What a great picture! Captured on film here, we have several items found in few pits there days. In the far back right corner, we have the ubiquitous 12v power supply - not just any power supply, a HUGE power supply capable of 20 amps of output, and heavy! Up close in the bottom left corner of the picture, we have a battery, composed of six cells (6s!!!) putting out a hefty 7.2V for an incredible 2000 mAh... but wait, it's being balance discharged! Those LiPo guys aren't the only ones who get to have fun. Lastly we come to the feature attraction in this corner of the museum - an in-use Competition Electronics Turbo 30 Turbo FLEX! Yes, this behemoth does it all still, exept charge big NiMH batterys or any LiPo batteries, but it still outputs 5v to test your motor with... wait, does that work with brushless? Seen here, this Turbo 30 is busy cycling a NiCad 2000 mAh pack after it's cells have been re-"matched". Let's leave the old girl to her business, shall we?
What you see here is an FM transmitter, which uses an extendable "fishing pole" style metal antenna to deliver its signal on a frequency specified by insertable "crystals" that you put in the radio and the receiver. If we check our history books, we'll see that this is a Futaba T3PDF with a whopping 3 model memory. Also visible in this picture is the big red Crafts Man-o-saur tool chest - she's been my faithful pit box for thirteen years now. she's old, she's red, and she's HEAVY, but she can't hold the power supply and the Turbo 30, so those beasts get their own pit box, seen below trying to camoflague itself on top of the Crafts Man-o-saur...
It's not working terribly well is it? Hey, look who just pulled into the pits!
It's the Kawada SV-10 Alcyon himself! Look at that fine Honda Accord body and those super special chrome racing wheels! He must get all the girls! Does anyone recognize the paint scheme from anywhere? It may have been a world champion or something, but it was in a magazine in 1997 or 1998 on a buggy. This driver asked one of the local airbrush-masters to adapt it to a touring car body - he did an outstanding job, and this is actually the third iteration of that body, - the second and third being done by another airbrush-master who added his own touches of originality to the paint scheme. This is the last known survivor of the trio. If this brash little kid didn't wake the Turbo 30 beast, perhaps we can get under his shell for a closer look at what passed for a touring car over ten years ago!
It's almost too easy to get this top off - I didn't even need beads! So whatcha got kid? Carbon Fiber chasis? check! Aluminum? check! Two-Belt driven? check! Stiff upper deck? check! CVD's? check! Super Front one-way diff? check! So, what's it missing? Droop stops. droop stops? ...so what? Ten years and the only thing you're missing is droop stops?
And here he is, proudly showing off his super-quiet 48 pitch gears along with those super grippy eight year-old Kawada tires, which have the writing "20 blue" on the inside of the rear wheels.
And now we move to the front of the chasis, where we can spot some more antique electronics. On the right, is a Tekin G12 III speed controller, for when you want to go fast with no limits (disclaimer : "no limits" does not include the use of LiPo batteries or brushless motors). On the left, we have a double stack of barely-out-of-the-tube-era electronics - a KO-Propo 2000 FET servo, which I guess, explains what the blue wire leading off from the speed controller is. On top of that, the always popular Futaba FM receiver, with a factory tuned antenna of the right length for channel.... 68 dude! Also pictured are the matching Kawada tires - these specimans containing the text "25 blue" on the inside!
That's all the time we have today for this trip around the museum! We're hoping to add a wing dedicated to NiMH in the near future!
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