diy-pro

So I've seen everything homemade rudders, cooling systems and hulls. The thing that gets to me the most though is the the same reason everyone makes there own hardware, the price of parts are stupid high. The only thing I don't see is homemade flex shafts. Today I took some 1/8 inch cable from home depot and 1/8 inch steel rod and soldered it together with no lath or hard effort and it was as strong as could be and was super smooth at high rpm. Has anyone else made there own flex cables? Why do online sellers sell a piece of metal and cable for 20 dollars when it takes 10 minutes to put together if that and the parts cost less than a dollar????? If you have homemade hardware that worked just as well as the pocket burning OEM lets see pics I rather build it than buy it.

MassiveOverkill

I've posted some pictures\instructions on my experiments with making my own straight shafts:

http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/m_11..._1/key_/tm.htm

OSE does state on its website that some of the parts like brass tubing and such can be found at your local hardware store (Ace is the bomb), and even gives instructions for DIYers on how to attach your stubs to save money vs having them do it.  I thought it was cool of them to provide this info. 

I could even make my own prop shafts from parts from Ace, but the money spent and aggravation isn't worth it over just buying them from OSE. 

chief3452

My $0.02,

"Why do online sellers sell a piece of metal and cable for 20 dollars when it takes 10 minutes to put together if that and the parts cost less than a dollar?????"

In my opinion most people buy parts like Aeromarine and Hughey flexshafts because they are proven to be reliable race ready components. While true that the average pond splasher like myself may not require a high priced flexshaft, I still enjoy running my models much more than retrieving them.

I will gladly pay the money for a part that used properly will hold up and provide many hours of trouble free service.

siberianhusky

For the cost of the lathe and mill, which is required to make quality accurate hardware for high power high speed applications, plus the cost of quality alloys I can buy more hardware than I will ever need in my entire life!
Then you add in the time required to hand machine each part unless you can afford CNC tools.
Then unless you have a nice shop where do you keep everything.
Plus if I bend or break something spare parts for quality name brand hardware are easily available. Probably have a spare for most everything I run in the kit now including esc and motors. Hate standing around watching because my boats broken!
I've never seen hacksaw and file hardware I'd waste my time putting on a quality hull, not going to spend my money on vacuum bagged carbon fiber only to hang ugly junk off the back!
I've seen plenty of beautiful custom hardware made by people who either have or have access to the proper tools. Bought some of it.

sundogz

DIY-PRO, please post pics of your homemade flex shaft! Sdg

Von Ohain

DIY. definetly.
perfectly usable 2nd hand workshop tools costs less than what 4-5 motor and escs do.
If you actually intend to use this equipment, its a no-brainer. It will pay itself no matter how big or small things you use it for.
If you got the hours, and the knowhow, you kan make everything you need for a gas turbine yourself, given that you got a welder, a lathe and a mill in addition to basic workshop tools.

Sure you can obtain the parts you need otherwise, but it will be more expensive, and its unbearably annoying to wait 2 weeks to obtain the single little part you need to get going, when you could make it yourself in less than a hour with the right tools.

Lathe, mill and welder is minimum equippment in a well stocked workshop, and a well stocked workshop is mandatory in this hobby, in my opinion.

DIY flex shafts is also extremely simple if you got some thin piano wire, a lathe, and brazing equippment.

diy-pro

My intenet is slow and lost all the text i originally typed so briefly this is what i did.

cut 2 inches 1/8 steel rod.
cut 3/8 slit in end with dremel.
squished 1/8 cable(stainless i think found at home depot)and fit into slot.
trimmed excess cable on sides of shaft with dremel.
wrapped solder around cable and rod connection
wrapped with foil and melted with lighter horizontally
rotated shaft down so solder goes to joint and cooled with water
remove foil melt again and remove excess with something metal
place cable in boat and steel shaft in dremel
sanded on high untill shaft went snug but smoothly into brass
even tied boat in kiddy pool with dremel mounted on high 30k rpm less with load ofcourse but worked great and even took my homemade cat to the creek twice
even strong enough to counter rotate against the wind of cable with my counter rotating props
oh and solder the end of cable to prevent it from falling apart and helps get a good connection in the shaft coupler.

also made my own shaft couplers with 3/8 aluminum rod, grub nuts and threading bit frome home depot

cheap brushed esc on ebay described as "320A 7.2v" lol def not but runs two 750 sized motors with 14 volts no problem with a good load(w/diy water cooling ofcourse). and with a good load i mean the boats only 29 inches and weighs a ton with two nimh bats in series and the motors lol.

Anyone know the cheapest place to get lipos online in U.S.?


Tags home made flex cable drive shaft rc boat

diy-pro

meow

Von Ohain

Looks neat, and I'm sure they'll do for the application with brushed motors.
If I were to make flex shafts for a high power application, brushless, gas or nitro, I would stretch out 3-4 bigger piano wires as a nucleus the full lenght of the flex shaft, and then coil up a finer piano wires wrapping around the nucleus (keeping direction of rotation in mind).
And then cut it at the right length, and braze the ends of it.
That would be a flex shaft totally up to spec.
Actually, I might just do that, as I'm now in my 4th week of waiting for a new shaft from HOR.

Edit: Sorry HOR, its actually my bad that its been so long, payment hadn't been sent

NobodyFamous

I just had a thought. . . I could use and old bass guitar string for a DIY flex drive.  They are a solid core wrapped in a smaller wire.  Although the ones I have are made of brass or copper, so that may not work too well the second time out.

Von Ohain

If its steel strings, it might be worth a try. I would, however, use several lengtes of the coarsest unwrapped treble string for a nucleus, and then spinning the finest string around it for wrapping. Again, keeping direction of rotation in mind.
A wire without a wrapping will wist under tension, and a wrapped wire without a nucleus will just be a tangled mess. You need a wrapped nucleus shaft for anything with a significant amount of torque to it.
Sure a bass string is a wrapped wire around a nucleus, but I think its too thin to serve as a flex shaft alone.

sundogz

A speedometer cable (if wrapped the correct direction) would do as well. A "B" string from a 5 or 6 string set of bass strings should do fine. Of the several brands I use, they are all plated steel and wrapped left handed, so should do fine.

diy-pro

Im going to be honest ive never even owned a real flex cable! I bought the aqua craft mini rio 3 months ago and was astounded by the low quality it represented. gaps in the non effective water cooling tube. seriously an aluminum tube zip tied to the motor bracket... Bahahahaha I feel sad for grims mama.

As for the copper idea no go copper is way to weak and tears almost instantly. i started tinkering around after my mini rio swallowed the dust it was already biting when i bought it and finally have a solid foundation going. Tried copper and 1/16 "aircraft cable and counter spinning didnt stand a chance lol. But i was impressed that the 1/8 didnt even show signs of unwinding on my twin counter rotating props on my sterlite cat.

Im going to have to check out some real hardware soon w/o buying it and compare it to mine. The 1/8 aircraft cable is virtually indestructable and as soon as my drill press arrives i will be drilling out some 3/16 and 1/4 stainless steel shafts and popping my brushless cherry soon. Only downfall i can imagine is that aircraft cable with a few bends creates tension and friction so a somewhat straight driveline and removable inner tube for after wear and tear should do some good on my pocket.

Ive also been looking at drain snakes. They have clockwise wound 1/4 inch cable. If you could find one that is counter and fill it with something i think it would do great with gas.

Just ideas tho. Ive loved rc since i was a kid and getting back into it now is just a riot with everything the have out these days but id like to enjoy it w/o burning my pocket