29 replies to this topic

[Mr. M]

This is intended for those that race this series.

 

For 2015, would there be support for adding a Hawk 6 with the tagged Pro Slot replacement arm? This would be an option to the Chinese arm currently in use.

 

I did a quick check of several racers at the last race and they were supportive. I also checked with the series Tech Director who is also supportive.

 

The intention is to add an option that would be comparable in performance with more consistency and longevity.

 

Discussion please!

[DOCinCanton]

Chris, what is on the tag? I hope that you are not talking about the "BD" arm.

 

Also, the Hawk 6 motor with the stock Chinese arm is run in the GT1/LMP class. The motor is very fast and has been very dependable for me. They last several races. The point is that this motor (Hawk 6) is the preferred motor in two of the car classes in the MySeries. I am thinking we should leave it alone.

[Mr. M]

Doc, all current options would be in place. This would be an additional option. What started this was when I looked at the pile of Chinese arms I went through in the last year. It was a big pile. Hence the request for discussion!

Chris

[Michael Rigsby]

If it ain't broke, don't try to fix it.  As a racer at the ONLY raceway in Florida that runs My Series rules in four classes and weekly or bi-weekly races running these rules in those classes, I'll say it ain't broke.  The Hawk 6 with the stock Chinese arm is probably the most reliable and economical motor run in any of the classes. For $18 you get a motor, that with very few mods other than springs, brushes, and a comm cut, that is competitive right out of the bag if setup properly. That motor setup, with maybe one or two replacement arms off the parts wall, can last you a whole race season if treated right.

 

We run LMP/GT-1 every week with this motor, and have very few motor failures. We run this motor in Group F every other week with very few motor failures and the motor is fast. The JK ready built car out of the case with this  motor and a simple gearing change is competitive. Why do you feel the need to replace a good performing cheap arm with a Pro Slot arm that costs almost $30 that may or may not perform as well? You can get two to three comm cuts on the stock Hawk 6 arm. You will literally weaken the magnets in the setup before you will destroy the arm usually.  Not to say they don't throw winds, because any arm will, even American made arms. You run the stock arm for a couple of races, send it off to be balanced, then put it back in, and you are good to go.  I ran one of these motors for a whole season in LMP at Jax and was the lap record holder for awhile. It didn't come out till the end of the My Series season.

 

This "motor change" has already been suggested and done when they fubared and allowed the Big Dog arm to be put into the Hawk 6 setup for GTP. That was done at a suggestion by racers who participate at a track who don't run the class on a weekly basis and also supported by the "Tech Director".  What that did was obsolete the S16D motor program that many of us had who actually run the class. Very hard to compete with a motor that makes the car 12 grams lighter, so many of us had to start a whole new motor program to be competitive with lighter cars. Let me tell you, the Big Dog arms are no where near as consistent as a "Big Block" (.560 dia.) S16D arm. At that "Tech Directors" track, they maybe run GTP every couple of months.

 

In short, I repeat, it ain't broke, it don't need to be fixed. If you feel the need to built extreme motors with American arms, we have the NASCAR class with the FLA 16D tagged arm, the GTP class with the Hawk6/Big Dog fiasco, and Group 12. Leave the LMP/GT1 class and Group F classes alone. They are working fine. "Nuff Said.

[Cheater]

[As an aside, this My Series subforum has existed for quite some time, but Mr. M alerted me to the fact that there was a permissions problem as he couldn't see it. Not exactly sure what happened, as last night it looked like the forum was properly permissioned for everyone but when I rechecked this morning, it wasn't and I corrected the problem.

 

I'm thinking that many My Series racers had not been able to see this subfrum until now and for that I owe you guys an apology. Perfection is the goal but it looks like I still have a ways to go...]

[DOCinCanton]

Greg, I have not "seen" the subforum either.

[DOCinCanton]

I have to agree with Mike.

 

The JK Hawk 6 motor is an awesome motor. Like any motor that you build, it's mainly in the set-up and breaking in the brushes right. We are allowed to send the arm out and get it balanced, but not wrap the comm.

