Today I took apart a Leopard 4074 2150Kv and compared it to the Castles 1515 rebuild kit. First thing that struck me is the wrapping on the rotor magnets. I believe Castle uses Kevlar and Leopard seems to use carbon fiber from the looks of it. Well it's black so that is why I am thinking it is carbon fiber but not sure. The second thing that struck me was the quality of the wrapping job. Castles rotor is a work of art and the Leopard looks like ..........well it looks like I did it.:lol: But seriously though it looks much rougher than the Castle job. On this alone I doubt that Leopard could see the same kind of RPM that Castle motors are rated for (60,000rpm I think). At least I wouldn't take it there.

Everything looked very close at first and at a quick glance it does look like a Leopard just cloned the Castle motor but the more you look the less you think this is likely. Rotor shafts are different lengths and magnets are positioned in a different spot on the shaft (bit lower on the leopard). For a second I thought you could use the Castle rotor shaft in the Leopard but it looks doubtful. Maybe with some crafty spacing work on the shaft. The Castle rotor shaft wants to stay a bit higher in the leopard can (talking about where the magnets want the shaft to stay). I am pretty sure you could work something out with the spacers to position the rotor shaft in the right spot but not sure how the spacers pushing onto the sides of the bearings would affect things. Also seems like there might be an issue if the rotor isn't aligned right with the windings inside. Not a motor guru but I think there might be some issues there. With the Castle rotor inside the leopard motor there was definitely more resistance from the magnets then with the Leopard. Godd or bad? I have no idea but just stating it.

Castle motor uses 3 screws on the front end wheres the Leopard uses 4 to secure it's end bell. Also the diameter of the inside lip is different and the Castle end bell will not fit the Leopard. Not that it matters as they don't use the same bolt pattern. One thing I did like about the Leopard is that it has six holes on the front for mounting the motor vs. Castles 4. Not a big deal but I thought I would mention it. Sometimes more mounting options can make some jobs easier.

Bearing sizes are the same. I have read else but was surprised to see that they were the same. They are also made by the same company too. Can't remember the name now (Just three capital letters) and they have one set of same numbers as well. Castle has another set of numbers wheres Leopard bearings have the word Thailand written instead of those numbers. Hope that makes sense.

So in my opinion these motors are not clones at all. Not by a long shot. They do look similar but so do all the motors in the 540 class. Maybe they had a looksy inside of the Castles motors before they made theirs but they did not pick up a set of vernier calipers and backwards engineered them. To me Leopard did their own take on this.

Still I do have to say that the looks of the rotor on the Leopard worry me a little. That wrapping job looks really sub-par when compared to Castles. This alone would make me want to spend the extra money on the Castle motor. Also I really like how Castle use wires and not just extend the motor windings out side of the can. They don't feel too stiff or like they will break easily on the Leopard but it would certainly be easier to make a neater installation with the Castle motor.

I will be putting the Leopard through the paces sometime soon on a friends XTM Rail (GV Cage on some markets) and will report back on findings. Don't have a Logger but just the general feel for the motor + temps. Will be running it on 4S and 5S.

If anyone would like to see some pics of the insides of both motors let me know and I'll try to do it tomorrow.

Big-block, you are a much longer winded typer then me. But did you see my pics on the previous page?

Yeah, I missed those. Just had a look at them now. I think there is a need for a clearer picture of the Castle and Leopard rotor side by side. There really is a huge difference in the quality of wrapping. I think the pics bellow a little clearer.
http://i53.tinypic.com/6gx9bn.jpg

Also bearings. Castle ones have the following printed on the shields. NMB R-1650HH 625ZZ. Leopard has NMB R-1650HH Thailand. Not sure which are meant to be better but the Castle ones feel much smoother. Much, much smoother. Going by that alone I would say that the bearings Castle uses are higher quality.
http://i54.tinypic.com/2qxmd7n.jpg

The leopard motor is also 2mm shorter.

I think the Leopard should do well but I think that in regards to quality it's chalk and cheese. Castle owns the Leopard in regards to the feel you get just by looking at the components. Everything about the Castle motor looks better made.

For sure, my pics are pretty crappy. I tried to get a clean one of the interior, and couldn't get any to turn out. I thought the Castle windings were better organized. I'm not concerned about the wrapping of the rotor. The Castle's for sure looks the best, but I've seen other's that were similar to the Leopards. The Xerun is wrapped more like the Castle, and has that glazing over it, but it gave the overall cheapest feeling.

So I'd like some opinions on this. I have 3 E-revo's here. I am most interested in testing the 3 bigger motor's, but I do not have 3 MMM's to run them all on, Nor do I have 3 identical set's of tires, I do have 2 Xerun esc's, and 2 MMM esc's, and similarly sized tires. To keep things fair, should I individaully test each motor in my E-revo, with the exact same setup? Or do I run them all at the same time, with the differences, so they could all be ran in the same enviroment, racing against each other.

Run all 3 motors in the same car. Less headache and you will actually see what the power differences are with the same load. Maybe one motor is easier on the ESC then the other. Powerband will be different between the motors. etc

hi,

I've been running the Leopard 4074-2000 for some months now and I'm quite happy with it. Best about it: it's not getting very hot, I would say less hot then the MR 3680-1600 I have had before.

I run it on 5s in a truggy. I miss a bit the torque, compared to the motors I have had before (losi celorin 1600kv, MR 3680 1600), but that's due to the higher kv. I really had to get used to the 2000kv.

