Typhon Typhon Mega Overheating

[JMega]

I have a stock Typhon Mega that keeps overheating and cutting out. It's becoming quite irritating and ruining the fun for my kid and I. Sometimes we only get 5-7 mins of runtime before it shuts down. When it turns off, the ESC, motor and battery are all very hot.

I contacted Arrma support about it and they replied that I had a faulty ESC and shipped me a new one. When it arrived, I popped it in - and had the same result. No improvement at all. I emailed Arrma again, but after a few days I hadn't received a response other than the default "we received your message" auto-reply. I tried again and another three days have gone by without a response. ?‍

Enough with the customer-service gripe though - I'm looking for ideas to fix the problem. Here's what I came up with so far:

1. Gear it down with a smaller pinion

The Mega already isn't that fast, so I'm not super keen to lose more top speed, but I thought this would be the cheapest and easiest way to reduce the strain on the motor and ESC. Doesn't look like Arrma sells a smaller pinion for this car though. It comes with a 14t stock. I did find this set of three on Amazon, which contains a 13t, 14t, and 15t. I'm not sure how big of a difference one tooth would make though - or whether I'd need a different motor mount to use it.

2. Buy a different brushed motor

Not sure where to get one in Canada, but I presume I could buy another 550 brushed motor with more turns to get more torque and less speed? Still not a great option because of the lower top speed, but I could live with it if it was close.

3. Upgrade to brushless

I've read lots of threads about this. Sounds like most people say it's a bad investment and you should buy the 3s version instead, because you'll need to upgrade all the gears and clutch etc. I get it - but my current Mega is almost useless as-is and, unlike most, I'm not looking for a big speed and power upgrade. The stock performance is ok - I just want to be able to drive for more than a few minutes at a time.

So if I'm not looking for more speed, could I do a brushless conversion without all the extra drivetrain pieces? What about an ESC/motor combo like this? Would the 3650 3100kv version be pretty close to stock but run cooler?


Any other ideas I haven't thought of? Should I just get fans?

 

[SrC]

Fair to say approx. 3000kv would be the limit with a blx setup. Try a new brushed motor of a different brand, similar wind but a well known brand first. The brushes may be shot in your motor causing heat issues. Also not maintaining any brushed motor(cleaning/lubing) will cause undue additional heat. Binding in your drivetrain is also a source of overheating all the electrics including the battery. Take a close look at your drivetrain for any binding, or even bad bearings. As bearings get old, collectively all of them can bind the drivetrain significantly.
You say your ESC goes thermal too often... I hope you are using a temp gun to consistently track temps of all including the wiring and motor. Just some ideas. Temp issues require a temp gun to solve and monitor effectively. Temps of 150F at the motor are generally its limit .
That above combo BLX setup looks about right for your rig. (3100kv) You will be running a 2s Lipo with that combo??? Correct?

 

[arrmablx3s]

Just go with a brushless system someone on here is selling a TALION in good condition for like 500 I believe can’t go wrong, I had a brushed set up last year I hated it

 

[JMega]

Thanks for the suggestions. I'll shop for a new brushed motor first I suppose and see how that works out.

I should have mentioned in my initial post, this is happening on a brand new Typhon - e.g. after getting it home and charging it up, it overheated the first time in about ten minutes. My kid was driving it for more than 1/2 of that first pack on the 50% throttle setting. It overheats with every battery pack since.

I suppose that doesn't rule out binding or something if there was an assembly issue at the factory - but it seems unlikely the motor brushes were worn out.

Nope, I don't have a temp gun at the moment. I understand why I should get one though - I'll shop for that too. The ESC and motor are getting too hot to touch and removing the battery right after it overheats is a game of hot potato.

If I switch to brushless I would be using my 2s batteries - but I thought I could buy a program card for that ESC too and maybe also use my NIMH packs?

While switching to the Talion would no doubt be exciting - that still leaves me with a Typhon that can't hardly be driven. Might be a bit much for my 4-year-old too.

 

[Jupitervix]

I’d exactly the same problem as you!
After buying two WTF fans (one for the motor (will change it to the ESC because the motor already have a built-in fan) and one for the battery) and an y-cable I can drive it hard on 100% for about 20 minutes and then it shutdowns. I hope it won’t overheat at all if I mount the fan to the ESC instead!