[marzac2]

I have run both set-ups in my 8ight buggy. Motor brakes/pinion and mechanical brakes/clutch.

I really like the clutch/mechanical brakes set-up more for racing. It gives me an edge in performance and tuning ability. It is NOT a big trouble having the addition of the extra parts. Troublesome brakes/clutches are not why most of us are converting to brushless. I think it is the nasty NITRO ENGINES.

People drop out of our hobby every day because they are fed up with unreliable nitro engines. Now that they have an alternative to chose from in the 1/8th (popular racing segment) scale field, they will not leave as frustrated as before.

I get frustrated seeing posts bashing the added brakes/clutch set-ups. They provide many useful features that enable you to tune the most important part of the car, it's drivability. Driving my car right now on pinion/motor brakes gives me so much less "feel" of the cars speed, especially around corners. It's much less predictable over jumps as well, giving me less confidence to go FAST.

As for the added maintenance... Since converting to electric, I am left with almost NOTHING to do in between races (besides charging a battery). I really appreciate being able to actually do some proactive tuning to the car between heats to give me a better racing advantage as well as keep me from going out of my mind from boredom. I have no more of a mechanical failure rate when running the clutch/brakes set-up V.S. running the pinion/motor brake set-up.

Just my experiences.