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blown up engine advice/help

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chewyboy

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I've had my gen1 maxx for a while and ran a fantom fr15 on it. the engine ran great and normally tuned pretty well for me. anyway recently while running it the motor decided to die, well blow up might be a better description of what happend. broken rod, seized piston, sleeve that is toast, and the rod that broke decided to do a number on the head making it a complete loss :) The question hopefully is a pretty easy one. I need a new engine that's a given, but which one will fit what i'm lookig for and that is.

easily tuned
nice bashing engine
no mods or small amount of mods to maxx for the new engine
runs well in both warm and cold temps.

i know there were a couple .18 small blocks that were bolt on replacements for the gen 1 max a while back but i forget who made them.

thanks for any help and feel free to ask questions to get a better idea of what might help me out in the end.
 
Do you have a budget? How much would you like to spend? The TZ is a kick as engine... The sirio .18 is also nice along with the sirio .23. The ofna .26 t-maxx drop in should be awesome too.
 
well budget yes, but to be honest if it takes a few more bucks to get something that in the long run will be a lot better then i'll pony up. I've looked at the sirio .18 at a lhs and forget is it a drop in replacement or do i need the big block conversion, i know for the .23 and .26 i definately would. if i went with the .2x motors what else would i need to change out because i can see a lot of things getting tore up on the maxx by going with something that big.


thanks
 
The Sirio .18 isn't the easiest engine to tune. The .23, I never had so I can't tell you.
I would also say the O.S. 18 TZ.
O.S. is known for their tunability.
 
For the brief amount of time I had the Sirio 23, I thought it to be really easy to tune. Break in wasn't tooo hard. But I could feel the thing was a screamer.
 
Actually, I disagree with Ratzo. I had a Sirio TX-18 in my Maxx for over a year and a half, and it was by far the easiest engine to tune that I've ever had in the truck. Very well designed and durable.

Even fried the thing on a race day when one of the headbolts came loose during a race. Hit 400F when I finally was able to bring it in and check. Ran for several gallons after that. It only recently lost compression to the point of not being usable.

Only reason I wouldn't suggest the TX-18 is because it's discontinuned, so finding parts for it will become harder and harder, I'm sure.

I went ahead and picked up a Sirio .23 drop in a few weeks ago. Same deal... once it's broken in, it's extremely easy to tune, and holds it well. I had actually put a brand new 2.5R in the truck (did the traxxas "trade-in" deal.... who can pass up a brand new engine for $100). Talk about hard to tune... Traxxas really could have had something if they wouldn't have skimped out on the crappy composite carb. Nothing but leaks all over the thing. Sirio's alum carbs are much more reliable.

If you can spare the cash (paid ~300 for mine shipped on Tower), you'll love it.
 
Erf.... btw, the TX18 is a direct drop in for the Maxx, and will use the stock engine mount. The TX-23 is a direct drop in as well, but comes with it's own engine mount (both the Revo version and TMaxx versions come with engine mounts in the "kit".)
 
if you have the original maxx you will need to upgrade all your exhaust header and pipe to a rear exhaust type header.....then you'll need to replace the chassis to have the bellcrank type linkage for the slide carb instead of the rotary carb......OS makes a side exhaust rotary carb .18 for around 125....forget the exact model but that will be the easiest upgrade and give some evil power for your maxx...and it's OS...... easy tuning....if you havent yet, do the wide conversion kit for your maxx...when you are running the faster engines you want the extra width for stability......it will turn like crackhead on his dealer getting a deal from the cops......lol...Lessen is that the type of adjectives you mean???
 
Agreed. I purchased the "Widemaxx" suspension for my generation 1 maxx shortly after getting the sirio replacement for my anemic .15 pro, and did the bellcrank upgrade. I think the upgrade "kit" was ~$50, but that gets you everything you need, including the template to help you drill the appropriate holes for the bellcrank->slide carb post install.

Gratuitous/overly large pics at the following urls (just finished installing my 40's, so I'm proud. ;) )
http://spill.erf.net/tmaxx/40s-2.jpg
http://spill.erf.net/tmaxx/40s-width.jpg
 
From what I've been hearing about the O.S. .18 i think that would be the way to go. I bought a Sirio .18TX to drop in my revo, after a month I'm still waiting on the exhaust manifold from trinity, so i have it in my maxx.. man this thing screams. I've not had any tuning problems yet. parts are hard to find now because they are discontinued, my advice, go with the O.S. .18 or bigger if you want. (2 words) wheelie bars......
 
The Sirio .23 and the ofna .26 t-maxx drop in DO NOT need a conversion kit to work. They both come with the mounts needed. The sirio .23 is a killer engine. If you want power and mad speed, then there ya go. It does cost more money than most engines, but i think you get what you pay for...
 
nitehawk: thanks for the compliment :)

.12rc: couldn't agree more... costs more, but well worth it imo. and yeah... no conversion kit needed. I took some pre-install pics of the engine itself for the morbidly curious.

http://spill.erf.net/tmaxx/sirio23
 
thanks for all the advice guys. after i went to the lhs today and looked around i decided on the drop in OS .18 CV-RX. Probably the main reason i chose the os was that it was a drop in swap for the gen1 max. os engines are easily tuned and have been around forever. also if i get boored with it i can always upgrade further.


thanks for all the help.
 

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