Please show your fan set-ups! fans for cooling the electrics

[Marc780]

I did a search which yielded no results...After burning up a tk-01 board after an hours use I'd like the replacement to last a while so I'm planning to add one when the parts arrive..If you've installed a fan or two can you show me how you did it and your results?

[Tankbear]

Hi Marc780,

TK01 isn't that the receiver circuit board? If so these generally shouldn't over heat so I would think that the problem was a manufacture problem and not to worry.

As for other electronics overheating, I think the cooling fan is seriously overrated. Last year our club went to the Yorkshire show and in baking sun 27C and all the tanks of various electronic brands never failed due to the overheating. Admittedly some acted up a little but no failures.

Ian.

[MichaelC]

Marc,

Burnt board is usually an indication of overloading on the electronics and fan is not going to help. It might be an indication of motor overloading which is more of a mechanical problem. I never have any of the Tk-01 board but I can't imagine them being able to handle any kind of upgrade on the rest of the tank (i.e. metal tracks, upgrade motors/gears etc).

MichaelC

[Marc780]

Well the motors did make a hum sound when trying to make a hard left or right even when new...The tank has plastic track and gearbox. I sent away for both a replacement unit and the parts for the tk18 upgrade so if I can make it drive and turret function eventually I'll be happy with that.

Maybe HL should make their circuit boards with quick disconnect wiring and wing nuts, ha ha.
The original tk01 board has nothing for cooling but a piece of metal probably intended as a heat sink on the back. I'll put a magnet to it, if the piece is aluminum that might answer that question alright. Obviously that's not enough and I've read this board has reliability issues anyway. .
Been thinking of placing the new board under the engine louvres with a fan...torro De even sells a cooling box for the rx18 that cost $15, reasonable enough but the shipping makes it too costly ($55)
You could be right, not sure what killed it but isnt heat often the culprit?...Surely a HL Tank should work longer then an hour before breaking?
Before I drove the tank I installed brass bushings in the wheels bearings in the idler and beefed up the axle and tried to make sure everything spun more or less correctly. It's very possible I missed something, have to recheck the drivetrain. Which I'll have plenty of time to do waiting for parts.

[Marc780]

And tank bear Thanks for the reply...After running in a new set of gearboxes letting them run for 20 minutes for instance I was amazed how cool they ran. Obviously they're different electronics involved but I found a post here, will try to post the link, where he put a thermal sensor on the board to find the hot spots.. He redid his cooling and claimed much better reliability.
You could very well be right but I don't how the simple tk01 electric board can work great for an hour then, kaput. Since the only variable could be heat, load, or both...As you know heat kills electronics and with no moving parts is hard not to conclude heat is involved somehow.

[jarndice]

Marc hi, you mention two sources that could harm the electronics on your Tank, there are at least two other sources that could do it, the first is eletro -magnetic pulse -radiation, this is generated by the explosion of an atomic device and I suggest you worry about other matters than your Tank should that occur in your neighbourhood, the other source is vibration, and when the Tank runs over your lawn it will bounce, ohh but it will bounce, and you might like to address that if your thinking of running at out of scale speeds. just a thought. shaun