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Taking her temperature... 3.3TRX

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AJay

AJay

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  1. Bashing
Okay, running temps... What is the correct method. When I tune it for steady blue smoke and good response I will get temps of over 300 degrees... 3 hours richer and it will drop to 258 and drool, sputter, randomly die at idle and in general, run like a finely tuned North Korean jackhammer.... with a bent valve.

I have done the "header mod" and am running 20% Traxxas fuel. I take the temp at the "head protector", over the glow plug, and horizontally on the cooling fins. The glow plug socket in the cooling head is the temps I'm referencing here. The temps are taken after a couple of hooligan blasts down the street.

I'm tempted to just tune it an hour richer of best performance and stop worrying about the IR temp (I have the thermometer set at "74" I believe.. whatever the manufacturer recommended for anodized aluminum.) The performance and driveability between proper temp and just rich of max performance is TREMENDOUS... Am I gonna cook my new toy?

Toodles and so forth
You Pal,
AJ
 
If only that jackhammer had a better valve.....

I'm guessing your LSN is slightly too lean. If you get poor performance and can't get it cooler with the HSN, that would be it. Make very slight adjustments to your LSN with an impact hammer set at 160 PSI. If you get too rich on the low side, you'll notice a sluggish take off.
 
Rolex said:
If only that jackhammer had a better valve.....

I'm guessing your LSN is slightly too lean. If you get poor performance and can't get it cooler with the HSN, that would be it. Make very slight adjustments to your LSN with an impact hammer set at 160 PSI. If you get too rich on the low side, you'll notice a sluggish take off.
Click to expand...

+1 Yeah what he said.
 
I've never seen a trx engine that ran "normal" temps. they run hotter than most engines.

just keep it under 300 and you should be fine.
 
I've had a few Traxxas engines in the past, and between mine and others I tuned, 285 seemed to be their happy spot. 300 is too much.
 
+1 at 285. I actually took my truck to a track today as opposed to the beer induced WOT asphalt tuning session (You children and Silverado are safe...super secret proving grounds closed to the public.) The temp was running 180's and it wouldn't grab second on the front straight. Tuned it like I would an airplane engine (just rich of peak, with visible smoke) and it was back to bat-sh** crazy (I'm new, don't know the "technical" term for way too much power for a newbie dweebster.) I was getting 256-262 and still had the blubbers off the corners.

I appreciate the help.
On my future questions you may want to first inquire, "How many beers and where were you at..."

AJ - Staining carpets in 3 continents and counting.
 
Ajay needs to post more often, especially after having a few. I love reading his posts:D

I'm glad to see others saying that the TRX3.3 like to run hot. I finally gave up on getting my into the lower 200's, it was always drowning in fuel. During the hotter days this summer I was running 260-280ish. Not that some of the humidity and heat have cleared out, it's more like 260-270 and it seems really happy at that temp.
 
MrClean said:
Ajay needs to post more often, especially after having a few. I love reading his posts:D
Click to expand...

Kind of in a tight spot free-time wise, currently. I will start up a blog of "The world according to AJay" in order to avoid adding random jackassery to the boards and being dismissed from our (I paid my fiver this month... earning the right to say "our"... I think??) little happy place.

Anyway.. Toodles for tonight and so forth... I hope to be at the Proving Grounds in Sumter tomorrow evening staining my running shoes red and looking for Walter.

AJ - A proud BSC supporting member.
 
I was out burning around a baseball field today and I brought her in to check the temp.

It was at 330° .. Holy bat-$h1t :)

It still had a good trail of Blue and it was running great. It was a bit sluggish on the bottom end, but I had the LSN a bit rich cause this thing just seems to idle too high. (I had 3-4 second on the pinch test). I could only get the temps down at 4.5 turns out on the HSN and the lid off. It droped to 250°, but would hardly grab second gear.

I was racing nearly WOT around the field for extended periods. Would this cause the temps to go up, as opposed to just farting around ?


It was very Foggy and 56°F. It had just finished raining so everything was a bit wet.



Also... I have developed a Turbo type whistle... Weird... I think I read about it on a naother post. I'm going to search for it.
 
I myself had called Traxxas and asked about temps.... I told them that it runs good at about 300f. And it has blue smoke... I told him about how it says to keep it under 270f and expressed my concern......
The guy actually told me not to tune it by temp, tune it by performance I think this is a little bit crazy, as I had blown 3 of the 3.3's in the past. If they wern't so damn cheap to exchange I would have upgraded already to an OS.

Wow looks like I got a little off topic.... UMHHHH try checking for air leaks as this will make it run very hot..... and ..... ohh yeah.... the Traxxas (and probably all nitros) are not made to run WOT for more than a couple seconds at a time.
 
There shouldn't be any air leaks... I have this thing sealed up like fort knox... It is a new 3.3, and I went ahead and sealed up back plate and carb. I installed new tank seals and fuel lines and I pressure tested the fuel system. I'm not saying there isn't an air leak, but I have done everything to prevent one.

I'm going to have to install a rad. like the one on my 4 wheler. :)
 
RC Addict said:
:wtf: I need some more cowbell and an explaination as I never heard that before... :confused:
Click to expand...

Ok.... now that I looked it up you are correct..... It says not to run WOT for long periods of time (whatever that means to you)

picture.php
 
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Running WOT across a 300 yard long parking lot or short grass is a bad idea. WOT to get up to speed, then back off to 3/4 throttle is proffered for long distances.

As for 285... I've only had 3 TRX engines. 2 2.5's and one 2.5R. The first was an old original 2.5 maxx (my first MT). Regardless what I did to that thing, it ran bad and hot (280+) with no power. I get better performance out of an OS15CV-R running 280F than I did out of the stupid 2.5.

My second came in a revo that was used and the carb was messed up. After cleaning/lubing the carb, I ran it for a while before getting the OS18TM. It was ok, but I never got wheelies out of it even when running a 40T spur and stock CB. It ran around 250F pretty consistently.

The third was/is in my jato. It's an old, severely abused, barely maintained engine... Showed up in rough condition in the jato I bought used off a forum. A few head fins missing and whatnot. Just a generally sad looking engine. I can run it all day in my jato and the temps stay around 240F with pretty good performance. Even when running in grass, it only gets up to 250F.

250F for me is a bit warm for average. My LRP28S3 in my aftershock runs 235-240F all day bashing in the lawn and cooler when at the skate park (concrete=less rolling resistance). I've had a few other engines and they all ran well around 240F as well.
 
Will the wrong Glow plug cause me to have higher temps... I'm running the McCoy MC-59.
I replaced the last Traxxas 3232 with the MC-59,,, I think the heat burnt out the 3232, seeing as it was about 2 tanks old.
 

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