My gripe is not with the controller or even that three of them have failed on me now in less than a years time. My gripe is that in that time Castle has had my controller(s) for 17 weeks assuming that I get this one back in the next two weeks as promised.

well i sent two of my MMs in with a $100 check and although its been roughly two weeks, I haven't heard anything from them since. Should I be expecting 17 weeks wait for replacement as well?

Hmmm -- The controller has been here for 17 weeks? I don't think so --

Right now the oldest MM repair we have on the books is about 4 weeks.

PM me your name and address, and I'll check on it personally.


Patrick

No, I mean in total. I have had to send in three different controllers and over the 10 months or so I have had a Mamba Max a total of 17 weeks have found one of the three ESC I have purchased at Castle waiting for repair or replacement. The current one I am waiting on has been at Castle since 6/23 and I have been told will be another two weeks before I see it.

He has had 3 fail - One tooks 3 weeks, the next 6 and you;ve had the last one for 6 with an ETA of 8 i.e. 3 + 6 + 8 = 17 (across 3 controllers)

It might pay to post more details of your setup as 3 controllers on a rustler is a lot of break.

Max they suggest for a rustler is 17/90 on 3s... The 5700 seems to pull a bunch of amps... I was running my Pede on 3s and the motor was getting very toasty 180ish

http://www.castlecreations.com/suppo...ring_chart.pdf

Yeah that is how I got to 17 weeks.

I have been through my set up with Castle Tech support guys a couple of times. Both Bernie and Thomas have been really good to talk with and a lot of good info but both confirm there is really nothing in my set up that is wrong. We have covered gearing, tire size, batteries, cooling you name it. My set up is good. The first failure was of my own doing (switch wires tore from circuit board) and Castle still covered it no questions asked. This is part of why I became such a big Castle fan. My only complaint is how long it is taking to get this one replaced. Everything else about Castle has been a good experience for me but two months is too long to have to wait.

So here we are at 8/25 now and Castle has had my MM since 6/23. So they have had my ESC for two months now and when I called yet again asking when I would get it I once again get the canned answer "we are working on them now should be within two weeks". This is the third time I have been told the same thing, waited two weeks only to hear it again. I have been a stanch Castle fan boy for a long time but this is ridiculous. I am so frustrated I just dont know what to do, honestly I feel Castle owes me something more than just a working ESC to replace the one they have had for so long to make up for the unreasonable amount of time they have taken on this.

Did you call and ask for patrick?

I have been talking with Morgan, she is in now in charge of repairs. I exchanged a few PM's with Patrick here on this forum that started because of this thread. Patrick first told me that he thought it had shipped. I asked him in a PM if he could confirm when and how it was shipped and never heard back from him. Then when I talked to Morgan the last time she told me she had talked to Patrick about this and he thought I was talking about a MMM not a MM and so here I sit still waiting for the replacement. I know I am going to eat a lot of crow on this elsewhere as I have been such a huge Castle fan and now feel so let down by this.

Just a thought speak to your LHS - Why don't you buy another and then return the new one from castle un-opened for a refund - Not ideal but just an idea...

There are two Rustlers in the house and we have purchased three complete MM systems and countless motors in an effort to keep the two trucks running. It is not an issue that I am down and cant run I have already bit the bullet and laid down $$$ to avoid that. It still does not change the fact that Castle has dropped the ball on this, to me it is now a matter of principal. I feel I have been mislead on when I can expect the ESC and I think having to wait as long as I have is just not reasonable. I hate sounding like sour grapes but have to admit when I read the story about someone getting a MMM on a mistake and being told to keep it free of charge it just felt like rubbing salt in an open wound to me.

My mm has been down for a month.Bad thing,CC is 10 miles from my house and I can't get a replacement,which was why I went there and bought it.Their respone to me when I asked about when "Just send in your old 1 and we'll ship a new 1 when available."

