New to the Crawler Scene

[russ350r]

Hello everyone! I am a newb to crawlers but have been involved in RC for about 15 years off and on. Unfortunately, it’s been mostly off for the last 4 years. Anyway, I have a 3.5yr old nephew that loves any kind of truck. My brother-in-law has an IH Scout that they use for trail runs. The last time I was home, I took him to an indoor race track and he had a blast. The hobby shop had some crawlers hanging on the wall and he wanted to play with them. Long story short, I am thinking about building a crawler for us to enjoy when I get to spend time with him. I will most likely get an Axial SCX-10 kit that I can build myself. I have a few questions that I hope you guys can answer.

Kits:
I can’t see any big differences in the kits on Axial’s website? Any pros/cons to the different kits? Any recommendations for one over the others?

Brushed vs. Brushless:
I know most prefer brushed motors. I don’t have any experience with brushed motors. Most of my RCs have been nitro. Those that are electric are brushless. What are the pros/con for one over the other?

I already have a Tekin Hotwire and a Castle link so most likely, I will stay with one of those companies for ESC/motor.

One last request….please don’t flame me with responses about using the search and what not. I work for a construction company (currently in northern BC). I am an office jockey but have limited use of the internet (lunch breaks). The wifi in the accomodations is pretty much worthless. Most nights I can’t even get Facebook to load on my iPad. I am actually writing this post in MS Word so I can just copy/paste into the forum.

I am due for my next rotational leave (8on/2off) in 4 weeks. I am hoping to get everything ordered before I go home so my nephew and I can build it while I am home.

I will appreciate all your help.

[new2rocks]

First off, welcome. I just got onto the scene at the beginning of the year after being out for 20+. The SCX10 is a great place to start with crawlers, and I have a tough time prying the remote for our G6 from the little fingers of our 5 year-old. My solution was to build several other rigs, so now we can play together. Here are some answers to your questions based on my experience:

-- Among the kits, I'd suggest staying away from the Dingo. It's the only one of the 3 kits that comes with plastic shocks. For $50 more, the G6 and Rubicon kits come with Icons that are much better. As between those, the biggest difference is body style. Wheelbases are very close (12" for the G6 vs 12.3" for the Rubicon), so I'd suggest picking whichever one looks best to you.

-- I run sensored brushless (ROC412 3100 kV) with a Viper VTX8 on 3s in my G6 as well as my Wraith, and I like that setup a lot. Good low speed resolution, plenty of top end, and 3+ hours run time with a 5000 mAh pack. Pros for brushed are lower (but not zero) maintenance and more efficient power delivery. The biggest con is that sensored brushless motors aren't waterproof due to the circuit board inside. Also, they do need to be cleaned out periodically, though that's simpler than turning a comm from a brushed motor on a lathe. If you go brushless, make sure it's sensored. Sensorless will cog at part-throttle with low speeds, where you'll spend a lot of your time on these rigs.

I also run brushed (Holmes Hobbies Crawlmaster Pro 16T) on 3 other rigs. As good as a ROC412 is at low speed, nothing compares to the low speed smoothness of a good brushed motor. It's just a different feel from brushless, and I like them both. The other pro to a brushed is that they're almost all waterproof. The con is maintenance - comms need to be cleaned and turned periodically, and brushes will need to be replaced from time to time (or you can buy a throwaway motor and just swap when it goes).

The Castle MMP is an excellent ESC choice, since it supports both brushed and sensored brushless (one of the very few ESCs that do this), and it supports 3s lipo. It also has some good programming options through Castle Link, including custom throttle curves (I'm a big fan of exponential curves on all of my scaler/crawler rigs).

Here are a couple of parting thoughts. There are some upgrades that you'll want to do right out of the box with the kit. These include aluminum servo horn, hardened tranny gears, hardened drive shafts, aluminum or titanium upper links, aluminum knuckles/c-hubs/lockouts, diff lockers, ring/pinion gears, slipper clutch. This will be even more important if you go brushless and/or 3s.

I could go on and on, but hopefully that gives you a starting point. There's tons of good info in the threads, so search will be your friend. And feel free to post more questions as you go so that we can help you out. Good luck and enjoy!

[Moaxr10]

I run a Gmage R1 with the Tekin ROC 412 35Turn brushless with the Tekin RSX esc, Venom 2s 2000Mah 20c and really love the setup. Huge torque and wheel speed.
Also running a XR10 with Brood Racing Specter 35 turn Type T brushed just to start out, with 2 Castle Mamba Micro Pro.

New2Rocks pretty much put the nail in the coffin.

[StomperCrawler]

I know you want to build it, but if it were me I'd go for the Deadbolt SCX10 RTR (the green one); why? Well, first and foremost because Harley (>22k posts on RCC) says "The Deadbolt [SCX10 from the context] is the best dollar for dollar scale truck you can buy" here. Secondly:

1) Price tag: $250 (@Tower with coupon from their front page)
2) Waterproof 3s-lipo-capable ESC
3) WB8 Wildboar axles
4) Dual-slipper clutch
5) Metal-gear servo
6) 32p gearing
7) Light bar

People will tell you that the plastic links suck, but my experience with them is that they take a lot of abuse and actually prevent breakage; you'll eventually upgrade them to metal when they start to get overly flexible, but by then your driving skills should be preventing the breakage, plus you'll likely have a better idea of how much breakage to expect and what needs upgrading to prevent it.

If you really want to take it all apart & put it back together so you know it better, feel free; that's what I did with my Honcho that I bought secondhand and I loved the experience... my absolute favorite in fact, and that's saying something considering my 25+ years RC experience with all kinds of models.

Add a balance charger, 4x AA's (rechargeable preferred to save money), a 3s 2,000mah-ish lipo and a safe charging bag (still gotta keep an eye on it while charging) and you're in business! Oh and don't be surprised when you feel the need for a second Deadbolt once your near-4-year-old gets driving on his own. ;)