60 replies to this topic

[Dan Ruddock]

I have my thoughts on this but I will refrain for now to not skew the results. Remember as a designer you have to consider many things to achieve a positive and balanced result. Dan

[toothdoc]

I have my thoughts on this but I will refrain for now to not skew the results. Remember as a designer you have to consider many things to achieve a positive and balanced result. Dan

Might the answer be class dependent?

[TSR]

I voted for infinity and warp speed...

[68Caddy]

I don't know about you guy's but I would like to have a cup holder?

Nesta

[Bill from NH]

Dan, I vote for 100. I have an old DR-40.

Nesta, my Subaru Legacy has 4 cup holders. Maybe you ought to trade your Caddy for one.

[68Caddy]

Sorry bud
It doesn't have a Northstar in it and the cig lighters in it.
I like to puff.

Nesta

[Mopar Rob]

Might the answer be class dependent?

If you are slot drag racing you could probably use a door bell swith? Would that be one band or none?

[Dominator]

More important than the number of bands, to a degree, is the power curve and how it is set up.

[Dan Ruddock]

More important than the number of bands, to a degree, is the power curve and how it is set up.

Ding, Ding, Ding, You get the door prize!! You win a free controller tune up. I don't care if it's one of my competitors products I will make it work better. Dan

[toothdoc]

If you are slot drag racing you could probably use a door bell swith? Would that be one band or none?

Would that make it a digital controller?

[Dan Ruddock]

I have a question for those who have not voted. Are you able to see the results before you vote by clicking the show results button.

I have not voted but I am the thread starter and I can see them. I wish it would not show them as it might influence a vote.

I will not vote on this thread as I am using it for market research. For the infinity and beyond voters how would you implement it, mount a trigger on a pot or what? Dan

[TSR]

Dan, it appears on top of the message on my screen because I was one of the smarta$$es who voted for infinity. If you vote, it does appear next time you get on the thread.

PS: D3 is a bit tougher than you thought, right?

[Dan Ruddock]

Dan, it appears on top of the message on my screen because I was one of the smarta$$es who voted for infinity. If you vote, it does appear next time you get on the thread.

PS: D3 is a bit tougher than you thought, right?

I wish I had more time to come out and race, the problem is not showing up as much as getting something built. I knew doing anything new to me would be difficult. Dan

[Prof. Fate]

Hi

10 or 12 years ago in the Bay area I met a controller guy at the flat king in San Jose. He was showing off a controller where he was using his PC to plot multiple power curves and have them as replaceable modules. Seems these days one could do a stick with hundreds of possible power slopes with a rotary switch selected.

I mostly use plan PM for most low powered cars and a DS30 for more amp cars. But I am not Stube and haven't the touch to drive and FEEL 22.4 bands or more!

Fate

[Rick]

Is this thread still open? I would like to give my opinion on the controllers,I have used all of them and they are all good, one way or another. What I would like to see is a controller with a longer stroke from brake to full on. What's the difference if its 30 bands or 9 bands in the same stroke? Now you have to find an even smaller sweet spot, if the controller throw were longer, you have a greater margin of error on that sweet spot, and THEN more bands would be much more relevant.................

[Dan Ruddock]

Is this thread still open? I would like to give my opinion on the controllers,I have used all of them and they are all good, one way or another. What I would like to see is a controller with a longer stroke from brake to full on. What's the difference if its 30 bands or 9 bands in the same stroke? Now you have to find an even smaller sweet spot, if the controller throw were longer, you have a greater margin of error on that sweet spot, and THEN more bands would be much more relevant.................

I can do that, add one extra band on each end and would add about .100" total increase in stroke for a total of 20 bands. I am not so sure it's a good idea but if it fits your driving style why not. Dan

[Dominator]

Ding, Ding, Ding, You get the door prize!! You win a free controller tune up. I don't care if it's one of my competitors products I will make it work better. Dan

Thanks Dan, I might just take you up on that! Actually I have one of your DR-40's and it works great. I use it for everything from falcons to 1/24 Eurosport. A true piece that will with stand the test of time.

[68Caddy]

Dan
I assume when we talk about bands we are actually talking about variable resistor? I think the important thing is the timing that the controller will react to the
persons habits to slow down or accelerate, after all how smooth is the transition between slow down and step on it?
So I guess the max power curve and the reaction time between the user and his driving style is very important after all we are dealing with simple DC aren't
we? It not much you can do with simple DC after all it's not digital?
Hate to be blunt but its it a hand held gas pedal?

Nesta

[idare2bdul]

If you are slot drag racing you could probably use a door bell swith? Would that be one band or none?

Nope, door bells give too hard a launch plus everybody keeps trying to answer the door.

[idare2bdul]

My vote is I don't know. I do know the ability to soften the response off the bottom bands has helped me. One of my controllers has an internal choke and to my surprise it really smoothed out a D3 F1 car on a low traction day. I'd have to try one of the new controllers to see if it makes a difference.

Some of my RC speed controls can actually be programed for response by my computer, doesn't mean I know how to do it right.

Several years ago I told Dan here is what my controller is doing here is what I want it to do. Sent it to him and it came back doing what I wanted it to do. Still working fine.

[Phil Irvin]

Most of us are a "build/modify" to what we think we want. .12 years ago I modified an OMNI to what I wanted....12 years ago. With only 7 bands. It was to much of a change between bands. Specialy on 12s & up. It was a get pulled by 2-3 ft or come off cause of going to fast around the dougnut thing. I tried a Defalco with 15? bands and liked it very much but adding 16 ft to the leads was not conducive. After looking & talking to many. I went with a JG 200 and like it VERY much . Is 24 bands too much...Its up to you & how your finger/head/eyes work together...I have had some say its to 'touchy in the midrange' to 'I wish it had a touch more there'......Of course I changed the wiper button and rounded the edge a little..made sure everything was right on and very smoooth....You Know...JUST GOTTA MAKE IT MINE

PHIL I.

