NEW ESC and shorty packs !

I received three 4000mah shorty packs from gn-fusion, a battery maker from china, for a cheap price.
I also recently bought the new ORCA VX ESC becuase my hobbywing has died for 6 months now.
Its nice to get back into boosted, however i have not tested the car or the ESC yet.
The ORCA VX ESC is very light and only 78g with wires and fan ! Thats a whopping 31g lighter than my old V2.1 ESC. When i did the wheel weights balancing, i found that the left side was too light, so i had to move the reciver to the left, right next to the ESC. Its actually possible now becuase the shorty packs free up a LOT of space on the chassis, and also the small VX ESC too. Now with everything in place (including PT), i had to add 10g to left side of the chassis on the rear next to the motor to balance out the car. The wheel weights are now as follows:
Rear wheels : 333g each
front wheels : 313g each.
That means L-R balance is  50-50, cross weight 50-50 and rear front 51.5 - 48.5. the rears are 41g heavier than the front. Total weight with body is 1396g, which is underweight. By adding 20g at the bumper, and placing the PT on top of the weights, the total weight is 1413g, and the F-R balance is 331+331=662g, front weight 326+325 = 651g. a difference of only 11g rear. I decide to add only 15g to the bumper and the total weight is now 1408g. Just nice for competition. I figured the little weight bias to the rear isnt detrimental to the car's handling. The car should eat up wayy less tyres and also accelerate faster becuase its lost 100g of weight. Becuase of that i surmise that springs must be softer to compensate for the lighter weight. i now shift the yokomo white springs to the front and use tamiya m chassis yellow springs at the rear. Only track testing will tell if this springs are too soft or not.

Met Up with a fellow Kawada Alcyon fan from Australia

Finally mety up with Mr Wang who has lived in australia for many years now. I have been in contact with him since 2006.
Met up with him at Sunway Giza on the 11th Apr - 2012 at 10.30 in the morning.

Need Belts Alcyon Fans?

So you stripped your belts for your Kawada Alcyon. Don't fret. There are current car belts that will fit.

1. Front belt - S3M 516, which means 3mm pitch 172 tooth. You can use the Yokomo BD-5 front belt which is also 516mm long. Make sure you buy the low friction version. Do not use the TRF416 front belt. Its marked 516 also, but seems like a tooth longer. The HPI RS4 Pro2 front belt is a direct fit also, if you can find one.

2. Rear belt S3M - 171 which means 3mm pitch 57 tooth. Use Sakura Zero rear belt, also 171mm. Part number SAK-12, which is low friction.

How to reduce maintenance on your Kawada Alcyon or other touring cars

Everytime you run your car especially outdoors, there is a lot of tyre dust generated and sand will also stick on  your moving parts especially the rear.
You rear ball diff will get gritty by the second or third pack, and your rear shocks will have its oil contaminated. Just have a look at your rear shocks shafts after every run. Notice all the black tyre dust sticking to it? Here are a few tips to extend our time of maintenace so that you dont have to take apart the car so often.
1. Use ceramic diff balls. Buy ACER racing ones, they are really good. The Alcyon uses 1/8" diff balls. I use schumacher diff grease as they are better than associateds.
2. Cover your diffs. Kawada makes foam covers for your ball diffs. if you can get them, buy them. I think the part number is SK-27? If you cant get them , buy some thin sticker sheets from car acccesory shops. then cut into a circle to fit on your ball diff pulley sides. a middle hole must be cut to allow the diff outdrives to go through. Now you have stopped dirt from getting into your main diff balls.
3. Get some dishwashing sponge. Cut a small block piece, and stuff it into the hole where the thrust bearings is housed. if the sponge is too big, trim it some more. Ideally it should cover the access for the thrust bearing screw. This will seal off your thrust bearings from dirt and keep your diff feeling smooth for at least 10 packs. so far i have run my car 3 packs and they are still as smooth as the day i cleaned them. Compare this when it was withouth this sponge, after 2 packs the diff is gritty.
4. Coat you shock shaft with associateds green slime. Do not place them on your o rings as this will cause your shocks to stick and jam up. When rebuilding your shocks, put very little green slime on the shcok shaft then slide them into the oring. They should move smoothly. Next put in your shock oil. Tyr moving your shock shaft again. if they are smooth, continue with the rest of the process. If not drain the oil and remove the green slime. try putting less green slime or put then only on the outside of the shock shaft, after you pushed them through the o ring.
5. Buy ceramic bearings for your car. i use ROCHE ceramic bearings that were for the Tamiya TRF416. they fit perfectly and are cheaper than other brands. They remain smooth longer and the teflon seal keeps out dirt much better than metal seal.
Just buy doing these few simple steps, you have cut down your maintenace time tremendously.

Shorty Packs a way to reduce weight

As it is My Alcyon II weighs in about 1490g with a PT and IP saddle packs. The IP Saddle packs weigh at 280g. The turnigy saddle packs weigh at 260g. I just discovered shorty packs which are 97mm long, 47mm wide and 25mm high. that means they are the same dimensions as one saddle pack except they are longer They also weigh at 200g only. Last night i did a mock up shorty pack placement on the car and checked the balance. It was enlightening, i still get good 50-50 LR balance, and the FR balance is only biased towards the rear by 31g. And the cars running weight is brought down to 1383g  even with PT at the front ! That is amazing ! The less Mah on the batts shouldnt affect performance much, but the weight decrease should help the car use up less tires and also use less turbo. I am in the process of negotiating a 3 shorty pack lipo deal and if it goes through, i will have them to test on my kawada. i will probably have to use much softer springs to compensate for the weight loss. I can actaully place some weights at the front bumper to bring the car up to legal wight of 1400g and laso bring the weight bias FR to perfectly 50-50 !

What Happened to me?

Well those of you who follow the blog will wonder what happened since november that i have not posted anyhting at all? Well in preparation for the final round of MNC, my Hobbywing V2.1 ESC decided to give way. it would not respond at all. i Got so dissapointed and having not enough cash, i went to my optima mid for rc fun. I only sent the ESC for repair in early february, and until now i still have not got any replies from HW. But its ok, i heard lots of horror stories about HW servicing, some people never get their ESC back. But its sitting here being useless, might as well i try to repair it. If it still doesnt caome back in amonth i will buy an ORCA ESC with better local support. I had lots of fun with my optima mid these past few months and learnt some things that i can transfer to the kawada. will let you all know what are those things soon.

Last Round of MNC for 2011

i joined the 4th rouund at glenmarie last month got quite a good placing, the cars especially solid in the first heat where i was blasting past half of the field in my heat grouping, it was immsensly satisfying driving a car people said couldnt be raced and overtaking many of the newer cars.
At the end ended up qualifing last in B main.
Learned quite a few new things after that on suspension setup, and i used that knowlegde to test out my car at Klang Track. The car is even more easier to drive fast and has more steering now. i am even more confident of joining the last MNC race this time. Look at this video below to see how well my Kawada performs.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WdraFWHB1Y4

my new setup

Rear end, Old Yokomo white springs circa 2000, shoucks mounted on inner hole of arm, on middle hole of shock tower, antiroll bar medium. Camber -1.5, piston 2 hole, 30WT oil, ride height 5.5mm, droop 3mm. The car has now more rear roll becuase the shock mounting shifted to inner hole on arm. Its easier to drive then in MNC round 4. i think i can beat the sole serpent S411 in the coming race with my Kawada with this easy to drive setup. The car just rails throught the corner without losing rear grip now even until the tyres wear down. Now thats consistency !