I hear ya 10Karer, Im on my third engine. The first two Con rods broke within three tanks of gas. I recieved A replacement Vmax 7 engine(a third one) from litemachines a couple of weeks ago. I still have yet to break it in. Im getting on edge about even firing it up. To me without a doubt, there is a problem with these engines. We all cant be doing something that bad for us to be breaking rods like they are going out of style. I dont fault litemachines I think its a norvel problem. It would be nice if Litemachines decided to find another manufacturer to make engines for their product. There are some problems I can work around but the fact is, if your engine is down, you just aint gonna get off the ground. We need some relief. Ive had filaments burn out completely in my vmax6 several times and yet I have not broke a rod on one of them at all, yet alone because pieces of the filament caused my engine to jam. The power of the Vmax7 on the litemachine is awesome but whats the fun if you can only fly about two tanks, if you make it to two, before you have to replace the engine. I hate to see that the Vmax7 is beginning to get the rep as a rod throwing lemon engine. Boy, I sure did hoot a hollar about its power . But kinda hard to hoot and hollar anymore when you fear that dreaded sound of the engine quitting on you in mid flight because your rod died.