48.3 Mongoose's ET48.3 Build

[Mongoose]

Ran it on 5S today and I gotta say I love the extra power. This thing just hops over ditches with just a bump of the throttle. It’s really awesome. I never even opened it up completely. The one time I tried, I was going up a grassy hill and throttled up too fast and almost flipped it over. 1/4 to 3/8 throttle is about where I stayed all day and MAYBE a 1/2 throttle punch for a pop before a jump. You can here this Backflips chewing the grass lol. Love it!

Edit - I ran for about 40 minutes and most of the time I stayed around 130 degrees. At one point it got up to about 160 and I shut it down to cool. After that I started running it harder but less punching and stopping and it stayed about 130-138. Not too bad I think but it will heat up fast if I start running it really hard. Outside temp was around 60 degrees.

 

[Timzzer]

I'm curious to know the weight of an ET48.3 with everything except battery & wheels?

Mine weight about 2kg but that's just the chassis with no electronics

Well I finally got it done and I could t be happier with it! Loads of power and so smooth. Wheelies on command, handles amazing and hooks up and launches. The suspension is unreal! Don’t get me wrong when I say this because I love my Kraton, but this is just on another level. It’s awesome!

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The Toro motor and a 17t pinion seems to be a pretty good combo. About 25-30 minutes in the motor temp got up to 159 degrees right in the middle of the motor and about 148 on the ends. The esc was about 135. I wasn’t bashing really hard either. What’s a safe temp to stay around? Or does this sound good?

This looks awesome

 

[Tbone]

sweet ride

 

[Mongoose]

Thanks guys!

Ran it for a very short time this weekend and it took its first hard hit like a champ. Came off a jump and lawn darted a ditch.....made a bang stopped dead in its tracks. Brought it back around to me and the only damage is an indentation on the front bumper. Needless to say I was relieved.

 

[AJH387]

Awesome truck. And from what I have seen of those things, they are bulletproof. I've seen some crazy vids of ppl launching those things and they are fine lol. And at the track, they seem very durable too. I love my 8ight-t 3.0 but I'd for sure give Tekno the edge on durability.

 

[Mongoose]

Thank you. I am loving this truck. It impresses me every time I take it out...love it. I let people run my Kraton at the park and you can see the difference between the two just by watching them run. The Kraton is a beast too and have nothing at all bad to say about it...it takes a beating and keeps on going.

I almost bought the Losi at one point. I don’t have any experience with it but from what I have seen in videos it looks to be an awesome truck as well.

I’m full fledged Tekno now though. I almost bought an MT410 or the EB48 since I already had the Kraton but I am so happy I just bought the ET. I had wanted from the get go and to be honest, they are kinda like different trucks anyway because they just drive differently.

Does anyone have any screws that aren’t flush with the bottom of the chassis? I have like 2 or 3 that stick out a little bit and I’m wondering if I used the wrong screws in those locations. Although, I don’t know how I would have done that....

 

[Pauly]

Does anyone have any screws that aren’t flush with the bottom of the chassis? I have like 2 or 3 that stick out a little bit and I’m wondering if I used the wrong screws in those locations. Although, I don’t know how I would have done that....

Most likely you're referring to the ones that secure the battery tray. If you crank down on those too hard they will protrude out of the bottom of the chassis.
Screw them in til they're flush using blue threadlock and you're good to go.

 

[Mongoose]

I think they are those screws. I will check tonight. Thank you.

 

[RC_User]

yup if you tighten too much you can drive them too far. I find it too easy to over torque screws and usually end up stripping plastic parts. The tekno plastic is really good though, it's tougher to strip than some others i've had.

 

[Mongoose]

I added the aluminum plates I won last night. They bolted right up with no issues whatsoever. The quality and craftmanship can definetly been seen when installing these...they just bolted right up.

I also heeded your advice on the battery tray screws and backed them back a little bit and added some more threadlock.

Really loving these plates.

 

[Mongoose]

Ran again tonight for about 30 minutes. I like this truck more and more as I drive it. It rips. It just floats over tall grass and looks like it’s riding on a cloud with the suspension being so plush.

My next mod is going to be strapping the tires. They really start ballooning when I open it up. After running in the grass and a couple passes up and down the street my tires were about 55 degrees and noticeably softer. It is cool tonight....about 60 degrees so not strapping them really isn’t an option if I want to keep them in good shape while running on warmer days.

Also, my motor temps climb to 160 even during these cool days. I’m going to need to mod the center brace to gear down. I have a 15T already so I will probably go straight to that. It doesn’t take long, maybe 5 minutes for the temps to drop but that’s wasted time.

Anyone know of a thinner center brace I can use? I don’t need much more clearance but as it sits now a 17T is the smallest I can put in it.

 

[Mongoose]

@WoodiE is it possible to edit my first post? I would like to update the parts list to show some of the new stuff I added and an updated picture.

 

[WoodiE]

@WoodiE is it possible to edit my first post? I would like to update the parts list to show some of the new stuff I added and an updated picture.

Yes you can!

There should be an "Edit" link in the bottom left corner of each of your posts, just click it.

 

[Mongoose]

Good grief. Yep I’m an idiot lol. I just had to hit the down arrow and there it is!

 

[Mongoose]

Finally got to put this on the terrain it was designed for. I loaded up and went to a local park with a BMX Park. Not going to say it’s a track because it’s pretty stinkin’ rough. Tall grass in areas and ruts from the rain in a lot of places and it hasn’t been groomed. Hopefully they will do something with it this summer.

