Jato 3.3 into E-Jato

[Robert]

Nice job, looks like it works very well. :)

[jnev]

Originally Posted by Janezki

jnev: Thanks! Motor mount is selfmade from two pieces of 2mm thick aluminiun plate. Got the best fit when made it myself and being 4mm thick it doesn't flex.
Jato is more driveable than Rustler on tarmac, I haven't tried this beauty on dirt yet so can't tell how it handles there.
Rustler I have no more, but might get the Slash for off-road use.

Did you just have to dremel the shape you wanted and drill holes? What exactly was necessary to make the piece of aluminum fit?

[Janezki]

I cut two pieces of (roughly) the same lenght from 50mm wide 2mm thick aluminium, put them together and drilled one 3mm hole for the motor mount. Bolted them together from that hole and drilled the remaining holes with drill press. Exact hole positions are vital, so atleast caliper must be used. The mesh adjustment hole was made from series of 3mm holes which were opened with dremel and the hole for the motor axle was made from two 10mm holes. The hole from where the transmission case comes through is quite snug fit, so it doesn't allow any slack or twisting which might strip the screws from transmission case.
The final rounded shape was made with belt grinder, with pieces still bolted together.
First I thought that I'd polish the final piece, but I ended up spraying it with black paint (I'm lazy...).

All the tools needed are available at the place I work, so you could say I'm fortunate. Ofcourse, no workingtime was spend while making this...

[bruce750i]

Hey Janezki: I tried a gyro in my e-jato now I can't drive it without it. Too windy for the heli anyways.

[Janezki]

Hehe, it does help a lot with the handling of a powerful RWD car. Although those cheap piezo gyros are quite fragile. They can't handle strong hits, so bashers be aware.

[Janezki]

Almost forgot...
To add the mess under the body, I installed two 5V fans - one for the ESC and another for the motor. They are driven by 4.8V receiver pack at the trunk. Hope this helps the ESC to stay a bit cooler when not going full speed.

Click the pic to view it BIG:


Check out the rears, I've driven only four packs with the car...

Also, ordered one MaxAmps 11.1V 6000mAh lipo pack to save some weight from the 8Ah monster.

[Motoman]

Coming from a guy with 2 helis, I would recommend that you try to place the gyro closer to the axis of rotation. It looks like you have it in the front right corner under the eagletree. You might see an improvement by placing it where the receiver is. Just my $.02 . I don't imagine they let you race with that do they?

That's a nice setup you got there, it's a lot less crowded than the nitro version. And a lot more reliable too. D

[crazyjr]

I run a gyro (hobbico peizo gyro, not sure of number) in my E-GT, I don't have a pic of it with it though. It allows me to hammer it on dirt as well as on pavement. I had the gyro in my T3 with 5700MM and bald proline steppins and could run without worry of spinning out no matter how hard i drove it. I really had to work to get it to spin out

[Motoman]

I've always wanted to try it out, but I don't want to take one of the GY401 gyros off of my helis. That, and it would be too expensive to crash one of those gyros! $135 each. I wouldn't want to go back to flying my helis without a gyro. I've done it before and let me tell you, it ain't fun. Try it, I give that to you as homework.

[MTBikerTim]

Would a 401 be damageable with a hard hit?

And that was a really cool video. The gyro does work well.

[Janezki]

Originally Posted by Motoman

Coming from a guy with 2 helis, I would recommend that you try to place the gyro closer to the axis of rotation. It looks like you have it in the front right corner under the eagletree. You might see an improvement by placing it where the receiver is. Just my $.02 . I don't imagine they let you race with that do they?

That's a nice setup you got there, it's a lot less crowded than the nitro version. And a lot more reliable too. D

Thanks for the info, I'll fix it to the center when I get my latest update to the car done. Pics will follow.
No racing for me - well not anything official atleast. This car is pure on-road fun for myself, and also I'm aiming to see (atleast) equal top speed numbers from Eagle Tree than that Traxxas tells the nitro version will do. At the moment I'm 8mph short...

Jato has been in the pits for two weeks now. There was a little mishap with it where it lost it's bulkheads and upper deck. Also the motor & ESC were borrowed by my new off-road toy E-Firestorm until I received the Sidewinder combo that I ordered to it.

[rcsammy]

very nice conversion, what does the jato handle like compared to the firestorm?
could someone explain what the gyro actualy does to stop the car spinning out?

[Motoman]

The gyro senses any rotation in the axis it is setup to work in, and provides correction to unwanted movement via the steering servo. There are some gyros that work on two axis at the same time, but for an application like this a single axis gyro is sufficient. If you use a "heading hold" gyro like the GY401, the gyro will compensate in a way such that the car will maintain it's original heading (or any other heading you tell it to follow, ie steering input from you) regardless of slip in traction or other factors. So, theoretically a car with a 401 gyro should maintain a straight line even if the trim happens to be off. In fact, if you use a 401 you can't adjust the steering trim because it will affect the gyro's ability to perform like it should. You would just set the steering trim at center and the gyro will take care of the rest to ensure the car drives straight.

It's a lot more complicated than that, but that's the jist of it.

MTBikerTim
I'm not sure how bad of a crash it would take to destroy a 401, and I don't intend to find out. I do know that gyros need to be mounted using padded double stick tape in order to cut down vibration transfer to the gyro. This is necessary to get the best performance out of it as possible and also to protect the electronics.

crazyjr
I've used that gyro before when I got started in helis, but I had bad experience with it. It died within a few flights, got it replaced at least once or twice and did the same every time until finally I gave up on it. I never did find out what was causing it to die.

[Janezki]

Here are few pictures from current evolution version, click to see them big:



yeayea, I know one motor wire is coming off... :)

Upper deck is made from 6mm thick industrial (tough) plastic & aluminium, bolted to the chassis with three 4mm bolts going through aluminium pipe. This supports the frontend and offers good mounting point for steering servo, receiver, gyro, esc switch & fan.
Wire holes from Lehner were "siliconized" to prevent sand and dirt getting inside the motor.

So really the HPI G-BOX is like a YAW control and ASC (active stability control) isnt it?