Custom Boat
 

Hey All!
I have posted once before but i think i posted in the wrong section....so ill post a new one here.

My Dad and I (mainly my Dad) created this RC Boat more than...possibly 8-9 years ago out of fibreglass, we used 3 layers of fibreglass on the boat and the boat size is approx 1 metre long and im unsure of its weight at this stage...i will get around to weighing it eventually.

Here are some pictures of the boat as it is now...

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...h_07022008.jpg
Side Shot
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...7022008005.jpg
Rear Shot
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...7022008003.jpg
Internals
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...7022008002.jpg
Angled Shot
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...7022008001.jpg
Front Shot

Now i basically want to do an overhaul and fix the boat up, if possible id like to keep the transmitter and receiver (Futaba) and the speed control which i believe was (Sanwa) just to keep the price to fix the boat down to a minimum.

So essentially the motor and the battery are of interest to replace at the moment and this is where the problem lies, i dont know what to go with in terms of my hardware. I prefer to stay with the electric setup and prefer to keep it one shaft as i do not wish to modify the hull, i do want to get some more speed out of the boat but im not looking for a racing boat....I do intend on building the cabin for this boat also so maybe a suggestion on what material i should be using for this would also be handy information.

Main objective is to fix the boat up at a relatively low cost, i dont have too much to spend but if there is only one type of motor that will handle a boat this size i will save for the motor if nothing else is available.

Any comments are welcome in regards to the boat.

Thanks Guys!

RE: Custom Boat
 

Very nice!!!! How did the hull get formed? What type of fiber glass did you use? Auto repair type? Tight woven boat type? What ounce fiberglass is it. That is sharp. Thanx, for sharing. Scott

RE: Custom Boat
 

Excellent build! What are the limits on the ESC in terms of voltage and continuous current? It's a lot of boat to hull around and will take some power to move it.

Ryan

RE: Custom Boat
 

Ok heres what i know as i was quite young when my dad built this boat. I believe he used a mould which he created himself and probably still has somewhere but im not too sure where at this stage. The fibreglass was just regular fibreglass, whatever was left around in his shed and he told me it was 3 layers of 1.5....

Now i also decided to weigh the boat today and the result according to my scales was 6kg....give or take cause of my crap scale.

To be honest im not too sure, is there a certain way i can find out? I gathered you meant Electronic Speed Control with that abbreviation? Its an old speed control so there were no markings on it. I may actually need to replace that as well but im unsure at the moment.

Any more suggestions...at least we have a weight to work off now...

RE: Custom Boat
 

So do we have any suggestions on motor and battery setup for my boat? If possible i want to try and keep the cost minimal....
im really out of the loop with RC boats as this hasnt been used in ages so i need some guidance.

RE: Custom Boat
 

what is your deffinition of minimal? thats going to take like at least 200$ to power and get some speed

RE: Custom Boat
 

Ok if its going to take at least $200 then thats fine, i just need to be pointed in the right direction of what type of products i should be looking at.

RE: Custom Boat
 

Any ideas?

RE: Custom Boat
 

Just checking in here....
Went to a hobby shop today and they recommended i put a drill motor in the boat....Spoke to my dad about it and he said it was not a good idea..

* Fired up the control today and tested the servos and speed control...all in working order!
* Throwing the old 12v battery away as it is now dead. (replacement will cost at least $50)
* My dad suggested that we throw the current motor (windshield wiper motor) away and replace it with something that is used to running at higher speeds such as a 12v Car Fan Motor that would normally run with the A/C. I think i will be giving this a go next as it could end up being quite cheap and might just give me the speed that i want.

I dont suppose anyone has tried anything like this before?

What are your thoughts on the idea?

RE: Custom Boat
 

I've always used drill motors in my project boats. You can find them in a 700 or 800 size cans. For a hull that big you will need 2 of them coupled to a geared down, single shaft running 12-20 NiMh cells depending on whether it is a 700 or 800 can. You should be able to run at least a 45mm prop or higher depending on prop drive type.

