GF-01 Motor and speed controller upgrade + FPV

[hallamnet 9]

Hi all. 

New to the site and this is my first post and hope someone can help me out. 

I have recently bought my first ground model and chose the GF-01 Heavy Dump truck for learning with and i must say, it has been great fun and very durable. Not broken anything yet but thinking about a few upgrades now i'm happy with the controls, orientation, cornering and so on.  

I used to fly drones quite a bit and had some 200mw VTX's and cameras spare so have kitted Dump Truck out with an FPV system and i just say as again, sooooo much fun. I will try and get some videos posted at some point soon and will update this post. 

From my previous drone life, I and have the kit for charging lipo's so decided to upgrade my 5000mah NiMh battery to a Gens Ace Hard Case 2S LiPo 5500mAh 50C. Checked dimensions and will fit just right if i have got my measurements right. This should be here tomorrow and looking forward to the little bit of extra power. Also bought an upgraded servo that is the Savox SW1210SG Waterproof Metal Gear Digital Servo - 32kg - 0.13s as my steering is quite unresponsive at present with a standard carson 3kg servo and have been told the Savox 1210 servo will help greatly!

I am currently running the Torque Tuned Motor and the Etronix ET0102 Probe WATERPROOF Forward + Reverse 100 Amp 15 Turn ESC (Nimh + Lipo) but looking to now upgrade to a brushless setup. Can anyone help me in the right direction of what would be the best setup to get for this. I do still want to keep the option of reverse bu hoping it will be a bit more responsive actually selecting reverse as currently if i'm going forward and pull back on throttle, the car will not go backwards right away. I have to almost go neutral first ith the throttle and then pull back to reverse. 

Thanks all and will catch you soon. 

[•Axle 145]

Hi Hallamnet,

Welcome to the forum, the FPV camera sounds very interesting indeed, I’d be interested to see more of this as I’ve had a little look myself. The GF-01 seems to be a very sturdy platform, if you want more from it I would personally start with adding bearings throughout with a small children’s brush ‘paint’ a thin coating of Tamiya ceramic grease to all plastic gears, double check diffs are working nicely, add a steel pinion instead of the butter soft standard 18t one, you can go 18t or 20t and metal wheel hex adapters for wheels.

After that you could go further with steering, it’s up to you...

Here is a good thread to follow as I’ve just added a Hobbywing Max10 3300kv combo and very please with it and others are taking things further with the WR-02, the rear wheeled version.

 

[burakol 462]

I used a 13.5t sensored brushless for two weeks in my Gf01 with the kit ESC (TBLE02S) and it was a superior upgrade over the torque tuned for sure. I would have loved to keep the brushless on it, but now I switched again to a 16t brushed setup with a Hobbywing 1060. I would say that comparing the brushed to the brushless, it is nearly identical in top speed, but I'm finding that the torque is greater with the 16t brushed. I'm using a 2s lipo so it also makes a difference versus NiMh. The brushless response is much smoother, but I will be putting the 13.5t in my Super Astute. 

If you are happy with your ESC, then I would suggest to try and go for a lower turn brushed motor since your esc is rated to go down to 15t. If you go brushless, then you have to consider buying a new esc, unless you use the TBLE02S from the kit (if it was supplied). 

The motor I have right now is an old school Kyosho Endoplasma which is a 16t double wound motor. 

[hallamnet 9]

Hi Guys and thanks for the replies. 

I did forget to say when I bought the kit, I opted in for the race bearings set that replaced all of the stock plastic bearings. I thought these would be the first thing to ware out so metal ones from the start. I bought some silicone lube to put on the bearings and internal gears.

With the motor and esc upgrades, this is going to be next and do like the look of the kit Axle advised of being the Hobbywing Max10 3300kv combo. I have looked up information of tuns for motors and still a bit undecided at present. 

I have now been running the model for just over a week and love it. Mainly been running it around the garden and local park with my son but is loads of fun. 

I have now added on the Savox SW1210SG servo and this has totally transformed how the gf-01 responds to turns and is a must for anyone who wants responsive steering. I have also install the Gens ace 2s LiPo 5500 battery and get around 1.5 hours worth of run time that is loads compared to what I was used to flying drones.  

The FPV system on the truck has now had an upgrade to a TBS Unify HV Pro TX and a RunCam Eagle FPV Cam with 140 degree of view and does work really well apart from the camera's internal menu has decided to stop working so no control on image settings. Might look at an Eagle 3 when released. Loads better than the Eachine TX and £8 cam I had lying around. When I was running on the HiMh battery, I was getting some camera black-outs due to current drain so did install an old transmitter battery under the top bucket but I don't need this now I have the Gens Ace LiPo. I do get some brie blackouts when the battery is low but enough to get me home if out of sight. Link to some Garden footage and driving below:- 

Tamiya Dump Truck FPV Fun

I am still using my old Taranis X9D Plus controller with X4R receiver and this is perfect for me at the moment and has a really good range. I have also installed an FRSky LiPo sensor so I can see the individual cell voltages and overall battery charge. The Taranis will also read out cell voltages when these start to get low.

I will give another update and hopefully some more videos when I have some good ones. 

All the best!

Hal

[•Axle 145]

Looking really smart! Definitely something I’d like to do – my wife says it’s creepy 🤣, I like the idea seeing where I’m going from a far.

[hallamnet 9]

It's great fun! Honestly, try it and it and you will see what i mean! 

Gives RC a whole new world and can be very cheap to do.

Here's another from the other day. Great way to keep an eye on the kids when they are playing in the garden. #DADHACK 👍

Fun Times

 

[Silver-Can 402]

That is awesome! Very impressed with you spacial awareness/depth perception etc to negotiate the obstacles and the tunnels and stuff. I would either crash or throw up after the first 10 seconds. Or quite possibly both 😁

Great stuff 👍👍

[hallamnet 9]

So as I have decided to don the 3S battery for the FPV, i decided to hook up my DJI Ocusync Air unit and I must say is a massive upgrade. 

Here's another video from a google recording of the new setup and a few photos on the new setup: -

Ocusync Upgrade

Happy Viewing!

[jupitertwo 1484]

So cool, and looks fun for your boy to interact with it. You can really see the picture quality improve on that last DJI setup. 
 

any recommendations on to start with this FPV gear? I’ve wondered about it before, along with racing drones, but never known a good way to get my feet wet. 

[hallamnet 9]

Hi jupitertwo. 

If you want to stat off in FPV with a drone, try flying a DJI to start with. You have all of the aids with that but do have the option of turning most of them off if you did want to. If you want to start building you own, Then have a look at hobby king or unmannedtechshop and you will find everything here you need to build one from scratch. This way you will learn a lot more on the setup and if you do get any issues along the way, it'll teach you how to fix them. That is the way i went to start off with.

If your not to fussed about learning with a drone and just want to kit a car out, try going for a TBS unify TX, bec, a RunCam eagle and a set of FatShark FPV goggles. That will get you up and running and will give you a good FPV view from your RC. 

Happy RC'ing peeps!