This is really getting unbelievable. I just got off the phoen with Morgan yet again and you will never guess what I was told..."They should start shipping in TWO MORE WEEK". I will say Morgan is very polite and conducts herself in a profesional manner but frankly that to me is far over shadowed by the fact that I am STILL WAITING and feeling worse about the situation.

Thank you I appreciate the personal attention.

Guys, this is not the place for a Novak VS. Castle war. NovakTwo, as noted already if you could keep to the Novak forum for any information relevant to Novak and its products/services it would be much appreciated.

TexasSP, this is also not the place to personally attack employees of Novak.

I don't want to see this thread closed because just like everyone else I would like to see resolution to the OP's reason for this thread.

This is both funny and depressing but the forum is actually mike cronin's so how about retreating to corners and deleting some posts...

Ah, you are right. These are Mike's forums. I figured I could come in here and help people out, but if my competitors are allowed to come in here and heckle me and my company whenever they want, I guess this isn't the place for me to help out customers.

You'd think companies would "work" together just a bit since we all obviously have some common interests. i think it is a bit inappropriate and not very helpful to anyone here.

I'm gonna hijack this thread for a moment...

GIVE TO A GOOD CHARITY:


http://www.bagramrcclub.com/

Supporting the Fisher House...

I agree with jaySki. I don't think we are going to have "defectors" from CC to Novak and vice-versa just because of what is said here.

And I really don't think it would be a good idea for any company to go into another compaine's forum and start some kinds of "me vs you" thread. Both companies have their merits and lets leave it at that. However, either company is welcome to post helpful suggestions in the other company's forums. It's all about helping the users here after all.

Most, if not all, of the members here really DO appreciate the input from each respective company, and it would be a shame to see heckling cause one or both to go elsewhere. That would be a great loss for the forum IMO.

Well for what it is worth even with the problems I have repeatedly stated or maybe I should say vented here overall the experience I have had with Castle over the last year has been a positive one. This last deal has obviously been very frustrating for me and tainted my opinion of Castle to some extent, but it appears it is about over. Patrick has informed me the ESC should ship tomorrow. I had requested and hoped Castle would sweeten the pot by throwing in a motor or something for the inconvenience this has been but that was probably wishful thinking and no mention was made of anything like that in the last PM. Being made whole by replacing the ESC and hoping that this is a one time and last time anyone will have to wait this long for a warranty replacement or repair is at least closure to this. In the end I would like to thank Patrick and Morgan for their time on this matter.

I think having the President of a company communicating with some of it's customers is really useful. Especially when a new product is just rolling out. Keeping information moving is really useful for both him and us.

They are one if not the only US companies that are working out the kinks for 1/8th scale brushless ESCs.
If I look, the MM and most of CC's products are quite reliable and the service really is awesome especially if you call and talk to them.
Just as Novak's tried products are quite reliable, etc.

yea I was frustrated waiting.But I always knew the Castle Creations Mamba Max was the best controler on the market for the money and it practicaly has a lifetime warranty.So I knew the Monster Mamba Max is something special.Or i never would have waited Period.Both of my MMM V2s work flawlessly.

Heckling from the competition is not "allowed" and has been deleted. Rather than engage in this, simply PM or email myself or another Moderator and we can easily handle the situation before it becomes a shoving match. The back and forth doesn't help anyone in the end - or make anyone look good. We do appreciate the support you provide on these forums.

I too am getting worn out on some of the content that is creaping into the forums lately - it diminishes the value and intended purpose of these forums. Maybe I will pull an all-nighter and clean the whole place up - and when I am tired I get cranky, so things may get thinned out quite a bit.

Fair enough Mike. My apologies for my part in this, some people just know how to step on my nerves.

My FInal Vent
 

Man I am stunned how this has all played out...

On 8/28 I got this PM from Patrick

So I assume it will ship on the 29th and I realize there is a holiday weekend so that will delay things. On the Tues after the holiday weekend I call Morgan to confirm if the ESC has shipped and to my disapointment am told it has not but will that day (8/2). That same day I PM Patrick again and just tell him I am disappointed that the ESC did not ship when he said it would. I then get an email saying the ESC has shipped on the 3rd with a tracking # . Now today I get this PM from Patrick in response to the PM I sent on the 2nd

So now I ask you is this kind of service good enough?

