Brushless vs Brushed. Which do you prefer and why?

[jsven008 155]

Which do you prefer and why? For me I use brushless on almost all projects except low-cost projects. Brushless motors are a huge upgrade in terms of power, efficiency, and lower maintenance. 

I remember the first time I used a low-turn brushless motor several years back I was amazed by the power. And I've been hooked ever since. Wheelies at 30mph. Breaking tires loose at 50mph. Brushed motors just don't come close.

Brushless: Almost all projects.

Brushed: Low cost projects.

[Kowalski86 3983]

Edit: Upon reflecting on my old post, I decided to update it.

I prefer brushed, it's cheap, easy to setup, and I don't have to mess about with programming cards/sensor cables. I only have one area where a brushless setup might be fun, and brushed setups work fine in it.

The only time where I've felt I really needed a brushless setup is when I've had more modern RCs, SCTs in particular.

A lot of modern bashers are complete pigs compared to old stuff. They're almost always 4wd, bigger than what 1/10 used to be, and often burn through whatever stock brushed setup that they come with. I can't help but feel that this is where the LiPO/Brushless cult comes from.

I briefly had a Traxxas Telluride (basically a 4x4 Stampede with Slash wheels), on the stock 12t motor and NiMH it was absolutely gutless. Yea, I can see why you'd want brushless/LiPO in this application.

Something like a Hornet will run on a silver can for decades, and you can get by with whatever NiMH you have laying around, they weight nothing and they're efficient.

[Twinfan 1796]

Brushed. Because they're authentic to Tamiya re-res, work better in cars with limited gearing options, have less wires cluttering everything up and look way cooler 

I have a few brushless motors but they not interesting to me, they're just functional tools for the job.

[Howards 586]

Silvercan + cheap esc + low profile 3s lipo is a fun alternative to a more spendy brushless setup.

[Mad Ax 10028]

Up until a couple of years ago, I'd have said brushless.  Back then you could buy a fairly cheap brushless combo from Hobbyking for not much money and know that it would work well and do pretty much what was asked of it.  Anything with a Turnigy badge on it was likely to perform well and make sense to operate.

Then suddenly anything Turnigy vanished from Hobbyking, what remained on the website was eternally out of stock.  A slew of cheaper alternatives came in (Gool RC, Etronix Photon) but these seem to have been designed by people who have heard about RC cars but have never actually driven one.  Utterly unintuitive controls, neutral bands the size of the Thames, complete inability to ever select reverse apart from that time you really don't want to select reverse.  In fact I have got 2 or 3 ESCs sitting permanently in my spare ESC box, which I refuse to fit in anything, and which have less value to me than the blown ESCs that I have kept for no logical reason.

So these days, brushed.  I don't mind buying brushless if I can afford to buy a good quality name brand system, but given the cost of systems these days, that's not too common.  Generally I'll use a 1060 and a cheap hot motor in bashers and anything that doesn't need a drag brake, and a 1080 in crawlers, racers and anything that needs a bit more finesse.

(Admittedly it's been around 12 months since I last looked at buying a brushless ESC, so perhaps things have changed).

 

[Superluminal 3841]

Brushed because it needs less wires and they normally come with connectors alreqdy attached.

I hate wires and i'm rubbish at soldering.

[skom25 1741]

Looking at prices and fact that if you want to go Brushless, you need LiPo packs, now I prefer to stay with brushed motors.

[TurnipJF 9722]

Depends on the model and the intended use. Race models get brushless systems appropriate for their class, due to their ability to remain competitive without faffing around with brushes and commutator maintenance. Modern bashers tend to get brushless systems unless they are likely to see water in which case they are fitted with brushed systems. Vintage and rere models get brushed systems appropriate to their drivetrains and handling. 

[bRIBEGuy 3326]

My own choices (and reasons for...) match up with what many have said here already.  My preference as a broad paint stroke is brushless.  It's newer technology, more efficient, significantly less maintenance, and often more power.  Now with that said, the paint stroke brushed over many little details, so the nerdier version looks like this:
 

• Brushless (sensored): Anything I care about, and want to perform well.  Higher end kits.  Anything that might see a race track. Probably
   
• Brushless (sensorless): Anything I care about, but can live with less-than-ideal throttle/brake feedback.  This is often what ends up in casual/"basher" type cars.  Also accounts for a lot of "legacy" cars/systems I have, as sensored is a newer thing.
   
