Now what is the fun in that?

While an engine should last you 8 gallons, electric will be cheaper.

A decent engine with matching pipe will be ~ 250 at minimum, or the same price as a MMM combo. Plus clutch shoes, plugs, glow equipment, an extra servo for throttle. Not to mention it's probably necessary to replace one rod/bearing during those 8 gallons.

Fuel is 250 for 2 cases of 30%, which would be the same or less or a 3-4 batteries. Just get them from HK/ etc, with exception of Enerland - FLightpower/Trakpower, and Kokam(both Korean) everything for our applications are made in China. The companies here just slap a sticker on it. While they do pay marketing/ some warranty costs + QA, they do not pay any R & D costs.

Runtime wise if you go 6s with a low KV motor (1300-1500) you will still get ballistic speeds and crazy runtimes with just 2-3 batteries. If you have 3-4 batteries and field charger you can almost run indefinitely.

Hard part is deciding if you want the more power/quietness from electric or the smoke sounds/ of nitro

Ok guys this has been going on for a long time. It's pointless for you guys to argue the runtime factor of the engines here. The only way to measure this is for the same driver under same race conditions running two different engines. (ie you or tib to take a vspec and a mach 427 and run it in the same day mounted in the same car.) They would also have to be tuned properly and matched with proper/pipe/plug etc etc. To be fair I have seen the clocked B5 run some ridiculus times, and I personally have never seen a vspec get out mileaged by a mach in the same day.

As for the cheap vs high dollar engines, yes a RTR engine will be great or better due to less precise tuning window to a lot of people. Most of us (basher or racers) with our offroad setup can not push the performance envelope of the engines consistantly to make the difference gap big enough to notice all the time. (or tune 100% correct for that matter) If you can not push the envelope consistantly, spending the extra money is based on reliability or cool factor.

The tell tale story is in the 1/8th scale onroad... how often have you seen a engine made by the mass producer companies compete? This isn't solely because of the smaller market. (This applies to 1/10th scale on road to a lesser degree.) Metallurgy is a part of a country/companies industrial base knowledge and abilities. It simply can't be raised as fast as the some other aspects of manufacturing. At least not without significant cost increases.

A little Brushless vs Nitro action for your pleasure !

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lr7vp8P9IqY

Don't forget though - this is RCUniverse. Most of the people asking "what engine should I get for my truggy?" here are not going to be racing against Ryan Maifield or Adam Drake next weekend... I have never said a Mach is better than a fill-in-the-blank "race 21". Only that, for the price, it's a very good option, especially for beginners.. I absolutely insist too, that for MOST casual club racing, it's a completely viable truggy racing engine.

I have a SW 26 in my SC8 right now, and will admit, I have the "I need a high end engine" bug... Here is a short clip of it on my very first ever outing with it on a track a couple weeks ago:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykzHGVUDOn4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXlfbYhAUgM

This engine cost me €100, and the pipe I had left over from an old Losi RTR. The engine is dead easy to tune. The thing is, I can't control it in a straight line. If I give full gas, the tires spin and I lose control. It's already got a +1 CB compared to stock(stock engine is a 28 too..) So how in the hell is an engine that costs THREE times as much(with pipe.. I really kind of want an OS 25 but can't afford it..) going to make me faster? I already get a decent enough run time.. The engine is easy to tune. It was cheap. It will last me at least a year.. And it's more than fast enough. FAR more likely to make me faster would be different tires, and maybe some suspension adjustments.. Oh yeah, better driving too.. But in RC there is this huge myth, that if I spend a ton on an Italian engine, I'll be faster. No, improving your setup and driving skills is far more important. Give me the most expensive engine you want, and against a good, high level driver with a Mach 427 I won't have a chance..

All about the image..

(Also, a pet theory of mine is that sound misleads people. My Mach sure doesn't sound as raspy and cool as some higher-end engines. But a lot of engines that sound fast aren't necessarily as fast as the sound makes it seem.. I know from experience, from having been side-by-side or even outpulling down the straight with all kinds of engines...)

For the few guys who race at a high level, OK, the extra run-time of a Speed or Nova P4 or whatever can make a useful difference.. But again, we're talking about guys just getting into truggy racing..., or people like me who just race now and then..(I would race more if I could..)

Additional factors - I don't even race this SC8!..(yet..) This is just for fun messing around at the track. And the Machs deliver that - fun - aplenty!.. Also, if I were to buy that OS 25, and it DIDN'T live up to my expectations, I would be FAR more aggravated about it.. I have already tried a couple expensive high end Italian "race" engines, and they sucked. I had a Nova 528XR in my Muggy. On the FEW occasions when it ran correctly, yes, it was pretty ballistic. BUT, it wasn't TWICE as ballistic as the Mach 427 I replaced it with. The Mach was fast as hell too. Just a BAZILLION times more user-friendly. Not to mention half the price...(more like a third when you consider I bought a special clutch and pipe for that stupid Nova...) And don't even get me started on that Orion 24 turd I had.. And yeah yeah bla bla, I should've bought a modded Jammin or whatever. I actually believe that I should have.. But that's not the point. The point is, I fell for the bug, thought I wanted to take my racing to the next level, so got an expensive engine on the assumption that that was enough. It was a dud engine, so in the end I finished the weekend with this same SW 26, which ran like clockwork.. Racing is all about setup, driving skill, tires, etc.., with engine maybe fourth on the list... People who put it first are obsessed with image and brand names.

And also, as far as the Asia thing goes, there is so much unfounded prejudice against Asian products. Yeah, a lot of low quality c.rap has come out of Asia. But you're completely naive if you think "Asia=low quality" (OS Speed...) For years when people mentioned a Fiat, the joke was often made "Fix It Again Tony"... And often, not without reason..

