Hi all

Here are a few pictures of Lubeck, a Manfred Sievers kit of a German Lifeboat 1942 to 1967, scale 1:20 and model length of 65cm. Sievers makes a range of kits and he has a website, Today was its first sail at Fishers Green Model Boat Club near Waltham Abbey, Essex.

It is brushless motor propelled and has a magnetic switch which you can just see in front of the motor on the starboard side. This negates the need to lift off the superstructure to switch on and off, since just passing a magnet over the hull in the right place switches it on and off. as needed.

The 2822/17 Turnigy brushless motor consumes less than 1 amp when running and the esc has been turned down 50% because otherwise the model virtually takes-off at full speed.

Paul Freshney

Editor,

Edited By Paul Freshney Editor of Model Boats on 02/03/2014 19:58:23

And here are a couple of pictures of the magnetic switch up against the hull's starboard side. The switch comes from Alexander Engel who has a website.

Interestingly, when I cycled the 3700mAH 8.4 NiMH battery after Sunday's one hour sailing session, the brushless motor had only consumed 0.45 of an amp from a full charge. So, the tiny motor which you can see in the pictures and which is rated at 102w, is also much more power consumption friendly than what I would previously used, such as a 385 brushed type. Speed controller, forwards and reverse, is a Hawk 30amp. Not cheap, but it works perfectly and does not need water-cooling. Motor fits into a standard 380 type of mount with no adjustments, except it is back to front. Rx is £4 Orange generic type for Spektrum DSM2 – also works perfectly.

Paul.

Robin

My orange coloured Sievers Pilot Boat, that you will no doubt remember, had two 2830 Turnigy motors (direct drive) installed late last year. Performance is now the fastest the hull can handle without taking off, but on the 8.4v 3700mAH NiMH sub-c pack, duration is now up to nearly 60 mins as against around 40 mins on the previous geared Speed 400 motors that were installed. Propellers are the same – brushless motors are rated at 210W, If I go to 9.6v, that model is virtually uncontrollable. The Hawk controllers are not cheap at around £40 each, but work perfectly.

You can use an Action mixer between the receiver and esc's as you would with brushed motors and controllers – I did a bench test last weekend to see if it would all work, and it was fine. You cannot use microswitches to turn off an inner brushless motor on a turn, because it loses its settings gained from first switch-on.

Paul.