zaintlouis

i just know the best way to prolong engine life (aside from proper maintenance) is to preheat it before using it for race or bash, in the house we can use our hair dryer or hot air gun but out door or there in the field we could use the sun expose the buggy to the heat (but would take much longer we don't have the patience t do that most of the time) or i could wish someone would invent an hand held device to heat up the cylinder head using, coz i beleive if we always start the engine an an expanded state (not bump start it coldly) we could really really slowly wear the engine piston and sleeve isn' not? and race happily ever after

VooDooModified

I've seen a few pre-heaters for cooling heads, similar to tire warmers on Ebay. They run off your DC power source (car battery, generator and DC power supply)

nitroexpress

This is probably one of the best heaters around. Unfortunately, it is AC powered.

http://www.competitionheat.com/Product_Information.html

Argess

I'm going to veer away from the pre-heating thing and address the question in the thread title:

Don't do a lot of WOT running, especially on grass, but if you need to, at least run the engine a little rich to help cool it and ensure it has plenty of lubrication.

On the warming issue, these are a bit pricey (maybe do better on e-bay), but maybe you can sell 3 of them to your frineds as you only need one. I'd ignore the little control box and just hook them directly to a battery. Pick a battery that seems to get them the same temp as the control box will when set to "max":

http://www.integy.com/cgi-bin/webc.c...=2980&p_catid=

I would think most people look at pre-heating the engine with more interest if they plan on doing winter driving.

zaintlouis

Thx for the replies i've been looking for this kind of stuff for so long maybe this is the difference when you don't get to race on the track you're always outdated of any new devices on the market. our town is just currently building one anyways after 6 years of just bashing around. i had gotten the chance to race in manila (an hour air trip) few years back but somehow my wife pirated my travel funds that i've been saving lol. Really appreciated your help thx again morepowerto you guys

proanti1

My Feedback: (2)

You do not need to preheat a motor... I do not understand why pre-heating has become so popular in the last year. Our motors were lasting just as long 3 years ago, before everyone heated them up to a million degrees with heat guns. Basically, to make a motor last, don't run it too lean and run it with an air filter. If you are extremely particular about engine life, flip the piston to BDC before your car cools down. It all depends on how much performance you want, I run my cars nice and rich when just playing around. Rich = cool. Lean = Hot. Hot = poor engine life.

Contrary to popular belief, low quality fuel is not bad for an engine unless it has a really low oil content.

VooDooModified

the only time I preheat a motor is before starting it for the very first time...after that, it's game on.

downunder

There are a few ways to prolong engine life and a couple have already been mentioned. One is to never turn an engine over slowly so you can enjoy all the pinch and tell yourself how good your engine is. Turning it slowly allows the oil film to be squeezed out and then it's left with a metal to metal contact. Never tune an engine absolutely peaked out lean, a little rich will help keep it cooler and ensure more oil is going through it. Air filters for a car are an absolute must have. Use a fuel with some castor in it, that helps lubrication, gives some protection against an inadvertent lean run and is a fantastic rust preventative as well.

Preheating generally is a waste of time although it won't damage anything. It may be of some use in a brand new engine or in particularly cold weather.

supertib

Pre-heating definitely helps, no question........ not only does it help the engine, it also reduces warmup time which is excelent for racing...keeps your tune much more stable .

quality fuel without too much oil...high oil content promotes detonation and higher temperatures... usually with a high oil fuel you need to run leaner to produce good power, however because of the high oil content you run the risk of detonation when you do lean down...... Longest engine life we have found with oil content in the 9-10% range..... A quality race fuel with 9-10% oil will make more power on a richer needle setting and typically runs cooler then a cheap fuel with 14% oil..... High oil is a bad idea in these engines....

larryf333

My Feedback: (2)

Best way to prolong engine life? Don't run it. LOL

downunder

You do realise that the fastest and most powerful model engines in the world use 20% all castor? There's no car engine that can even approach their performance.

supertib

Try running 20% all castor in a offroad engine on the typical 20% or 30% nitro...you will detonate the engine like crazy trying to tune in a good throttle response......

Yes I do realize boat engines use high oil content, however they have liquid cooled heads, they run extremely high nitro and they tend to run wide open all the time...The high nitro % requires them to run extremely rich, which means massive amounts of fuel pumping thru the engine, that large amount of fuel also helps to cool the engines and reduce detonation, as well the liquid cooled head also dissipates heat much better then a air cooled offroad engine...... High oil content in a offroad engine is a bad idea and will only lead to difficult tuning, high temps and detonation....The very best offroad fuel I have seen as far as engine wear and performance is as low as 6% total oil content !

calvino

I agree with Supertib on pre-heating. My take is, even if it doesn't help the engine last longer, it sure makes warm up faster... I can say that. Just make sure not to heat the carb up as that is a real pain, boils the fuel [:'(]

As for oil, I remember running 20% Sidewinder (12% oil...) and the engine running "okay" but it was spewing oil and fuel and never was able to get a good tune. Then i went to 30% Sidewinder (10% oil yes its higher nitro... still) the engine ran a TON better (I vote partly due to the lower oil!) and I noticed an almost immediate difference in power, till the head leaked

As for "After run oil" my thing is, it works good at providing a nice thin film of oil to help keep things nice and "happy" when you go to fire the engine up the next morning. Just don't go dumping in 2 cups of it. 3 drops max is all I found I needed. My friend was religious with after run oil and I think it, partly, contributed to his TRX lasting forever, despite issues

Lastly, and NOT COVERED (!!!) is keeping your air filter tight, and clean. Remember that just because the filter "looks clean" doesn't mean it has a ton of trapped dirt in it. Something like old nitro fuel works good, but depending on your running conditions, changing filters (tossing out) after every gallon or two is a good idea. Sounds dumb, but its real cheap insurance against engine problems and getting dirt sucked in [&:]

downunder

Nope, not boat engines. The most powerful are the 2.5cc CL speed engines and they're tuned to absolute peak. Size for size they develop more HP than a supercharged nitro drag car.

supertib

Once again, massive amounts of cooling and no throttling up and down...wide open all the time, no throttle response needed, idle isn't really needed either............... offroad is completely different...a quality fuel using a low quantity of high grade oil is the best....

proanti1

My Feedback: (2)

You run the risk of detonation at close to WOT... which is how boat and CL engines run. You are not going to detonate at idle in an off road truck, even with the engine under load and burning 20% oil. Maybe if you were running a .12 extremely lean and got the motor so hot it coked up the pipe... but the standard basher probably isn't going to do that. The plug would blow before you did any damage anyways.

buttdud1122

haha! but even that ruins the motor! my mgt sat on a shelf for six months and the engine was shot! before then it only had two gallons through! yes, i used after-run oil, and was particularily generous before storing it