• Brushed: Crawlers, trail trucks, vintage, and casual stuff.  Definitely better throttle control in a slow-going application, and the general ability to go under water is appreciated.  Vintage cars get vintage motors.  Casual runners (i.e. rere's) and kids cars get brushed since it's cheap and easy and really doesn't matter.
   

 

[Kowalski86 3983]

3 hours ago, skom25 said:

Looking at prices and fact that if you want to go Brushless, you need LiPo packs, now I prefer to stay with brushed motors.

Brushless motors/ESCs work with NiMH batteries, you just won't get good performance out of them.

3 hours ago, Superluminal said:

Brushed because it needs less wires and they normally come with connectors already attached.

For what most brushless motors cost, you would think that they'd have connectors on them from the get go.

[Twinfan 1796]

7 minutes ago, Kowalski86 said:

Brushless motors/ESCs work with NiMH batteries, you just won't get good performance out of them.

You can get good performance, just not maximum performance I guess.

[Saito2 7246]

To be perfectly honest, the only brushless system I ever ran was a Castle Sidewinder V2 4600 set-up. It was exceedingly fast and powerful even on Nimh...and now sits on my work bench collecting dust.

So, the answer is brushed, and sealed can at that, more often than not. I'm pretty much a vintage and rerelease guy (with the exception of giving the TD4 and BBX a try, both also brushed BTW) and brushed just suits me and my vehicles the best. Everything I run is rockin' a silvercan, Torque Tuned or on the off chance, a Sport Tuned. Some bigger monster trucks get 550s or 15T Firebolts. I'm in love with the way things were and that means there's no room for brushless or Lipo in my heart. I'd probably still run Nicads instead of  Nimh if they were still around. Most of my radios are still AM as evidenced by the classic antenna tubes bopping about in the pictures I post. If ESCs weren't included in kits, I'd also have more MSCs in my fleet too. Yep, I'm that stupid.

The RC hobby is one area where I don't need to be shoved and pushed around by technology. I don't mind the progress of technology but I don't like being forced into it when the old way was simpler/easier. Give me dash buttons and keys for my cars, not touchscreens and fobs. Still pay with cash and still love watching bewildered kids at the grocery checkout scrambling on how to make change. If you like tech, great. Just accept my answer of "No thank you, not interested." rather than going on a long ramble about the benefits of lipos and brushless. I'm going out the yell at a suspicious-looking cloud and tell those kids to keep off my lawn now.

[nowinaminute 3319]

I tend to go toward brushless a lot these days but a lot of it is down to where I like to drive.

I'm much happier in grass, dirt, sand etc with hills and gradients and so on. All of those tend to result in pretty high motor temps and in many situations can easily lead to burned out motors, especially if you give a brushed motor access to a lipo where it can draw more current. 

I've had a few brushed motors lose power while racing up and down dunes with sand paddles, usually the magnets have gotten so hot they gave up the ghost. While brushless isn't some magical technology that is immune to all torture, they do tend to have much higher thermal headroom and tolerance, and although I've gotten some good and hot before now, I've yet to kill one.

For that reason, I often tend to go with brushless just because I find it to be a bit more foolproof in terms tolerating long runs on surfaces with a lot of drag. 

Like most things, though, it's horses for courses. I seldom find brushless necessary for on road stuff and while I enjoy even my Grasshopper with brushless power on the dirt and sand, when it comes to tarmac, even some fairly talented chassis are overwhelmed by the power and just less enjoyable to drive. I find brushed is more than sufficient for crawlers, too. (although I do love the modern ESCs that use sinewave or PWM to get ridiculously smooth low RPM performance from brushless motors)

There are also many times when I'm just running something vintage (don't want to wreck it) or budget (don't want to spend a lot) or just something I'm experimenting with  (don't want to wreck it YET), and brushed is more than adequate for that.

