Vorteks Vorteks Boost to 3s

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I'm new to the forums and recently stepped into RC cars, initially mainly for my 5 year old son.

I've been flying helicopters myself for years and played around with cars back in the 80's but current cars are completely new to me.

As mentioned at first it was intended mainly for my son but you know how it goes ... dad tends to like it too 😅

So now I'm looking into upgrading the brushed 2wd Boost to 3s brushless 4wd 'on a budget' with a surpass motor/Esc combo since i read good things about them. (Suggestions for the right combo are welcome of course)

So far so good, but naturally I will run into questions. Noob ones most likely 🙈

The first question I'm running into is regarding the pinion and spur gear. These are 48DP on the brushed version but 0.8mod on the brushless one.

Do I need to replace the spur gear when converting to 3s or can I run out with the 48DP one?
 
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I just noticed that Jenny's rc has special offers on the stock motor and ESC. Resulting in about the same price total as the surpass combo.

What would be the better choice?

Stock motor and ESC
Surpass combo
Stock ESC and Surpass motor
...
 
Surpass motors are decent. The 3665, 3150kv you mentioned is great in a Vorteks and what I run. Surpass ESCs not so much. Stick with the blx 100 or even better the 120 (4s model) or 130 (axel rift). Both can be gotten off Jenny’s but are out of stock often unfortunately. I’ve had very good luck with the blx100 and spectrum smart 130.

You’ll want a better servo also. I run the s652 (off the 6s line) on four of my 3s cars and they work great. They also work with the stock Servo saver (23t).
 
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So the quality of the Surpass ESC is inferior to the stock Spektrum ESC?

One difference between the 2 is that the surpass ESC is sensored. Does this make a lot of difference compared to not sensored?
 
So the quality of the Surpass ESC is inferior to the stock Spektrum ESC?

One difference between the 2 is that the surpass ESC is sensored. Does this make a lot of difference compared to not sensored?
Beats me honestly. Perhaps it will do you well, I just haven’t had good luck with them and I know other people haven’t either. All I can really do is give my experience with what I use. I do know there is a general saying, you can go cheap on the motor but not the ESC.
 
Just ordered the SPMXSE1100 which was on sale and the slipper clutch assembly at Jenny's RC.

Keeping the VAT and handling costs in mind it was still quite a bit cheaper than ordering local. Saved me a few bucks.

The funny thing is that the Infraction 3S and Vorteks 3S have the same SPMXSE1100 ESC but the Infraction one was 3 bucks cheaper 🙈
 
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In the meantime I've ordered a lot of the needed parts at Jenny's RC at fair prices.

But since then there's a local black friday deal on the RTR 3S which is so cheap I would have been better off buying a complete kit 🙈
 
In the meantime I've ordered a lot of the needed parts at Jenny's RC at fair prices.

But since then there's a local black friday deal on the RTR 3S which is so cheap I would have been better off buying a complete kit 🙈
Heya,
How does this go? I bought myself the Vorteks 3S blx, but Im unhappy w the Spektrum shennanigans. I am planning to buy my son a good car too, but I am thinking to just buy a Vorteks Boost, then stick the body on my 3S and give it to my son. And then I convert that Boost into whatever I want.

But you re so right, when Vorteks BLX is on £360 price, its hard. £179+ wheelie bars + esc + motor + AVC receiver and Im probably more than £400 :/
 
In my case I misinterpreted the parts needed for the conversion.

I bought the Boost on sale, just to see if my 5 yr old would like it.

I figured I could always convert it to 3s later on because I calculated the cost for 4wd conversion and 3s setup and added up it was only slightly more expensive than the 3S kit.

One thing I didn't know at that moment was that the slipper clutch assembly and servo had to be upgraded as well 🙈

To make things worse the 3S came on sale for black friday 🤕
 
Any tips on a budget servo and servo saver for the Vorteks? (running the stock 3S ESC).

DS3218mg perhaps?

Or would a heli swash servo work? E.g. an Align DS620? Reckon I can source one of those for free.
 
Any tips on a budget servo and servo saver for the Vorteks? (running the stock 3S ESC).

DS3218mg perhaps?

Or would a heli swash servo work? E.g. an Align DS620? Reckon I can source one of those for free.
Anything is better than the stock. iirc there s S650 in the boost. Look for something that does at least 20kg torque with 6.0V under 0.15s and you should be good. You can find smth on your local hobby website for €30-35 I guess
 
Thx. I'll see if I can source a suitable swash servo. If not I'll look into the DS3218.

Boost has the 5kg S650 indeed. 3S the 10kg S651.

If I'm correct the Spektrum servos are 23T instead of 25T so I will look out for a proper servo saver as well.
 
Thx. I'll see if I can source a suitable swash servo. If not I'll look into the DS3218.

Boost has the 5kg S650 indeed. 3S the 10kg S651.

If I'm correct the Spektrum servos are 23T instead of 25T so I will look out for a proper servo saver as well.
You are correct. Spektrum, in their "infinite wisdom" elected to go with a 23t servo instead of 25t like most other manufacturers. Even the 10kg servo on the BXL line is kind of weedy and I would advise you look for something in the neighborhood of 15-20kg. This will give you some ceiling if you run bigger tires.
 
Decided to stop throwing money at this because it turned out I needed even more parts than expected.

So I bought a 3S BLX on sale instead, cheaper than the sum of all parts needed for the conversion.

Gonna sell the parts I already ordered/ keep some of them as spares.
 
Decided to stop throwing money at this because it turned out I needed even more parts than expected.

So I bought a 3S BLX on sale instead, cheaper than the sum of all parts needed for the conversion.

Gonna sell the parts I already ordered/ keep some of them as spares.
thats a wise decision. the great thing about these cars is that while parts are not necessarily expensive, the sum of a full cars parts is still greater than the cars price. so you re doing the right thing.
remember, you will probably still need a better servo in the BLX too. for that things get a bit complicated, but depending on how good servo you want. if you find a servo that goes super well, strong and fast enough on 6.0v, you're good. otherwise, you'd need to update/downdate your ESC firmware to a version where the BEC voltage on ESC is still adjustable, so it can use 7.4v accessing this way a way stronger version of your servo. for example, some servos look smth like this:
- 20kg torque with 0.15s speed on 6.0v
- 25kg torque with 0.12s speed on 7.4v
- 30kg torque with 0.10s speed on 8.0v
if you have one of these, its quite a pity to be running it on 6.0v, but its still ok.
let me know if you want me to elaborate on this more
 
No worries since I fly heli's I'm well aware of the theories behind servo's on HV, LV etc. Up until now just not that much about the requirements a steering servo needs to meet.
 
Since I find different results on the subject yet another question:

Will the Hobbywing LCD/USB program box work on the BLX firma 100A ESC?
 
Since I find different results on the subject yet another question:

Will the Hobbywing LCD/USB program box work on the BLX firma 100A ESC?
Not entirely sure, there was a video from razor rc about the topic. And iirc some ppl were mentioning the spektrum program box is just a rebranded hobbywing
 
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