Sportsman is a kit that was produced by Lesro Models and designed by Les Rowell of Aerokits fame. The boat is 33'' long and represents a sports fishing boat. The performance achieved in the photo above was the result of a lot of fiddling around (and expense!) which I will describe.
I started off with and MFA 850 on a 12v NiMH battery driving a 40mm prop. The result was lacklustre to say the least. The boat planed, but there's planing and planing. I was told that I needed to increase the voltage- which, of course, meant changing the esc. I always use esc's that allow more than 12v now- namely, Electronize which can go up to 24v. I went up to 14.4v and this was better, but I had a friend with exactly the same boat using a Graupner 700 motor on 8.4v and his flew- left mine standing! After much input from helpful members of different model boat forums I decided to go with Lipo batteries, a Graupner 700 motor and a rubber coupling from Model Boat Bits (brilliant) and this really improved matters.
I still find the boat a little unstable at speed and on one turn the prop cavitates. At the moment (May '14) I need to do a little work on the boat to bring her up to scratch. I used solid mahogany on the tarnsom originally and this sort of curled up. This has been replace with stained ply. The tube needs new bearings as the original prop tube had plastic ones(!) and I replaced them, but they are a bit sloppy.
Below is a slide show showing some photos from the building sequence and a few action shots.
I started off with and MFA 850 on a 12v NiMH battery driving a 40mm prop. The result was lacklustre to say the least. The boat planed, but there's planing and planing. I was told that I needed to increase the voltage- which, of course, meant changing the esc. I always use esc's that allow more than 12v now- namely, Electronize which can go up to 24v. I went up to 14.4v and this was better, but I had a friend with exactly the same boat using a Graupner 700 motor on 8.4v and his flew- left mine standing! After much input from helpful members of different model boat forums I decided to go with Lipo batteries, a Graupner 700 motor and a rubber coupling from Model Boat Bits (brilliant) and this really improved matters.
I still find the boat a little unstable at speed and on one turn the prop cavitates. At the moment (May '14) I need to do a little work on the boat to bring her up to scratch. I used solid mahogany on the tarnsom originally and this sort of curled up. This has been replace with stained ply. The tube needs new bearings as the original prop tube had plastic ones(!) and I replaced them, but they are a bit sloppy.
Below is a slide show showing some photos from the building sequence and a few action shots.