I live in Germany and deal with German business people every day. While yes, many German products are better, they are NOT that much better than products from elsewhere - sure as hell not as better as they are more expensive. When you pay for European products, you're mostly paying for their insanely expensive pension and welfare systems and high labor costs, for people to work 35 hours a week.. Germany thrives because of the image that they are this great land of engineers and high quality products. I live in the town where the Porsche Cayenne is "made"(and have worked there..) The Cayenne is not even "made" in Germany. It's %80 made in Slovakia, then the bodies and chassis are shipped here, mated together, and a big fat "made in Germany" stamp is put on it. Then people, for this stamp, are willing to pay $40,000 more than the competition, because they assume it must be better.. Clever, the Germans. They understand image.

all i can say is LLLLLLLEEEEE E E AAAAAANNNNNN jitters and you can hear it.
i'm a nitro fan through and through but you have to lean the crap out of it to keep up with brushless.

then again speed=moola
the faster you go the more crap gets broke.
the hard core fact is that either way you decide to go (nitro or amps) it costs money and always more than what is anticipated.
especially when you realize the speed of either may be too hard to handle and OH CRAP you hit a curb, pole, tree, mailbox, car, fence, etc......................................... now you have to fix and depending on the severity of the wreck will govern the emptiness of your wallet.
IT IS THE NATURE OF THE HOBBY

I love this thread, the best flaming ive ever seen turned into nice-talk. I would say "keep it coming" but that would just be a bit silly Not all high-end racing engines are the best, some are really b*&^hes to tune, some are easy. Some perform better than others, some dont. It all depends on how you drive/race, the track style/surface and other factors. It all comes down to which one seems to be popular all-round AND the choice at the track. If a fair few people like the Ninja .21, the next person might not - they might like the way a VSpec performs in THEIR HANDS for example. So it's kind-of half a waste of time to ask for which engine to get - in the end you really get what you pay for, and I would rather get a known-brand engine Vs the RTR-type engines, just a personal choice. If your just a fun-time racer, go for a mid-priced engine, parts-a-plenty and is user friendly. If you are a full-blown racer, then the story changes and you need a well-designed and race-minded designed engine. Different pipes, different plugs, and a whole lot of time. But for the average joe, all you need is a few plugs, maybe some different tooth bells at hand, maybe some wheels (a general description, either off-road tire treads through to different shore and offset foamies). As long as it is a happy engine, the user should be happy! Its all in the name of fun for the most of us, but for some its more like win or die! Just my 35 cents!

Patrick and I go back many years...we rarely agree on much...but we also agree to disagree...we may get heated every now and then, but we both have respect for each other and have learn how to argue without things getting personal and nasty.....We just come from 2 very different ends of the hobby and have 2 very different views on how things are...... So tho we may not agree on much, but at the end of the day we are still here for the same reasons...

I am definitely not prejudiced against Asian products. In fact I would trust the electronics from Asia over most NA mass produced products. We could get into how the work culture/unions changed how stuff are made here but that's getting too political.

However the experience with Metal components are personal. I used to do production costs on oil/gas industry components. While we were able to outsource the non critical valves/etc to China with proper QA. The actual stressed parts like pony and sucker rods had to be made in Canada. The quality discrepancy was just too large despite the savings.

They do have really high end stuff (China just broke thru on turbofan/jets production last couple years, only a handful of countries could do this.) Unfortunately they are just not available to us average consumers.

Working on these engines every day i can definitely see some pretty big disparities in the metallurgy between the Italian and Asian engine....The hardness on the cranks is one of the main areas...engines from Picco and OPS have got the hardest pure steel cranks I have ever seen...To do any machine work on these cranks puts the tooling thru hell.....Somehow Picco and OPS have figured out a way to achieve this hardness without making the crank brittle..Any time a Asian has come anywhere close to this hardness the cranks become brittle and tend to snap...For those who don't know the harder the crank the longer the lifespan of the crankpin.....Another are I see a difference is in the quality of the piston material, once again Picco has a amazing composition to their pistons, they are very durable and wear extremely slow...And due to the strength of the material they are machined to be very lightweight and still be reliable.......The only Taiwanese engines that impresses me with its metallurgy is the OFNA JL 21 made by Force..the hardening on the crank is better then any other Asian I have worked on and the piston material is nearly as good as it gets...The engine has displayed amazing durability even when pushed to the very extremes.....It takes some effort to machine a JL crank, and a miracle to machine a Picco crank...But engines like SH and Go I can cut like butter effortlessly......I have also has issues with both Go and SH with the pistons collapsing at the wrispin when they are pushed into the higher RPMs...they use a relatively basic cast piston that just doesn't have the strength and durability of the billet counterparts.......As well the cast pistons are usually heavier then the machined billet pistons, the lighter the piston is, the better the performance as well as less stress on the internals as the engine is revving........Many of the Taiwanese engines do run very good, but they definitely do not have the same level of expertise in the metallurgy as the Europeans, working with these every day it becomes very apparent.....

I believe someone in this thread said it right. The engine you choose depends on what you want to do. I distribute SH Engines in Canada and I am not dumb enough to say they are better than a OS or Picco or a $400 Novarossi . At a club race level or even National races, SH is a cost effective choice. Many people have won races with the SH PT2009XB or a LRP .28 or a LOSI 454. All SH Engines. I have 2 team racers that raced in the RCPS this past season, in their first season of racing, and did quite well with their PT2009XB and the PT2010XB.
If you are going to the worlds, spend $400 - $500 dollars on an engine, it does make sense.

I find it quite funny when I see guys debating which is better. Chances are 10 guys have 10 different answers.

youve got a point there......they do balance out in time