New battery harness design

[Horshu]

I finally finished my new battery harnesses (minus rubberizing the solder points). These things use a new wiring design I've been working on. The idea is expandability. I've got two base harnesses - a dual AA and a quad AAA. They both have a connector consisting of 3 Dean's connectors (dipped in black rubber). Two are glued together; the third is a "terminator" (connector with both posts connected, so it's basically a piece of wire). To run 4 AAAs or 2 AAs, just plug the free port into the board ESC, sitting over the driver-side rear deck plate screws. To run, for instance, 3 AAs or 6 AAAs, remove the terminator and place it on the "other" plug on the expansion pack's power plug adn plug the free port on the expansion into the base. Because each pack uses the same plug format, you can chain as many as you want (or use multi batteryharnesses). Also, this system allows for a power capacitor, again using the same plug format, to be inserted at the head of the chain for "NOS" functionality. It also allows for monitoring devices inserted into the power system as well plus I've got my turbo modularized as well and coming just as soon as my heat sinks come back from the machinist.

[kel]

nice thinking, that can be easily changed to accommodate other battery types in a matter of seconds.

[Horshu]

Thanks, the whole idea is scalability. The car can go from running like a stock vehicle (I use neo magnets on a stage 2 to overcome the weight on takeoff, but it is only slightly faster than a stock car, and I've dyno'ed it at 15 mph) to a 45 mph (I hope) version in 5 minutes. The harnesses are probably overkill, since there's very little cases where you'd use the expansion port, but I'm not one to be concerned about every gram the car carries (when I finally get my turbo mounting pieces back from the cutters, you'll know what I'm talking about )...center of gravity is more important at high speeds, IMO. But I do like that I can easily insert a power cap due to the design. I'd actually forgotten to build one, but when I came up with the harnesses, it turns out the cap can just insert into the power system as another "battery".

[Horshu]

That's a 75 MHz Dean's flex antenna that a got from RobotCombat.com. The Superflex lead requires the tuning pot to be adjusted, as the resistance is different,but I haven't had any really bad problems with range.
BTW: I'm having to redo the rear wire position, as it was preventing the body from seating properly, but it as long as it doesn't come near the motor gear,it's OK.

[Clint]

very nice, i'm liking the modular design.. thats kinda what i went for with my car. all v2.2, lipos and motor connections are coded plugs. i can pull out the v2.2 and go stock or plug it into another car nice and quick. Although, since going with the v2.2 and lipo, i dont think i could ever go back to 4nimh.


got the alum front cups finally. and now i'm popping the driveshaft out of the plastic gears. so i ordered a perfect shaft..hopefully it's a mm or two longer than stock..if not i'll have to make my own.

got hit with the speed bug bad now.. also just ordered parts to make a plasmatomic....and will have the front gpm dogbones around the 3rd week of june.