Yeah Racing Dual Motor Steel Cable Winch with Control Switch #YA-0511BK Review

Picked this up the other day, it's the Yeah Racing Dual Motor Steel Cable Winch #YA-0511BK



Very cool and really fast. This model came with a pre-wired DPTT (Double pole triple throw) switch that allows you to manually control the winch without a 3rd channel. Flip the switch one way and it rolls out, put the switch in the middle position and it stops, flip it the other way and it rolls in.

With 2 motors it's fast and strong.

When I first hooked it all up it didn't want to work.
Turns out I had to reverse one of the sets of wires from the motors. The two motors were turning against each other.
Once I flipped that around it was working great!
I guess they just tossed two pre-wired motors onto it and didn't think about the fact that one needs to go the other direction!

I wish these people would think about how you're supposed to bolt this thing on though. The 4 bolt slots (at least they are slots so you have some work around room) are all under the motors. First I removed the mounting plate from the winch and used it to mark and drill the holes to mount it (the bumper I was using was not setup for a winch). Then I re-attached the mounting plate to the winch (used loctite). Then I had to use a pair of Hemostats to hold the nuts in place while I worked the bolts up thru the bumper (they do supply all the necessary mounting hardware) . It was a bear and there was much cursing going on for sure but I finally got them all on.

The Real Test, my scratch built up against a RTR Axial SCX10 Deadbolt.

So I've had this thing working for a while now and I really love it.
I did finally break down and buy an Axial Deadbolt RTR. It was almost new, literally barely run.

To see more about my Deadbolt mods Click Here.

So I got to give my little truck a real test. I put it up against the Deadbolt climbing some rocks at Flat Rock Park in Columbus, GA

It did AWESOME, it climbed almost everything the Axial Deadbolt did.
There were a few spots where the tires lost grip but I'm willing to bet that if I had swapped tires it would have made it further. The Deadbolt was running Proline TSL Super Swamper 1.9 tires with the G8 compound and those stick like crazy.

Afterwards I did some serious swamp running with it back at our campground.

Rebuilding the differentials (ecx temper/redcat everest 16)

So I got my new aluminum differentials in so I tore apart the front and rear axles and installed them.
I figured it was a good time to clean up the axles and lube them up good.

The first thing I noticed when I got the Solid Aluminum Spools was that the screws weren't in all the way. So I took them apart and put them back together with a little Loctite.

Then I packed the whole thing up with Mobil One synthetic grease.

Aluminum Rear Axle Lockout Kit

Hot Racing ECX 1/18 Temper Aluminum Rear Axle Lockout Kit ETE2206

Got these today! They should help stop the wobble in the rear and make the rear end look better without all the extra linkage going on back there!

Broke the rear differential

Redcat Racing 680010 Connect Box

So I just replace the front diff and then the rear blows out.
This time I ordered a solid aluminum spool instead of plastic.

As expected, more power = more breakage!

So I have my first real repair on my truck.

I was out banging around in the back yard doing some Rock Crawling when I noticed my truck wasn't performing as well as it should. I wasn't able to climb a particular rock face that normally I can scoot up with ease.

So I started looking around and realized that my right front wheel was kinda free wheeling.
I figured maybe I had broken an axle shaft or lost a CV pin. So I started tearing apart the front axle.
Why is it always the front one! The rear one is easy to get out, the front has all that steering linkage and crap!

Anyway, I finally determined that I had rounded out the slot in the Ring gear spool/differential where the axle goes in. Instead of being a nice little rectangular slot it was a nice little rounded hole!

Grrrr, So I looked up the part number and started shopping. Knowing that most of the parts in this car are the same as the RedCat Everest 16 so I searched around and found a replacement.

UPDATE: This is the same piece that broke. If you can afford it, I would get the Aluminum version of this (see my post "Broke the rear differential"

Redcat Racing RC 370 Version 2 Motor

So I updated the motor to a Redcat Racing RC 370 Version 2 Motor

Now this little truck can move!
It took a little engineering to get it in.
The screw holes are slightly wider then the stock motor but nothing that a drill bit couldn't fix.

The factory motor is a 260 according to this document so the 370 is definitely a step up!

I'll just have to hope it lasts.

Building a R/C Trail Truck using an ECX Temper as the base

So my two Grandkids wanted R/C cars for Christmas last year.
I remember the last time I bought them R/C cars they lasted a very short time before they were broken. It was a combination of buying cheap cars and giving fast cars to inexperienced R/C drivers.

Well this Christmas they were much older so I figured we might try something different.
I thought maybe I'd give crawlers a chance. They don't go as fast so the kids can't wreck them as fast!

So I went to my Local Hobby Shop and bought 3 ECX Tempers (Hey I gotta have one too).

ECX Temper $129.99

These are really fun out of the box (and everything you need is in the box).

We played with them all weekend and had a ball crawling all over my backyard (I have a dry stream bed in my yard so that became the crawl zone).

Stock Temper Chassis

Well after a few weeks I was bored with it being stock so I began to make some changes.

One change lead to another and well, here we are now.

I began by getting a new body. Proline's 1972 Chevy C10 fit perfectly! It had the right wheelbase (the Temper is SHORT) and was a Chevy!! Proline does a really nice job with the decals and window masks too.

Next I wanted a new set of metal rims that would help keep this thing right side up! I found the GMADE 1.9 SR03 Beadlock Wheels (Uncoated Steel) and fell in love! These things are awesome. They are super heavy and look great!I got the unfinished ones because I wanted them to get a little rusty! They are also available in Black and Painted Silver. GMADE makes several types of 1.9 inch wheels and other cool crawling accessories too.

Next up, I needed some tires to put on them rims.
I found these cheap Chinese ripoffs of the "Dick Cepak Mud Country" tires. For the price ($14 for all 4 w/foam) I figured I'd give them a try.

These are AWESOME tires. They are exact copies of the "Dick Cepak Mud Country"  tires except they don't have the DC logo on them (Although they do say Dick Cepak on them). Super squishy, super soft, great traction tires.

So life was going pretty good and I was very happy with the performance of my temper.

Then I started really looking at some of the other "Rock Crawlers" out there and realized that there was more to this sport (R/C Rock Crawling) than just climbing rock piles.

Ok, now I wanted a Trail Truck. I could have just saved another $200 and bought an ECX Barrage

Which is a wicked little truck in itself.
But I had already invested time and money into the Temper so I decided to try and convert my Temper into something like the Barrage.


First thing was to get rid of the TVP (Twin Vertical Plates) chassis and get some sort of ladder frame like an Axial frame. But $100, that was just to pricey for me.

Then I found the Integy Frame in Blue for $20. SOLD!
It looks awesome and for $20, if I screwed it up I wouldn't cry!

I bought the frame and some bumper mounts and a Skid Plate from the Barrage


And I started taking pieces off the Temper and moving them over to my new frame. There was definitely some modifications that needed to be made to make it all fit.
I had to drill a few holes in the frame, relocate the Shock mounts for a shorter wheelbase and modify the upper linkage some, but it all fit quite well.

In the span of 2 nights I had completed the swap over and had my new Ladder Framed Temper running.

I realized that the wheels where too close to the frame and I needed to move them out a tad. I was able to find some very small offsets for the wheels (only 8mm) to make it a little wider without destroying the overall scale look of the truck.

8mm Wheel Offset

This provided the clearance I needed to keep the tires from rubbing and gave the truck a slightly wider stance to keep it from rolling over too easily.


Next is a set of Barrage Bumpers and lights.