83 replies to this topic

[CoastalAngler1]

Maybe someone can help - not happy with Pro Slot...

 

Bought PS2101S (Super 16D blueprinted), and PS2102S (16D blueprinted).  They are supposed to have aligned brush hoods, centered magnets, balanced arm, BFII brushes, Champion light (red) springs, can bushing soldered, and are engraved - is this correct?

 

I bought one each. Started with the S16D motor - what a piece of garbage for twice the money! Mags not centered, glued in place in a sealed motor. I could put pressure with my fingernail on the can end of the shaft under 5v, and move the arm where it was centered - no vibration and amp draw went down from 1.8 to 1.4. After break-in, I took out the brushes to examine why it seemed such a dog on the power supply. Both brushes were a millimeter longer on the trailing edge.

 

The 16D motor had no engraving and was marked that it was on the package - I returned this product!

 

Is this normal?? I sure feel like someone changed the brushes, springs, engraved 2101 on it, and stapled the bag... really?

[Cap Henry]

I don't believe the "blueprinted" motors from Pro Slot are up to the same level of precision that you'd receive from someone who specializes in blueprinting motors. 

[Cheater]

Agree with Cap, but I would also suggest that you will almost never get a blueprinted motor from a commercial vendor that will meet your standards, especially if they are high.

 

You know the old adage: If you want it done right, you gotta do it yourself, though there are blueprinters who turn out very good work. That being said, I almost never saw a blueprinted motor done by someone else that met my personal standards at every turn. But I understand why, too: no one could ever charge enough to cover the amount of time I put into blueprinting my own stuff.

[Michael Rigsby]

Maybe you should have bought all my motor building tools that I got rid of.  Had just the right items in it to build any D or C can to your taste.

 

Buying any bagged Pro Slot "blueprinted" motor is a waste of money, most times they are worse than a stock one.   You can do better blueprinting on a sealed Pro Slot motor yourself by investing in a buss bar tool, a fine set of screwdrivers, a small hammer, a socket to fit the can bushing, and a sonic fiddlestick (yes, I am a believer in those and it's not hard to build a device to properly use them). If you can find them, and I sold my last three in my motor building tools, comm cleaning sticks made for RC motors are good for polishing the comm on a sealed motor, or you can find the equivalent of an old Trinity Comm pen on Amazon.

 

If you don't need a sealed motor....then you will need more stuff like a magnet matcher and magnet zapper, and can sizing dies to do a really good, accurate job.

 

Depends on how deep you wanna go.....or just buy plain sealed motors, adjust them with your eyeball and put them in and drive.

[Gator Bob]

Agree with Cap, but I would also suggest that you will almost never get a blueprinted motor from a commercial vendor that will meet your standards, especially if they are high.

 

You know the old adage: If you want it done right, you gotta do it yourself, though there are blueprinters who turn out very good work. That being said, I almost never saw a blueprinted motor done by someone else that met my personal standards at every turn. But I understand why, too: no one could ever charge enough to cover the amount of time I put into blueprinting my own stuff.

 

Exactly.   

[CoastalAngler1]

Commercial vendor is right!  Manufacturer my a$$!  Pro Slot should be ashamed. Off the shelf competitive anything is a lie, too...  

 

Buyer beware - stay away from anything 'blueprinted' from Pro Slop.  

[Gator Bob]

Chill, my friend... I wouldn't get that carried away.
 
What Greg said... good work takes lots of time.

To expect that level of attention from a production source is going to be disappointing. Dan can't spend one or more hours on any given motor and sell it at a price point that would be very attractive at all.

[CoastalAngler1]

Chill, sorry no. Whoever Dan is, he should immediately change the packaging, recall all the motors out there and re-package. The 'blueprinted' typing on the labels is a waste of ink, cut corners there. Dan should send me a good motor, too... oh ya, customer service - what's that in the slot car world? Non-existent!  
 
