Proboat Blackjack 26" Brushless

[greenman407]

Also at a steal of a price is this Proboat 26" offshore style catamaran. In years gone by a fast electric boat would give you about 2 mins. run time if you were lucky and speeds anywhere from 12 to 20 mph. Well this boat is a whole new ballgame. Since it is powered by a brushless motor running two 6 cell Nimh batt. packs wired in series its quite a step up from times past. Speeds over 30 mph and run times in excess of 8 to 10 mins. are available. Another quantum jump is possible if this boat can handle Lipos. Since Lipos are soooo much lighter it would be extreme! I was very surprised at how much noise this thing makes even though its electric. Its quieter to be sure than glow or gas but its still lets you know its got a motor under the hood! Im going to find out about the lipos. It will make for an interesting speed comparison.

[greenman407]

I called Proboat today and their technical Dept. told me that it handles LIPOs well. The speed control is rated at 45 amps and (2) 4000 to 5000 Mah Lipos in series would be just the ticket. However the speed control is not set up for Lipo voltage cutoff so if you are concerned about it you have to buy their speed control programmer to set up your speed control for the cutoff. But you dont have to, you can run it as is. Just be careful with the batteries.

[greenman407]

My latest video.

[greenman407]

So , as you can see I love to modify things. This boat was made to run on two 6 cell NIMH batt. packs. The weight of the packs themselves helps to provide stability to the ride. When you put lighter batts. in it you then proceed to run on the raged edge and at times exceed it. This was my sons first attempt at videoing fast boats as you can see but he can only get better. The tendency to prop walk was tremendous and I had to hold quite a bit of rudder into it to get it to track somewhat in a straight line. About midway into the run you can see it get all out of shape on the straightaway. Then in the last turn I decided( for your viewing pleasure) to take the turn without slowing down. The unsteady camera missed it but the boat lept out of the water and spun in mid air like a drill bit and landed perfectly back in the water. I then gunned it and thats when it flipped. Would have made a great video if we could have caught it.(Heavy Sigh!) OH well, such is life. Here is where I critique the boat. The radio box is one of those ' GLAD' brand tupperware type boxes. In the middle of it they mounted a waterproff antenna. They even put a waterproff pushrod seal where the rudder rod exits. However, where the wires exit the box to hook up to the motor was left wide open. So if you flip the boat you have a instant funnel into your radio box. Also the watercooled speed control is just laying in the box unsecured. When you flip it falls against the radio box lid popping it open to the water.I threw the reciever and servo away and will replace them, its not worth losing control down the road. I will purchase a new radio box lid from Publix and silicone down the speed control and mount the antenna on the hull.I am also going to silicone up the huge wire exit hole. Im not going to add weight to the boat as this would defeat the purpose. Im just going to drive with greater awareness. The boat weighs in at 3 lbs. 2 ounces empty. With two 2 cell Lipos it weighs 4 lbs. 6 ounces. With two NIMH 6 cells it weighs 5 lbs. even. That surprised me. I thought that there was a greater difference between the weights of the batteries. It worked out to be 12.5% lighter. But as you will see in the next video, that made all the difference in the world! If you could take any hi performance vehicle and reduce its weight by 12.5% , thats like being able to catch another gear!

[greenman407]

So , out comes the fast inflating raft that I use to recover stalled boats. I didnt see the alligator today, I think he was bored with me. A sucessful rescue was achieved.

[greenman407]

Oh! By the way! Try hitting that with a Torpedo Dude! Good thing it doesnt carry depth charges.........(Taunt)........(Taunt).

[greenman407]

Ok ,so I called and ordered another radio box cover but this time I sealed up the antenna hole in the center of it with silicone and installed the antenna on the back of the boat using a home made alluminum mounting bracket.
The reason being is that if you flip your boat the force of the water on your antenna wont try and pry your radio box cover off.Also the electronic water cooled speed control as seen here I also siliconed down so that it wont knock and unseat the radio box cover.

[greenman407]

Notice these nice looking battery boxes. If I were to cut them away I could put the batterys right down on the bottom and that would help tremendously in lowering the CG and prevent flips in the turns. But they look so nice Im not going to take them out. Notice the water cooling jacket on the brushless motor and the source of that cooling water, a fitting and hose just behind the prop.

[greenman407]

It even comes with some installed floatation foam in case the unthinkable should happen! Here I have included some shots of the hulls beautiful lines.

[greenman407]

Got it out on the water on Sunday to checkout the mods. that I had made. This time using the heavier NIMH 6 cell batteries there was a noticable drop in speed and pep. The tendancy to prop walk was still there but somewhat subdued. Its still a fast ride even with heavier batterys. I also plan to install a BEC with LIPO cutoff in the near future. Or better yet a LIPOguard without the BEC as the ESC already has one in it. Its always something.

[greenman407]

All the Nimh batts that I have, save one, cant handle this boat. Its such an AMP draw that they lay down pretty quick. I just ordered a new set of 4000Mah 6 cell packs from cheapbatterypacks.com When they get here well putumin and let her rip on video anthenulsee! LOL!

[greenman407]

It has been my experience that with NIMH as well as LIPOs that you MUST keep them charged up. Thats why mine went bad. If you put them on the shelf for a while in the depleted condition, they will never be the same, especially with demanding power req. I also believe that they are really pushing the limit on NIMH to compete with LIPOs. I bought a set of 5000 mah a while back from Venom and I didnt see any difference between them and the 4200NIMH that I already had that were two years old. In fact, now that I think about it , they didnt perform as well! Thats why this time I ordered 4000NIMH.

[greenman407]

If you install a lipo guard you will want to make sure that you disengage it when you go back to using your NIMHs. Because your Lipo guard will sence that your battery voltage is dropping(thats what NIMHs do) and will shut you down while you still have plenty of juice left. Im going to disengage mine with a little switch in line on the small batt. voltage sence wires. That way I can go back and forth with both batt. types and still have LIPO protection.

[greenman407]

Got her on the water last night only to find that the servo that I found floating around in the bottom of my junk box isnt strong enough to turn it well.Give him a soapbox! Well just for that im going to buy a high torque servo and take care of that.One good thing that came from it was that I flipped the boat. NO, NOT ON PURPOSE! When I recovered it, only a few drops of water had migrated inside the radio box, by no means an easy feat.

[greenman407]

First things first. Since I last posted to this thread I have learned that you dont store your Lipos fully charged. Shoot for 3.6 volts per cell for storage.No lower. The Lipo guards that I am familiar with shut you completely down at 3.0 volts per cell. As far as battery placement is concerned, using two, 2 cell Lipos, I put them forward of the battery boxes and tuck them behind the foam where the wires are just long enough to still plug in. Rides great with no blowing over. The old AM radio receiver has got to go. The boat got out of range when it wasnt too far away. Ill switch over to the 2.4 GB radio system that Im already using for my 1/8 scale gas car and my twin nitro outboard. Since I didnt know when to quit running it , because I had know way of knowing what my battery voltages were, I just went by the seat of my pants. Im going to install a Lipo guard next.