 

My best Hawk 6 motors are not even balanced and I have been using the stock brushes lately because they seem to be harder than the earlier ones.

[Mr. M]

Interesting. I find that I have to go through six to ten arms to find a good one that is competitive. And a good one will last, I agree.

 

What I do see are pole shorts showing up quickly, short life for some, others with no top end, just dogs. it seems there are very different experiences with these. Probably related to different manufacturing batches.

[Mr. M]

Would this alternate as an option obsolete the Chinese arms? This was not my intention at all.

[DOCinCanton]

Chris, thats what I was thinking. The American arm would make the Chinese arm obsolete.

 

When I build a new Hawk 6 motor, somethimes I buy an additional arm. And work with both arms to get a better motor. And I admit, some arms just seem to be dogs. But that can happen with any motor.

[Michael Rigsby]

As with any motor, you have to work with the sweet spot on the comm to get the right performance. Sometimes all it takes is cutting the comm twice to get it to perform. Also, here lately, Pro Slot makes a shorter Gold Dust Pro brush that's cut down in length for their Euro motors. These shorter brushes, combined with a slight facing of the brush to narrow the contact patch as it rests against the comm (not for timing... you can't cut them far enough for that), and using Koford M313 springs, you get a super performing motor with excellent brakes, less motor heat, and you don't have to worry about the springs collapsing like you do on Champion lights. Yep, the brushes are a couple bucks more for the shorter Euro style, but it saves me having to cut them down on a Turtle.

 

Like Doc has said, several of my best Hawk 6 motors have had stock unbalanced arms... and they ran like the dickens forever. Hey, when it goes bad, you chuck it and buy another six dollar arm.

 

To be honest, I have suggested that we even need to run these Hawk 6 motors in the My Series NASCAR class instead of buying so many Pro Slot FLA16D arms (which anymore are way inconsistent), but now that the Retro Hawk is legal, don't really need to.

 

I would much rather buy five or six Hawk 6 arms to get four really good running ones, than to buy eight or nine Pro Slot American arms to get two that run well.  Don't believe that happens, then you aren't running Big Dog arms in GTP. They are just that... Big Dogs..

[Mr. M]

How about comments from other tracks and racers in the series?

Chris

[Gator Bob]

Not a qualified track owner or series racer comment .... Just a thought....

 

 

NASCAR class - Hawk6  stock arm and springs only,  - no refurb or rebalance. 

GT1/LMP class - Hawk6 Tied and reconditioned Chinese arm. Blueprinted.

Group F - Sealed motor class w/ ProSlot 4002FK motors.

[Jeff Cox]

Wow

 

I feel that I need to chime in on this thread being that I have been referenced in previous comments. First of all I DID NOT support BD arms in Hawk 6 set ups, I pushed very hard for C-Can motors in GTP with up to a Super 16D arm, that would conform to the USRA DIV. II rules. Secondly as Tech Director for My Series I find it difficult to see any kind of consistancy with the Hawk 6 arms, as some batches are balanced and some are not and some have a completely different look and appearance. My main problem is that we are dealing with an untagged Chinese arm in an unsealed motor that seems to be very different from batch to batch.

 

As Mike stated the brushes are too big for the comm on the Chinese arm, a very poor combination from the start, yes the brush face can be cut to cure this but it is not so easy for the inexperienced builder.

 

Doc the arm we are talking about is the proslot that is tagged HK, the ones that I have had and seen run where much more consistant and seemed to be better suited for wing car racing where there is a much heavier load on the motor, and requires no brush face modification.

 

Jeff Cox

[Jeff Cox]

I really meant Super 16 C arms.

[Mr. M]

Jeff, With this PS HK tagged arm, would you expect that it would make all other options obsolete?

Chris

[Jeff Cox]

It is a couple of tenths faster.

[Michael Rigsby]

Jeff,

 

I do owe you an apology.  When he referenced the Tech Director I thought he may have been referring to Bill P. as some folks often refer to him in that respect.  I am sorry for the mixup on my part in that regard.  You and I are both racers and I have always respected the time you volunteered to be at the tech table for the My Series, and for you input as a racer. Again, I apologize for that mixup, as I was again referring to Bill P in that statement.