What's not so cool are the motor wires, as they are stiff and winding ends, but the MR was even worse. The Losi had solder tabs, pretty comfy.

some pics here:
http://www.rc-monster.com/forum/show...leopard&page=3

the wrapping of the rotor is not "beautiful" but it works. I don't think it's carbon fiber.
It's not a high end motor, but a very good motor, for the money paid, has sufficient power.

So I finally had a chance to run all the motors. I could not get accurate data logs on them, as my Data logger was being maxed out. I saw bursts over 120 with all motors, but as I said, it's not really accurate, so I'm not sure just how high they went. I tried to log 1 battery in a parallel setup, and saw 91 amps, that would put the sytem at 182 amps, quite possible, but not confirmable. But also had trouble with the batteries not draining equal, so didn't feel safe doing it for all the motors.

Ran in my E-revo, geared 24/68 with Masher's 3.2, MMM, SPC 8000mah 4s. I have a hole in the windshield , for added air flow, and a dual motor mount, which gives more area for the mount to work like a heatsink, especially with the air blowing right over it. I ran each motor for around 20 minutes, of hard bashing off road. Radar was used for speeds, except with the Tacon, as I was by myself, I used a GPS. Ambient was between 70-72 for all the runs. I take multible temp readings, and don't just use the highest, but try to find the range it's going to run in. Generally by the time you're 10 minutes in, temps should level off.

Xerun 4168, 2250 kv.
Speed was 51mph
motor temp was varying between 120-125
The extra kv rating of this motor shows. It was the fastest, and felt like it. 5 minutes into it's run, the pinion came loose, so it got around a 5 minute break, it's temps might have inched a little higher otherwise.

Castle 2200. While my earlier pics showed the Castle version, I used the Tork version for testing. It has a little smaller overall can, but also has funky nubs, I guess you could say they act as cooling.
Speed was 49mph
Temp was between 115-120
I think the added strength of the magnetic field can be felt with this motor. It spools up a little smoother, and has more drag brake effect.

Tacon 2150
Speed was 48mph
Temp was 125-130
Spools up quicker then the Castle, but I saw no difference with torque.

So what can I say, all the motors perform very good at this speed. While they all have a slightly different feel to them, you'd have to run them back to back to distinguish them IMO. Though the other motors really need slightly higher gearing, to match the XErun.

My next test will be a higher load, I'll use some Big Joes, and see how the bigger tires and increased speed effects them.

Sorry I could not get more technical data, ;)

The speed and temps reading are good data. Better then nothing. How was the spool up of the Xerun?

The Xerun felt more like the Tacon then the Castle, as far as the spool up control, it just hit harder then the Tacon. The Xerun was really the power house of the bunch. It would wheelie faster, and was more prone to spin the tires uncontrollably. I want to say I could really feel the higher kv of it, where the kv of the other motors felt more similar, if that makes sense. I just don't know how much running the higher speed played into that, but they are also so close, that I'm not sure I could hit a perfect gearing to match their speeds.

Ah ok. What timing where you running the motors at? What if you added two degrees of timing to the Castle and Tacon to match the speed of the Xerun? See what the temp differences are at the same time.

I was running all factory settings on the esc, except cutoff voltage, so it had 10* of timing. I'll kick the timing up, and see if it makes a difference.

I went to 15* of timing on the Tacon, and it only added .6 mph, and that could have been the stronger tail wind it had. I didn't bother to do a full run for temps, since there was no real difference.

Bummer. There is always the opposite version, which is gearing up and lower the timing. Are you having fun yet messing with settings?:smile:

I've had around 6 runs with my E-revo this weekend, more then I've had in the last 6 mos. Messing with the settings is just a great excuse to have more fun. ;)

Honestly I'm not to awfully worried about the minute differences. I really wanted to see if a $59 motor could really happily handle a Monster truck. I was quite skeptical, but I found out, yes it does, and does a fine job at it.

I just got back from the park with the Tacon. I was pushing it pretty much as hard as I could, lot's of open grass area's at wot, hard brakes, doughnuts, ect. It's my normal bashing spot with my E-revo, so I know what to expect from the Castle. After 25minutes, Temps held true to the 125-130 range. There was no point I thought, boy the Castle would have done better there. So far there's nothing I've found not to like about the motor. But we all know longevity must be factored in, so I'll have to see how it holds up.

I think if the Xerun had the bigger bearings it would be a better choice for the MT's then it is now. The performance seems to be there. Maybe a better choice for a SC.

Great info!
I have been running the Tacon 36 74 1300 kv in a rc8 on 5-6s with similar temps after 10min. I was happily surprised the motor wires were so flexible. The shaft spins easy with a slight notching effect. To bad the shaft side(front?) endbell looks pressed or threaded on(no crimp marks).

I have 6 leopard motors, 3 castle neu and 4 xerun ........ all with 4 poles ....... all are great motors and the difference of efficienct/temperatures/runtime is minimum ......

pd: the leopard 4074 new cost 60-75usd + shipping

definitely the leopard motors are awesome ....... Im using a 4065 2700kv for 1/8tte races with +300 batts and still working perfect (only changed the bearings 1 time)

also I have a 3650 3900kv in a 1/10tt 4x2 with aprox 120 batts and works great .....

also using a 4074 2150kv, a 4282 2000kv and a 4274 2000kv ..... all the motors works perfect and I dont had any problem with none


in the last year I sold all my castle-neu, xerun, tekin etc ....... and at this moment only Im using leopards, simply because are the better motors I had.......

if you see the vids of my chanel will see my cars ...... running only with leopard motors in the last year ...... and winning a lot of races ;)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSy-_ldjus4