New car- Breaking in and tuning, Am i doing the right thing?

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Meldarion

RCTalk Rookie
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RC Driving Style
  1. Bashing
Ok so i have had a look around at some of the different cars, and though i did like the sound of the traxxas t-max, i can only find the 3.3 which costs like £330, so i am going to get the schumacher rascall, which from what i have read, appears to me quite good (Please let me know, if you know of any major issues with this car!)

Ok so the main issue for me now is going to be how i break in/tune the engine. I have spent a lot of time looking around the website at different break in methods, and i have seen enough to know that there is no one method that everyone has decided is the best, but i just want to make sure that i am doing the right thing so that i don't completly nacker my engine. I will try and go through it step by step and if you could just let me know if i am making any major mistakes, or suggest any other things, i would greatly appreciate it :)

1) Check that all the screws in the car are tight, glue the wheels, set the needles to factory settings leaning out the HSN by about a quarter of a turn (Because the factories settings are often overly rich, and from what i have read, you want the engine to be *Slightly rich* for heat cycling)

2) Use a sharpy to mark out BDC (Bottom dead centre) on the flywheel

2) Wrap some tin foil around the cooling head of the engine and then use a hair dryer to warm it up

3) Fill up the tank with fuel (I think the one that i have is 20%), prime the engine

4) Fire up the engine and start running it around, varying throttle, but not going over 1/2 throttle- Aiming to get the engine up to operating temps (200F)

5) After 3 minutes, shut the engine down and allow it to cool, with the piston at bottom dead centre

6) Repeat this process for 15 minutes, shutting down every 3 minutes and allowing it to cool

7) After the first 15 minute block, i will begin to increase the throttling from half, going up to full but not for extended periods of time- Checking that the temp is still around 200F, For 4 minute intervals, allowing it to cool down at the end of each

8) Continue this for a further 20 minutes, and at the end of this it should be pretty much run in

For tuning :
After the engine has been run in i will begin to slowly lean off the high speed needle until there is only a thin stream of smoke coming from the exhaust, and its performance appears to be maxed, i will then richen it off slightly once it reaches this point to ensure maximum life of the car, and good lubrication

Hopefully this doesn't sound too bad, but i just wanted to check it out with you guys before i try it out :)
Thanks, Meldarion!
 
i have the schumacher rascal i can post some pics of it for you if you want ill get camera in a bit and take some i think it is a brilliant car! tho i have scratched all the bottom and the place where you put glowplug -_- first car only had it about a month i got it from my local hobby store they broke it in and tuned it just gave them 2 hrs to do it (was included in price) so i went shopping and went back to pick it up so can't help you with break in sorry

car:
1.jpg

car without shell:
2.jpg

damage to head:
3.jpg

damage to bottom:
4.jpg
 
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Glad to hear that it is a good little car :p And yeh that would be great if you could show me some pics :) Wish i could have my car tuned for me ^^ But i don't know any local hobby stores near my area :(

Edit : Nice pics =D, I am looking forward to getting mine :D
 
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just braught it in when i took them pics so it was a bit muddy lol all cleaned now i would recoment cleaning well after useing looks better and its bound to last longer :D
 
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