I'd recommend an ESC capable of 80A @ 16 cells - 19.2v or 80A @ 20 cells - 24v.

Any motor found in a car is not capable of high RPM. My blower motor sounds like it runs at no more than 5000 RPM. A drill motor is capable of over 20 000RPM.

Ryan

RE: Custom Boat
 

Now i meter is 39 1/4", alot of boat for electric. Boat looks great and that size is GAS. Go to Zippkits Easy Vee will give you an idea of what to use. Zippkits go to google and pops up first hand.

RE: Custom Boat
 

Personally, I think I would go with a weed eater engine. These weed eaters get tossed out all the time and you can get the conversion kits for them. You can use larger props and get planty of speed. Check into it. One of your servos with operate the engine throttle and the other to operate the steering. Scott

RE: Custom Boat
 

Hey Guys thanks for all the assistance.
Despite most your comments and i really do appreciate everyones input i thought id have a crack at what my dad suggested first off. (gotta listen to the parents hehe)

Anyway a bit of an update here...
* Purchased a A/C Fan Motor for $10 from the wreckers (bargain!!)
* Purchased a new 12v Motorcycle Battery (smallest size i could find) for $69
* Compared the old motor to the new motor simply by listening how they both sound when connecting to the battery. I was very impressed with the A/C motor as it looked like it was much much much faster than the original motor, all i need to do now is mount it permanently and give it a test run.

Now to answer a question from a PM, the motor that i was referring to is the motor that is normally housed on the passenger side of any car i believe it is used to operate the blower to blow the air out of the air vents in your car. after pulling one out today it reads 300watt down the side.

I will report back how im going as there may be some of you interested in how this actually performs in the water. I cant wait to give it a go in the water!

RE: Custom Boat
 

I would have rather saw you take the dual 700 drill motor route as it would have been more powerful and much lighter. 900w vs 300w.

After researching the average blower motor, I have found they typically only spin about 1500-3500RPM. A Wiper motor suffers at much less than 250RPM which is literally un heard of in RC.

As far as 12v batteries you could purchase small hobby grade Pb's such as the following
http://www3.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin...&I=LXL370&P=ML
http://www3.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin...?&I=LXSK06&P=7

What car model and year was the blower taken from? Is the hull submerged drive? What size was your previous prop? What kind of speed are you hoping for?

Ryan

RE: Custom Boat
 

ryan_t888 i appreciate what you are saying but i dont have any experience in modifying the hull of the boat so a dual setup would have been out of the question for me as i wish to keep the single shaft.

In relation to the blower motor and the wiper motor rpm i was aware of these figures and it is very noticable with the difference in speed that the blower motor has over the wiper motor. Im really not looking to build a speed demon im just after something a little quicker than what the wiper motor was putting out and i believe i may have found the right solution although it has not yet been tested properly as yet so i cant confirm.

Had a look at the two links you provided for batteries, the first one although it is 7ah and it sounds tempting i think its a little bit bigger than what i wanted although the second one seems to be at the right size and at 4.5ah sounds like a great battery for my project. Since i have already purchased the motorbike battery i will stick with that for the moment until i run that one dead and then ill look for the one provided in your second link. By the way the motorcycle battery is 4ah which isnt far off the mark and im sure ill get plenty of time driving the boat with this battery.

I believe the blower was taken from a late 90's or 2000 model Holden Commodore here in Australia. I believe the hull is submerged drive and im not totally sure on the size of the prop all i know is that it was the largest size i can go on my boat without it hitting the boat itself. As stated above im not looking for a speed demon just something that will perform better than what the wiper motor was.

Thanks for all your comments.....i can take more close up pictures of certain things if required?

RE: Custom Boat
 

Ah, so you are building more of a scale type setup rather than a FE setup. Sounds good.

With a 4Ah battery I believe you should see around a 20min (@ 12A) run time which is decent for a scale type setup.