So, yeah. It depends a lot on usage. If it's something I'm going to bash off road a lot, I tend to favour brushless just because I know it will be dependable and will stand up to prolonged use in trying circumstances. But there are plenty of other circumstances where brushed is fine or even preferable. It's cheap, works, is dependable and sometimes you just get a better driving experience without that relentless torque.

 

[River19 65]

Depends on the car and purpose.

All my race platforms are brushless for obvious reasons but they also aren't Tamiya BUT I race the heck out of my TT-02 and I am building a Euro truck and the torque tuned and 1060 combo on 2S for an indoor carpet course is a blast.

TLRs and Schumacher are all brushless and come with higher expectations of course.

[Nicadraus 6417]

I like using both. For oldschool kits from the 80s, 90s and re-res, I prefer to use brushed for the nostalgic reasons and also the looks. For modern (2010 and up), the brushless works well for me. I also like the fact that brushless are easier to maintain and very powerful. Plus the turbo and boost capabilities of sensored brushless ESCs and motors are nice. Turbos and boost are not usually allowed in club/regional/national/international races except for open categories, but for open space/parking/lot/track use and bashing, they're amazing.

[Kowalski86 3983]

3 hours ago, Saito2 said:

To be perfectly honest, the only brushless system I ever ran was a Castle Sidewinder V2 4600 set-up. It was exceedingly fast and powerful even on Nimh...and now sits on my work bench collecting dust.

Same here, I sold the 4600kv motor but I still have a Sidewinder 3 that needs a home. It was fun in straight lines and straight lines only, way too fast for most of my areas.

[Sir Crashalot 265]

2 hours ago, Nicadraus said:

For oldschool kits from the 80s, 90s and re-res, I prefer to use brushed for the nostalgic reasons and also the looks.

And the sound. I'm not a fan of the various noises produced by brushless.

Give me an orange Novak ESC and a colourful brushed motor. Why is everything black and boring these days? 

[Saito2 7246]

8 hours ago, Kowalski86 said:

It was fun in straight lines and straight lines only, way too fast for most of my areas.

Yeah, that was my situation too.

I know there are more sane power levels available from brushless. Part of it may have to do with where I run. Admittedly, a 540 silvercan might seem pretty boring on a big supercross-style modern track. In my backyard or around a park, its fine though. I'm very used to grabbing handfuls of throttle when using lower power brushed motors and like it that way.

[Kowalski86 3983]

39 minutes ago, Saito2 said:

Yeah, that was my situation too.

Admittedly, a 540 silvercan might seem pretty boring on a big supercross-style modern track.

I even tried mine in a few "modern" short course truck RCs, it just lead to a lot of rollovers and really highlighted just how badly some of them handle (and why stadium trucks are better!).

The best part about silver cans is that a new motor is only about $7, and you can find bundle deals. Brushless motors cost a lot for what they are.

[urban warrior 407]

This is a story of very mixed experience for me.

A lot of years back I was tempted to put a (at that time relatively new) Novak SS Brushless system in my Tamiya Hummer. Admittedly this was way too much power and I had to add a gyro to keep the Hummvee on track (Well, power is nothing without control!). Apart from that I found it great. The next was a HV MAXX system for my Kyosho Twin Force. Also worked great, but got hot in the heavy rig quite fast (especially with summer temperatures).

I always wanted (or expected) more from the brushless technology, because (as some here already mentioned) it's more efficient (you don't waste so much energy with electric brush sparking) and capable. Not to forget that brushed motors always need to be "silenced" (supressed) with capacitors. But I was not always happy with brushless solutions. My worst experience is/was a system from Hobbyking. Maybe it's because it needs more tweaking at the setup. I don't know. You can see the mess below (yes, way to many wires and I would need to shorten them significantly) in a MST CFX and a Tamiya CC02 Chassis:

Then there came Hobbywing (not ...king!) with the integrated Fusion line. Less wiring and one component integrated into the other. You just have the wires for the receiver and the batteries (OK and the switch as well). Admittedly no solution for excessive and fast driving, but the ideal thing for scale, trail and crawling. And this is not so "noisy" as other brushless systems (especially sensorless). But you need the extra space, since it is more on the 550 side than on the 540.