Regardless of the condition of the “track” I still had a blast! The dirt was very dusty and dry with a loose layer on top of a hard dry pack in most of the main areas but it was just rock hard dirt everywhere else. Sun was out and it was around 75 degrees. Perfect weather.

My truck ran great and soaked up the ruts and bumps with ease. It’s awesome to watch the suspension on this type of terrain but it’s just handles it so well. It flies through the air and lands like a deer....so graceful. The Backflip tires were well suited for the hard pack and the type of driving I like to do....sliding in and out of turns. Yesterday, I added T-Bone bumpers on the front and rear along with the MT410 mudguards and I’m really glad I did because the front bumper took some pretty good hits on a couple landings where I landed nose first in a rut smacking the side of the rut with the bumper flipping dirt as I bounced out of it.

I got about an hour and a half in on my 7600mah battery because I couldn’t really drive TOO fast because it was just so rough. So, I spent most of my time just circling the same areas and hit the same jumps trying to learn how the truck handles in the air.

Once I pulled the body to disconnect my batteries after LVC hit I noticed my MMX had come loose. The Gorilla tape was covered in dirt and my ESC was loosely sitting in there. I’m not sure how long it was bouncing around but it seems to be fine.

I got home and started the cleanup. Man was this thing a mess! First I hit it with some air to blow off as much of the dirt as I could and then used a few different types of brushes to get the rest of it off. Next, I sprayed down the outdrives, dog bones and bearings with Moo-Klean and followed up with Moo-Slick to re-lube them. The bearings were feeling and sounding a little rough from the dirt but after spraying and re-lubing them they seem to be back to normal. After that I drenched the whole thing with Pledge and used some brushes to agitate it and then microfiber towels to wipe it off.

Hopefully tomorrow I will be able to remount my ESC. Anyone have any good suggestions?

The cleanup time took a while but it was well worth it because this was the most fun I have had with my ET yet. Gonna be going back soon!

 

[Mongoose]

 

[Mongoose]

I posted this in the “Your LiPo battery of choice” thread but also wanted to add it here since it’s my build thread.

I have been running Lectron Pro 7600mah 2S and 3S batteries in parallel to run 5S (only because 2 3S 7600mah batteries are too tall for the Tekno straps). Up until this weekend I haven’t noticed any issues with them at all. They have always drained evenly, each cell within .02 between both packs and they have always balanced evenly.

However, last Sunday, not yesterday but last Sunday, I charged them up thinking I was going to get some runtime in but it turned out I couldn’t. So, I left them fully charged thinking I would be able to at least run them down to storage level the following day. That day didn’t come until this past Saturday. Before I left, I checked each cell to see where they were and they were between 4.15 and 4.16 but they had been sitting all week fully charged.

I ran them close to a hour and a half or hour and forty five minutes until I hit LVC. Once, I got home I threw them on the charger to put them in storage mode and I noticed my 3S pack was normal, 3.24 to 3.25 across all 3 cells but my 2S pack all over the place. One cell was at 3.17 and the other at 3.15. Regardless, I put them both on to storage charge them and all was normal after that. I will keep an eye on them and see how they do the next time out.

I’m not sure if this is normal but I have heard that running 2 packs in parallel can tax one battery over the other but haven’t seen it yet.

I wanted to share this on here for documentation purposes. I think sometimes people recommend stuff on a forum (or another outlet) without having much experience with it. They will give high praises to something because it is new to them, say how great it is and never follow up on it. So, people see the good review a month after it’s posting and think it’s a good product. But, in reality, the product failed or turned out to be junk after week two but the initial review was never updated to clarify that.

Now, I didn’t recommend the batteries (or really even say much about them actually) but someone may be swayed to buy them based on my post while in reality, I really hadn’t had a whole lot of time with them to judge longevity.

With all that being said, I really have had good results with them and am very happy with them so far and hope this was a one time thing.

 

[Pauly]

For mounting ESC's I use the 3M tape rated to hold 25lbs. Make sure you clean both surfaces good with rubbing alcohol. On the Castle ESC's I cut the label off the bottom of the ESC. Not sure why Castle does that but the tape sticks like garbage to that label and there's also the chance the label will let go as well. If you want a bit of reassurance wrap a zip tie under the ESC plate and around the ESC. I believe @Billl DeLong even notched his ESC plate for a spot for the zip tie to sit.

Glad you're having great results with those packs

 

[Mongoose]

Thanks Pauly, I will give the 3M tape a shot. I really didn’t want to have to shoe goo it.

So the levels I saw on my batteries are ok?

 

[Pauly]

Thanks Pauly, I will give the 3M tape a shot. I really didn’t want to have to shoe goo it.

So the levels I saw on my batteries are ok?

I keep my LVC set a bit higher than that. I set my LVC to trigger at 3.6v per cell, but that is under load. After resting they are around 3.7 - 3.8v per cell. Practically storage charge. Usually a couple hundred mah will get them to storage. You lose some run time but I'd rather do that than over discharge a pack. They say 3.0v/cell is OK, but I don't think it's healthy long term for the packs. Don't stress too much about the slight variation of cell voltages. Keep an eye on it tho and if it gets drastic you most likely have an issue in that pack.

Like I said too, zip tie the ESC in and it really doesn't matter what brand tape you use. The tape will give you some vibration protection and the zip tie will definitely hold it put unless something really bad happens