What is the hammer for in the above motor tools list? I know - it is to flatten the junk Pro Slop motors into trolling weights for fishing. Why even sell a sealed motor if you can't glue the mags correctly and align the hoods? Tough to do after sealed, duh?
 
Charging consumers double to learn a lesson is BS!  (Has this happened to you, too?)
 
Attention: Do not buy Pro Slot motors marked as 'blueprinted'.

[Matt Sheldon]

I have a question - Did you contact Pro Slot prior your post? 

 

I have bought two American arm 16D blueprinted motors in the past and while not as good as my motor builder built motors, they were pretty close.

 

And Pro Slot motors would come with Goldust brushes and not Koford BFII.

[Danny Zona]

Take one apart and see how far the arm is off from being centered in the middle of the magnets.

The tabs on the endbells need to be cut off and push the magnets up against the endbell for the arm to be centered in the middle of the magnets.

[Michael Rigsby]

Yup!!

[Gator Bob]

Charlie,

 

The term 'blueprinting' is totally subjective and not necessarily representative of the quality of work that went into it. 

[CoastalAngler1]

Contact Pro Slot?     Maybe I send them an invoice?  

 

At least the motor ran better when I changed the ruined brushes out to BF2s and moved the brush hoods where they're supposed to be. I put a new shiny red set of springs on it since the ones on the motor were barely red colored and oxidized.

 

You can bet I will be looking at every Pro Slot motor in the shops I visit... very carefully. I need to find a defective one with the magnets pushed up where they belong. Good thing Outlaws don't use these things. Some Florida racers really like them so I'm stuck learning '90s D motor technology with the only vendor left. 

[Matt Sheldon]

Hard to bitch about customer service when you did not try that option first.
 
Not saying you are not completely accurate with your findings, but there is a better way to go about these types of situations in my opinion.

[CoastalAngler1]

Not bitchin about customer service, in slots it is almost as extinct as commercial raceways. Fixed the problem as best as you can without opening the seal.  
 
Lesson cost double. No one wins.   
 
Attention: Do not buy Pro Slot motors marked as 'blueprinted'.

[Matt Sheldon]

Dan should send me a good motor, too... oh ya, customer service - what's that in the slot car world? Non-existent!

I guess the real question is are you buying a blueprinted sealed motor or a blueprinted motor that is sealed. For the price and intent I would assume the first, otherwise no point with the seal.

[Samiam]

This is why the Hawk Retro has become the go to motor for so many classes. It obsoleted the Puppy Dog that was as much a blueprinted motor as the ones Charlie just described and cost four times the price of a JK HR. And like Matt said, are you buying a blueprinted sealed motor or a blueprinted motor with a seal? The latter was deemed illegal by the IRRA^®.
 
This is why sealed motor racing is like Communism and Socialism. Sounds good in theory but never works in the real world. It is supposed to make all motors equal. But you just end up with some motors being more equal than others. But so many racers today wouldn't know what to do with the motor building tools Michael R sold.
 
My advice is buy stock sealed motors, and fiddle with them the best you can while maintaining the seal's integrity. Just sucks Charlie had to learn the hard way. Should have asked here on the blog first. Lots of free advice here on the Interweb.

[MikeC]

Sooooo.... You expected to get the performance of a $100-$125 built 16D, with the attention to detail a motor builder would/should use, for, what... $40? And you're disappointed?

 

Re-gluing the magnets on any "sealed" motor is common practice. If they aren't centered, center them the best you can. Hoods not perfect, straighten them. **** happens.  I think you're over reacting just a tad.

[Marty N]

I disagree. Blueprinting isn't 'subjective' or it isn't blueprinting. Then again what many people think blueprinting is, isn't. Blue printing is 'building to print". The factory blueprint; and optimizing the build with in the confines of "factory" tolerances. What good motor builders do and what you expect is "an exacting proficiency in build". Which they are not doing at the commercial level. The factory term means less than nothing. Okay, it means 'marketing' is attempting to separate you from your money and the drive bush/bearing may be solder edin place.