Here it is in my TWS Jeep chassis. A real tight fit with the grille:

When I built my Dynahead I thought I give it a go with a Tamiya brushless (sensored!) motor. I believe it's running a bit more roughly than with the brushed motor added in the kit. So I am not that content with this solution either.

I still use brushed motors, especially in older models. But for my "mountain goats" I will go with Fusion. OK. it's quite expensive but it saves a lot of space and is quite adjustable. In principle there is nothing bad about brushed motors (except "sparking"). And for people like me with (on some models) a quite low mileage, maintenance won't be an issue.

Remembering back in the late eighties of the last millennium, winding a Kyosho LeMans with six turns of thick copper wire by hand. Never saw an electric motor turning that fast those days ... until the copper wire came loose from the commutator.

 

[alvinlwh 6884]

.

[dannymulder 933]

For me it is only brushless motors, 95% of the time I run my cars on the beach, brushless motors have more power to go trough sand with lot of resistance, and way more speed, and low maintenance.

 When I started the hobby I used only brushed motors,  but then  I bought a brushless motor combo and never looked back.

The  biggest problem I have with brushed motors is that most of the times they are open cans and sand and dirt comes in between the brushes and wear them out quickly,  I had a brand new sport tuned motor that after a few runs the brushes where completely gone, and other brusheds motor that overheat or died because of dirt comes in them and wear them out , in the end brushless motors are cheaper because they don't wear that quick, my first brushles motor combo that I bought 8 years ago still runs after a lot of runs, you can't do that with a brushed motor.

And to be honest I am used to the speed and power of brushless motors, I do not see me running a car with a sivercan motor, for me to boring, even my lunchbox has a castle sidewinder 5700kv combo in it, and yes I can drive and control it as long as you don't give it full throttle at once its fine.

I only use completly closed can brushless motors.

The only car  for now that  I am thinking of putting an  brushed motor in, is my tamiya m-05, light weight  car that runs on tarmac, with the brushless motor it has in it now and with front wheel drive, you have to be very gentle on the trigger,  because if you don't you only have wheelspin and eating tires.

 

[Mouc-RC 469]

19 hours ago, Saito2 said:

[...]

So, the answer is brushed, and sealed can at that, more often than not. I'm pretty much a vintage and rerelease guy (with the exception of giving the TD4 and BBX a try, both also brushed BTW) and brushed just suits me and my vehicles the best. Everything I run is rockin' a silvercan, Torque Tuned or on the off chance, a Sport Tuned. Some bigger monster trucks get 550s or 15T Firebolts. I'm in love with the way things were and that means there's no room for brushless or Lipo in my heart. I'd probably still run Nicads instead of  Nimh if they were still around. Most of my radios are still AM as evidenced by the classic antenna tubes bopping about in the pictures I post. If ESCs weren't included in kits, I'd also have more MSCs in my fleet too. Yep, I'm that stupid.

The RC hobby is one area where I don't need to be shoved and pushed around by technology. I don't mind the progress of technology but I don't like being forced into it when the old way was simpler/easier. Give me dash buttons and keys for my cars, not touchscreens and fobs. Still pay with cash and still love watching bewildered kids at the grocery checkout scrambling on how to make change. If you like tech, great. Just accept my answer of "No thank you, not interested." rather than going on a long ramble about the benefits of lipos and brushless. I'm going out the yell at a suspicious-looking cloud and tell those kids to keep off my lawn now.

This, just above. I could have written this (with much less style for sure).

Thank you Sir Saito2

[El Gecko 1426]

Most of my cars are vintage, and brushed is what I started with back in the 90s, so I've just kept on with it. I favor interchangeability and rebuild-ability in RC, so I stick with what I know.

My DT02 is the only car I would possibly ever consider a brushless system in, however with its current 17t brushed motor and a 16t pinion, it's tons of fun and seems plenty fast enough.

It has already devoured 2 sets of rear tires in the brushed configuration, so I can only imagine how quickly they'd disappear if I went brushless.

[Kowalski86 3983]

21 hours ago, alvinlwh said:

I do have a handful of brushless but the cost and ESC  setup kind of puts be off.

Considering that they all come from the same 2 or 3 factories in China, the costs put me off too. Then you have the programming cards and what not.