 

And like you, when they were wanting to look at a replacement motor to give an alternative to the S16D for GTP,  I also suggested a S16C or Contender motor.

[Wizard Of Iz]

As a partial owner of SCR&H, it's sometimes tempting to change stuff just to drive sales at the parts counter. Not always a bad idea.

However, I believe that if you change too much, guys will stop coming around. Pockets are only so deep and the farther you get from "stock", the fewer people you get to participate.

In this case, I agree with Doc and Mike......let's leave well enough alone. You can buy a Hawk 6 powered JK x-25 LMP OR Nighthawk Group F right out of the case and be successful.

I understand Jeff's concern about tech-ability. Jeff has done a good job of keeping things in order. But either we have a bunch of guys that are incredibly lucky, or the motors are closer than you'd think. We see very close racing every week. Honestly, some of the fastest motors are in cars that need chassis work ...... Or more practice laps.

If you don't like the Hawk 6, run the Hawk 7. Rick Gibeault has done quite well with the 7 the past couple of months.

[Mr. M]

Guys,

I know the difference between owner and Tech Director.

There seems to be quite different experiences with just buying an arm off the wall when one goes bad. I have a pile of 20-30 arms from the last year that either were not competitive or went bad. Of those, maybe 1 or 2 were competitive. Hence the question

What are other's experiences in buying Chinese Hawk 6 arms to get a good one? How many? And when I say not competitive, not mid pack, but half a second off mid pack pace.

This is my motivation for bringing thus up at all. Buying this many to get 1 or 2 is nit economic.

Chris

[Wizard Of Iz]

Our success rate with pre-conditioned replacement arms is pretty high. We sell arms that have been sent out to be balanced and trued and they're pretty consistent.

We've found it's a good use for the H6 takeout when Johnny builds a GTP motor

[Michael Rigsby]

Chris, I will also extend my apology to you as well, as it was my incorrect assumption nothing more.

 

When I built and exhibited my Group F cars back in 2009, it was with the purpose of keeping the class low cost and away from the price of built up American armed motors. Allowing American made arms will take it to the point of being like a Group 12 car. Two tenths faster puts it in the realm of Group 12.

 

LMP/GT1 was a little more open as we used to the run built up chinese motor we used in MY Series NASCAR, then the Falcon VII was allowed, then we went to the Hawk 6 when the Falcon VII had availability problems. This kept it in the same price range as the built up Chinese arm 16D we used from Pro Slot.

 

Chris, if you want to reach more My Series racers, you might try posting over on the Hobby Talk forum. There are a  more that frequent over there. I can count on one hand the number of My Series racers who actually post here, and I don't know why that is.  Just a suggestion. I would be interested as well in hearing what kind of issues they are having in building Hawk 6 motors since a lot of us have no issues.

[DOCinCanton]

I keep notes on all of my motors for both series that I race in, GRRR and MySeries. For the Hawk 6 that we race in LMP and Group F of the MySeries series, I have notes on 21 total motors. Also, I probably purchased 6 additional arms.  For someone who travels the entire series and has never missed a race in 4 years, I don't think that that is a lot of motors.  I have never had a Hawk 6 motor go bad or throw any windings. I would say that I have at least 10 race-able motors with 6 of them being rockets. I tend to install the best hawk 6 motors in my GT1/LMP cars.  Obviously, I am very satisfied with the performance of these little dynamos.

 

My opinion is to leave the motor rules the same, its working. We need stability in the rules as Rollin stated above.

[Danny Zona]

I would hate to see the cost of GP F go up. It is an entry level class and I believe it is popular because of low cost motors. I like the fact I can run a hawk 7 and be competitive with out even building a motor.

GP12 should be the big money class and big money it is.

[Mr. M]

How is this low cost? 20 Chinese arms conditioned = $240 and 4 PS tagged arms = $100.

I can't imagine anyone needing more than 4. Initial cost for Chinese arm is less, recurring cost for true cost of ownership is less!

Again, no one is answering how many to get one competitive.

Chris