 

IMHO. Yes, if the package says blueprinted and your paying for it. I give a hoot what excuses may be given in preventing execution. Not my problem. Neither is the strike price.  There was no issue in taking the money for the claimed work I spent my time earning so produce the work. If you know that it's a lie, don't bite on shinny thing in the water, fishy. If you didn't know... live and learn young one. Don't bite twice.

 

Not reacting strongly allows, no, encourages continued abuse of the terms and the trust. What I expect is to not be lied to, stolen from, or manipulated for another's financial gain. SO, yes, again, I disagree. By hey, it's just another opine. Yes, it happens. No there is nothing I can do about it... directly but I NEVER have to accept it or agree with it. Or pay for it.

[Gator Bob]

Marty,

 

Did you miss the word I placed before "blueprinting"?

 

As used in this hobby... it's a 'marketing term', not an engineering term... that makes it 'subjective'.

 

Of course we know that a sealed motor can only be blueprinted before it's sealed.

 

After the seal is on... tuned - yes... blueprinted - no.

[Michael Rigsby]

This is why the Hawk Retro has become the go to motor for so many classes. It obsoleted the Puppy Dog that was as much a blueprinted motor as the ones Charlie just described and cost four times the price of a JK HR. And like Matt said, are you buying a blueprinted sealed motor or a blueprinted motor with a seal? The latter was deemed illegal by the IRRA^®.
 
This is why sealed motor racing is like Communism and Socialism. Sounds good in theory but never works in the real world. It is supposed to make all motors equal. But you just end up with some motors being more equal than others. But so many racers today wouldn't know what to do with the motor building tools Michael R sold.
 
My advice is buy stock sealed motors, and fiddle with them the best you can while maintaining the seal's integrity. Just sucks Charlie had to learn the hard way. Should have asked here on the blog first. Lots of free advice here on the Interweb.

 
Exactly. You can remove the brush hoods, take off the locating dimples for the hoods, reassemble the hoods, and use a hood tool to straighten, align, and adjust them for best brush timing. You can also loosen the magnets very easily with the seal on, move them forward and re-superglue them super easy and do your own blueprinting in under a half hour per motor. It will run cooler and smoother. And toss the stock brushes and springs and put your own favorite brand in. Make sure to use industrial strength super glue on the magnets when you loosen them and reglue them. I even saw a guy one time adjust the air gap on them using thin pieces of paper with the seal on. It can be done.
 
Super easy and you saved yourself a ton of money.
 
I always hated sealed motor racing, but learned the tricks to it quickly when I had to run them.

[Zippity]

Sealed motors are a joke.

 

You can easily true the comm. 

[Bill from NH]

You can easily polish the comm of a sealed motor. In order to true the comm of a sealed motor you need a specially designed comm lathe, unless you're going to remove the seal and take out the arm. Polishing isn't truing.

[idare2bdul]

Blueprinting as a term may be to optimize factory tolerances but what racers want is to improve performance and that at times means diverging from those tolerances if allowed by rules or by sloppy or non-existent tech inspection. 

 

Even with the best intentions and tools motors will vary and some will be better than others. 

 

This may be a secret to some of you but I hate sealed motor racing cheap Chinese motors! By the time you buy a lot of them to find the fast one your savings over a decent motor is gone. That said I am impressed with the Hawk 7 but maybe I should say I was impressed because the last batch I got tested slower.

 

One of the best systems for equalizing performance was done by one raceway that gave the racer a new motor to replace an unusually fast motor while smashing the too fast motor on an anvil with a sledge hammer; very cathartic.

[Danny Zona]

Sooooo... You expected to get the performance of a $100-$125, built 16D, with the attention to detail a motor builder would/should use, for, what... $40?  And you're disappointed?

They are disappointing.