I am about to be the new owner of a Midwest CRANBERRY ISLE LOBSTERYACHT its been built, and finished. Its got all hardware and a stock motor "I am assuming the Midwest hardware, motor".. Anyhow what would you guys suggest me use, stock set up or upgrade to something a little better.. I am going to use a 2-4 channel radio, but just run around the lake, pond and dont need to much speed but I would like it to have some "get up and go" but really just a scale speed look for most of the run time. My budget is to try to stay under $150 hopefully for the motor "if I should upgrade" ESC, Speed Control and batteries.. If you could help me understand and figure out what is needed that would be sweet. I am not an electric expert by far I pretty much am good with "plug and play" and thats it.. LoL

If you could provide links that would be sweet too. I like to shop Tower or will at least use their listed items and find em elsewhere if cheaper..


Thanks all..

Chris

Chris,
First, I'd suggest you run the thing and see how it does. If it behaves like you think it should, why mess with it at all? Nothing wrong with 'up-grading' if it needs it, but if it doesn't, then whats the point?
- 'Doc

If you bought it from Vett, just have him set it up to run and pay the cost of the parts.

Well its only coming with a motor and the hardware, prop, shaft etc.. As far as I understood anyway. So I assume I will need to get a ESC, batteries and drop in 2 servos..


Yep I am buying it from Vett I have always admired all the boats he has posted here and other forums and I finally decided I couldnt pass up another and I've been wanting a scale lobster type boat for years now just never wanted to buy a kit and try to build it myself because I know where it would end up, in the garage or basment on a shelf collecting dust..

Yes, he does build awesome boats.

Well, I would bet the stock motor and prop will give a good "scale" speed to the boat. It is much too easy to exceed scale speeds and make a nice scale boat look foolish, imho.

But anyway, just about any simple marine esc should control that 550 motor easily. I would go for an Mtroniks Viper Marine esc from Hobby People:

http://www.hobbypeople.net/gallery/159230.asp

And you will only need one servo, for steering. The electronic esc negates the need for a second servo. The Viper esc can handle 10 cells, ( 12 volts), so you could really make that motor cry out for mercy if you wanted to. I would just run it on a 6 or 7 cell battery pack. You will probably be very pleased with it at that level of performance.

Thanks for the link and info Kmot I'll order that next month sometime..

I used a Novak Rooster ESC I got for cheap on eBay on the Cranberry I built. It worked fine, just had to make sure it stayed dry, so I mounted it up high in the hull under the cabin.

Like Kmot said, the stock setup (Mabuchi 550 direct drive to the kit's 3-blade prop) moves that boat along nicely for scale speed. If you wanted to put a Mabuchi 555 motor in there it'll probably get a longer run time at slightly lower RPMs. That's what I put in the Cranberry I built, but those motors don't seem to be quite as easy to come across. Last time I found a 555, I pulled it from a copier that my work was throwing away.