the ESC.

Final thoughts:

Over all everything worked fine, and as excepted the performance was okay. Even with the 2 speed kicking in, I thought this conversion would be faster. Plus the limited availability for small spur gears makes it harder to change the gearing.

So the next step will be swapping out the Revo transmission to a 2008 EMAXX tranny.

For my first attempt in converting to a brushless i used the following parts:

• Custom motor mounts
  
• Custom ESC mounts
  
• Novak HV Maxx 4400 brushless system ( for more speed I would have gone with the 4.5 HV but I could not pass up the deal on ebay for $130)
• Novak Sintered Rotor - Upgraded the 4400kv BL motor, should be equivalent to a 6.5
  
• (2) Maxamps 6000mah lipo packs
  
• Hobbico CS-170 Titanium Geared Ultra torque Servo (333oz-in @ 6.0v in 0.15 sec) You do not need to change the servo but it made a night and day difference on the steering. This servo is the same thing as the Hitec HS-5955TG but the hobbico was cheaper at a local hobby store. It was one of those spare the moment purchase.

• Spektrum DX3 radio system, another unnecessary upgrade

Total Cost:

To continue to Revo conversion part 2, click here...

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