[Slapshot]

Being one that races Eurosports professionally, builds or set up commercial tracks, has provided several tracks with worlds records power supplies, build my own cars and also happen to build my own controllers I think I can offer little to the theroy. I am not the controller Guru as Dan is. I know only some but understand the broad spectrim. I also have had the oportunity to try every controller on the market today from the States and Europe and most are exceptionally good.

This is my simple reponse:
Its not how many bands there are, its what you can do with whats between the brake band contacts and the full on that counts. You can only put so much betweeen that 1.5 inchs of trigger response. Any method that improves that response is a posative.

I would probaly trace the origin to the use of multiple bands (other than the original 8-10) to the open Eurosport racers or Flat tracks especially.

There was a time when the 8 band and 10 bands was fine for the wing racers since most King tracks require a short blip in a certain portion of the track. The resistive bands range was simply not a high priority or needed since they were relying on the full on upper portion of the resistance curve.

Then years ago Eurosport racing became popular starting in Europe,then the States but it involved racing on a flat twisty non banked track. The controller aspects for Eurosport and needs changed. Initially you were relying on the lower bands to controll the high power cars. Chokes helped but they limited the response time and bogged a motor at inopportune times. The short chutes and twisty esses involved running on the lower bands quite often which meant using the first 4/5 bands of a 8/10 bander. Those bands were notchy and required fast reactions to controll a car. Riding the lower bands on these controllers heated up the transisors so much you could scorch yourself and once the transistor got too hot the controller became like a on off switch, loosing middle range. The controllers response curve was later changed by a number of controller manufacturers once they learned about adjusting to a proper rate. Something else was needed though and everyone that was a pro was searching for ways to improve thier controller because it was critical to thier needs.

The Europeans and Czech"s were the first to recognise the limitations of the 8-10 band controllers then and experimented with multiple bands. The theory was to get away from using power limiting chokes and relying on the tranfer power on the controller instead. The idea was to get the lower band linear in reponse in the first multi-band range by streaching it out using more bands. This involved adding bands,streaching out the band count and making the resitance range closer. This keeps the entire rage consistant, keepeng the car controllable without have to work so hard on the trigger. I emphisize the words not haveing to work so hard. That gave a smoother trigger response in esses and tight curves. Plus it allowed less strain in driving by having to find the sweet spot because your not haveing to full swipe to get a particular range. Adding the extra bands tones down the heat buildup in the motors resulting less chance of a failure.

Years ago in the NW there were a few builders that experimented with a number of other aspects. One being modifying the step rate of the sectional resistors between the brake and full power to an actual varible resistor with additionl step rates added using parrallel and series resistors to a wirewound resistor. This wasn't the common step band method but a linear variable resistor system(almost). This resulted in giving tremendous linear controll where it was needed in the esses and allowed lowering the requirements of using a choke. Depending on the wire guage this method didn't add much more bands as it was close to just 25 sometimes 50 at most but with it you did have more variable controll. The response was phenominally easy on driving as it made it less tiring on the trigger. That important because an open eurosport can be exhasting during forty minutes.

This was later adoped by a couple of manufacture that added thier own little spin to the design. These controllers were specifically geared towards the Eurosport racers who prefer to have more bells and whistles in thier controller. Theres a lot that quickly goes on in a race and you need a controller that responses fast to those needs. Things such as step adjustible sensativity rates aside from the dial rate sensativity. This is to compinsate for different motor setups or winds. As the motor heat up its requirement change and along with taxing the heatsink of the controller (or sometime the senativity pot is too sensative) and a minor trim is needed. Fourty minutes of Eurosport is not the same as a 40 min Open wing car race. There is much more load going through the motor, choke (if any) and controller transistor.

I will add to this later......to be continued


Raymond

[Courtney S]

Where can I look at a JG Controller?

[Prof. Fate]

Hi

I noticed no one actually addressed Nesta. We aren't really talking here about resistors. Mostly, these days, we use solid state electronics in one part or all of the controller to do what we want.

You have seen Philippe talk about the Professor Motor, this is a simple example.

The origin of the controller was an earlier Slot Works controller about 12 years ago. In essence it used a series of 1kmf/3amp rated diodes to control the car. It does this by dropping the voltage .7 volts on each diode. The original only used 12 diodes, so, just below the brake dropped the voltage to the track by 8.4 volts. But unlike a resistor controller, it did drop the amperage. This ment that the controller would work on any car that didn't do 3 amps continuous draw. At the time, I had over a dozen resistor controllers in the box with resistors from 45 ohm for the Ninco NC1, down to .3 ohm for the G7 stuff.(I like "softer than most"). By only adjusting the voltage, i was using 1 controller to replace all the controllers between 45 and 3.

I also modified one with 6 amp diodes for 20s.

The issue discussed above, both with the euro/chokes and others is trying to define where and how the voltage comes up.

My old pre-wing pro cars that I have for fun, my current Ruddic is good for a measurable improvment over the highly modified Turbo of the day. I like "Heather" mods, except the controllers I tried were "bumpy" using bare metal against the bands. As I no longer run "serious" modern stuff, the advantages of the Ruddic, or others or the Heather are lost on me.

Well, as I said, I do use a ruddic on old pre-airdam pro cars.

Fate

[Phil Irvin]

Where can I look at a JG Controller?

www.jaygeeracing.com