Hmmm, like I said, we tried. I pulled two people out of the production line specifically to get your MM completed. They weren't able to get everything done on Friday, because the conformal coating didn't get done.

So they shipped on the very next business day, Tuesday.

Again, I'm sorry if the additional day was an issue, but we tried to get them out on Friday, and we went through extraordinary effort to get them out to you.

Again, we have no excuse for this taking so long -- but we did make an effort to get them to you Friday, but had to ship on Tuesday. And I'm sorry if that isn't good enough.

Patrick

The whole thing is just FRUSTRATING Patrick and the email and tracking # confirm it was not shipped on the 2nd but the 3rd. After waiting for months one more day hardly makes any difference at all it is just the principal of the thing at this point. I would rather have been told it would ship on the 3rd or 4th and then had it ship on the 2nd or 3rd rather than be told it would ship on the 29th or 2nd and not have it ship till the 3rd. I've had many dealings with Castle customer service and they have all been good to reasonable up until this one. This one sure has tainted my feelings about things and I can only hope it is not a trend we will see in the future.

patrick check your pm box

I can completely understand. I know how frustrating these kinds of things can be.

And I really am sorry - - I didn't mean to sound nasty in my reply to you. I guess I just didn't read what I wrote before I sent the PM.

We really did screw up on repairs in the last few months on Mambas, it should never have taken that long.

What do you want Patrick to drop it off at your house?????

Let's be serious. How about a reasonable turn around time? How about shipping when prmoised? I was told two more weeks at least 3 times I think more. I was told twice it was shipped when it was not. A little bit of truth and sticking to what was said or promised would have gone a long way here.

I think they have bigger issues the MMMs right now... if I had to guess.

Nahh -- if you read the forums, it seems like the world is coming to an end.

But in truth the MMM V2 has been a real success so far. Very few returns considering the number we have shipped so far.


Patrick

thats great patrick, what exactly is causing the BEC failures though?

Check ur Inbox too ;)

If the forums are any indication of what has gone out to the general populous of consumers... The rate of return/failure has to be substantially more than 1%....
Speaking of which.. I called last friday and was told my second failure(BEC) would be replaced with it shipping out Tuesday.. I haven't heard anything since.
I don't doubt your claims of the V2 being successful, as only you know what your measurements are.
The world ending here... is probably due to these being some of the more... in depth users... witch one would think.. are likely to be more experienced or at least in making sure they do things properly.
I currently have a MMM v2 running well currently.. but with an external BEC. I guess I am not brave enough to try it with out after 2 failures, and I really want to run the revo before the snow flies.

The forums are never a good indication of the scale of anything. Everything get blown out of proportion on the forums. Not to say there was not a problem, there was. Also not to say no v2's will fail, some will. I just think things usually turn out to be about 10 worse on the forums than in reality. 1 guy posts on 5 different forums with 5 different names about his problem & that becomes 5 guys with problems. In addition people with no problems have no reason to post. :neutral:

Sorry to hear about your frustrations. I felt the same way on my replacement MMM. I stilll have to receive it and it's already 3 weeks. CC was nice enough though to send me another one last Aug 28, 2008 but I'm still waiting on that one too. I'm stationed at an overseas naval base so it will take about 6-9 days (normally) for the package to reach me.

Tell you what though, I quit waiting on them. Whenever it arrives, I'll be happy. If not, I'll just continue running my nitro trucks to ease my frustrations. I also called them twice even though I have to pay for overseas long distance phone call. CC's customer service is top notch.

I know how you guys feel..

I sent in my Mamba max 3 months ago at this point... and I have no idea when it'll come. I have gotten the "2 weeks" response from Castle as many times as anyone.. I had to buy a replacement :(