OS 21 RG-X(P)... Disgusted

[olds97_lss]

Well, I’m officially disgusted with the OS 21 RG engine. A few months or so ago, a friend of mine (bomber), had his brand new just broken in OS 21 RG blew up on him in less than ½ gallon for no good reason. Today, I had the same unfortunate occurrence.

Here I’ve been boasting about how well the engine has been running and performing and how my smaller 15 cv-r(x) has lasted so long and performed so well, then boom. Not actually boom, but a bad metal grinding noise nonetheless.

Now, I’m not sure how I feel about the 21 RG. Dissatisfied, yes. Bitter, yes. Annoyed, yes. Pleased… definitely not! It ran well, gave ok low-end power, tuned relatively easy and was pretty cheap ($160 at a LHS). I’m torn between fixing it and going with something else.

Anyone have any suggestions for a good running engine with at least 2hp that has a longer life expectancy that 2 gallons and is under $200?


Any info will be appreciated.

Oh yeah, here are some pics of my busted crankshaft. Probably wouldn’t be so bad, but I can almost push the piston out of the sleeve with my thumb, which is a tell tale sign that it’s about done. 2 gallons… figures.

 

[Mike02vr6]

Yikes, Have you spoken to the manuf about that? or is it the well we dont care cause we have your money type of issue? Good luck

Michael

 

[Maxx Trooper]

that sucks man. maby u can get the sleeve pinched and then get a new crankshaft. i dont know much about .21 engines and bigger cuz i dont run them and i see it as too much power for these little things. u shuld try a Wasp .18, i got one from towerhobbies for $90 bucks, and i have heard good things about it. i havent ran mine yet because it is still too cold up here in NY to break the engine in.

later

 

[olds97_lss]

A loaded up maxx needs a 21 to get it rolling without having an engine that overheats all the time. I'm looking for a 21, as I said above. Thanks for the info though.

 

[Maxxcrazy88]

I dont have any experience with .21 or larger enges besides the s-25 in my savage but what about the Ofna Hyper .21 8-port or the wasp/picco .26???? The Hyper I heard is hard to tune but I think the carb off your O.S should fit (don't quote me) so you could have easy tuning and good performance...
just my

 

[GilBeQuick]

Olds, you've got a PM.

 

[olds97_lss]

Anyone have experiance with the picco outlaw 26? I know my 2.5 maxx engine had a composite carb on it and it got all f'd up in less than a gallon before I converted to a 21.

To avoid any confusion, I think this is the engine I'm asking about:
http://www.lightninghobby.com/store/viewitem.asp?idproduct=6992

 

[El Pirata]

You mean the crank is not supposed to be 2 pieces? Man learn something every day.

 

[mcvickj]

Man that sucks. I have the same engine in my buggy and I have been very happy with it. It has about a gallon thru it so far.

I have a Hyper .21 8 Port in my Savage with about 1.5 gallons. Another great engine.

 

[olds97_lss]

I just picked up one of these at my LHS. Picco/Omega XT-21 Pull Start

If my damn job would stop calling me, I might actually get it installed and broken in today.

 

[olds97_lss]

Well, I got 4 tanks through it. It's to early to tell for sure, but I think I'm going to like it. It's quite a bit different breaking in than the past 4 engines I've done. It got up to 200 in a hurry while being retardedly rich. It was up to 200 before half the first tank was through. It had gotten to 225, so I richened the hell out of it to get it back down a bit. By tank 4, it was starting to come to life. Since the temps were already at the 200 mark, I didn't start leaning it out yet. It's still coughing and sputtering quite a bit. I think it's going to take quite a few more tanks before I can start tuning for performance. I use the temp cycling method. Get it to 200, drive it around slowly through the first 4-5 tanks while keeping at 200. Shutting it down between tanks, putting the piston at BDC and letting it cool to 80.

Here's some pics of it installed.
One:

Two:

Three:

Has anyone ran this engine? If so, what kind of life did you get and how would you rate this engine?

Thanks.

Edit: (Apparently you can't post more than one pic within a post anymore?_

 

[newnitrofan]

Ummm ok so what is it???? you didn't make mention of what it was.

 

[olds97_lss]

I mentioned what it was in my previous post right above it...

Picco/Omega XT-21 Pull Start

 

[bomber]

Do you suppose that bearing locked up on you? Looks like there's a bit more wear there than what I've seen on my own .21 RG(P). I didn't even get one gallon through it before I toasted my con-rod though. But that was just PEBCAK

 

[olds97_lss]

The bearings all felt smooth and free. I thought the same thing, but from what I can tell, there isn't an obvious reason behind why it broke.

 

[bomber]

Maybe the bearings roll free now, but when assembled with the flywheel shims, the pressures too great - causing the bearing to bind.

 

[kazi]

olds97_lss wich fuel are you using?

 

[olds97_lss]

Don't think so on the bearing. I had it apart after putting the shims and and pulled the piston and con-rod out to see if there was binding. (thought I had mentioned that in a previous conversation... you know me though, can't remember)

There wasn't any binding. Or at least there wasn't any apparent binding. Besides, I've checked on shimming of the flywheel and we aren't the only 2 that do it.

Trinity MHP 20%. I have 6 gallons of the stuff through my OS 15 cv-r(x). And it's still kicking.

 

[kazi]

I was just asking about the fuel because the piston looks toasted, OS engines should run rich oil fuels due they don't have the same piston hardnes than European engines. There are some fuel brands like Ultimate fuels that make special fuels for OS engines.

 

[bomber]

Originally posted by kazi
I was just asking about the fuel because the piston looks toasted, OS engines should run rich oil fuels due they don't have the same piston hardnes than European engines. There are some fuel brands like Ultimate fuels that make special fuels for OS engines.

This is good to know. I too run Monster HP, but I'm gonna run Monster Brew next if I can find it. I believe it has 33% more oil than MHP.