Good Luck and post results
Ryan

EDIT:
I'd like to see a photo of the prop exiting the hull if you dont mind

RE: Custom Boat
 

Hmmmmmmmm, interesting, I was thinking my idea was a little heavy. You should have no problem getting from point A to point B. LOL! I must agree with your decision and think it will work fine.And for 24v motors, you can double up on the 12v batteries to make 24 volts. For the price you paid for that battery, you could have bought TWO nice lawn tractor batteries at Home Depot @ $29 each + tax.Hey, how about dual AC motors? OK, forget that last comment LOL. I would love to see the 'before' picks of the motor and battery before installation. Yeh, I think you have a great idea. I will use the same idea for my next scale boat build! I will be watching your progress closely and listening to your pros and cons of that set-up! Congrats on that choice! Quiet is better and cleaner. Take care, Scott

RE: Custom Boat
 

ryan_t888 ill try get some pictures of the prop exiting maybe later today or sometime tomorrow.

ElectricFlyGuy before pics are the ones above, i have already started ripping things out of the boat so....next pics will be the after shots and im hoping to get a video going when i run the boat as well.

My main issue at the moment with the new motor is that i need to create a new peice to join the motor and the shaft together, the current peice fits but its not as tight as id hoped it to be which means when i turn the boat on the boat shudders violently, so its not ready for the water yet but when i fix this up and fix the motor and battery in place it should be ready to go.


Ill keep everyone posted on this one...

RE: Custom Boat
 

AWSOME!!!!! Thanx, scott

RE: Custom Boat
 

Ok took some more pics on my phone tonight....heres what im working with so far, i have thrown one or two questions in under the pictures so feel free to make a suggestion to help me out on them.

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...7022008011.jpg
Battery in comparison to my mouse
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...7022008010.jpg
New A/C fan Motor in comparison to my mouse
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...7022008008.jpg
Servo and speed control for throttle
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...7022008007.jpg
Servo that controls the rudder
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...7022008006.jpg
Close up to the speed control
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...7022008004.jpg
My newest dilemma as explained in above post i need to join the motor to the shaft. Anyone know if there is something i can buy off the shelf? or will this be a custom made piece that me and my dad need to work on together?
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...7022008003.jpg
This is the old piece that used to join the shaft and the wiper motor, it did fit on the new motor but was not a tight fit which led to massive amounts of vibration in the boat.
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...7022008002.jpg
Here you can see the size of my prop used on the boat, notice very little gap between prop and boat
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...7022008001.jpg
another shot of the prop exiting the hull
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...h_27022008.jpg
and another shot of the prop exiting the hull once again....

Hopefully this can show most what im up to so far....will keep everyone updated on the project

RE: Custom Boat
 

I don't believe that prop is going to be big enough for that Blower motor.

There are several couplers available at www.offshoreelectrics.com I would imagine your shaft is at least 5mm possibly more?

Ryan

RE: Custom Boat
 

Really, i thought it would be plenty....i dont think i can go any bigger than the one that is on there....maybe i might be able to find slightly bigger but will it make that much of a difference at all?

Of and thanks for the link ill have to measure the shaft end and motor end to find the right coupler, at least i know what they are actually called now so im not just taking a stab in the dark.

RE: Custom Boat
 

i am interested in learning how to build a custom boat using an alternating current motor.  can someone provide me some suggestions on ac motors which would work on 100 or 200 watts?  also if anyone has any helpful instruction manuals on how to assemble the necessary parts for the motor.  my goal is to create a small rc boat which is powered by an outside ac electricity source. 
thanks!

RE: Custom Boat
 

AC motors = Brushless which is what everyone uses

Ryan

RE: Custom Boat
 

Is that just a typo, or is that an AC motor? How will you power it? An AC motor needs alternating current (house or 'grid' current) so you will need an inverter and an AC speed control to operate it.
Brushless motors are 3 phase, requiring a different type esc to control them. The speed control you show looks like it is for DC current - like 12v car motors or brushed hobby motors- requiring yet another type speed control.