Nasty, Lazy and Cheap (12v 5A Charger Power Supply)
I don’t know about you, but I think the cost of RC power supplies is simply ridiculous. I have a hefty 30A bench supply that I was fed up of lugging around. I wasn’t about spend £50, £100 or even more on a ‘proper’ RC supply.
I wanted a small and light, and above all, cheap power supply to run my HOT POWER (AMAZING name!) charger off. So I made one…
In my Graupner Ultramat 14 charger I knew there was what looked like a laptop power supply to provide mains input capability. I know other chargers use something similar.
My charger only needed 5A input, so I trawled ebay for a laptop supply with 12v 5A output. £8.99 including delivery! Bargain.
Chopped the cable off short, soldered on some 4mm sockets. Then I ruined it by Shoe Gooing the cable to the side of the supply.
I could have gone to the trouble of putting it in a nice box etc, but that would have made it bigger. I could have left the leads dangling, but I wanted it neat and tidy.
The end result is brilliant, perfect for running a regular charger, or a soldering iron.
The boys laughed at my nasty construction skills, but funnily enough they agreed it was a perfect solution for less than a tenner.
Make one today. Hell, if you really want one I’ll make you one, for about £50.
Petit Race 2010 Day Two
*Beep beep, Beep beep*. ”What time is it?” ”OH SHIT!!!”
That was the start to the day, luckily it was only mild panic as the alarm that didn’t go off was set about 15 minutes before the text came in from Crazy Bob…
Rapid getting-up and down to the track for practice.
Mark went out, stripped a spur gear in about 5 feet. Nice start. That’s about the 123rd spur gear he’s stripped on that Cat. And he has no idea why.
Rob goes out, fine and dandy. I go out and the bloody plastic Durga went just ace, admittedly I was playing very safe with an 8.5, but it was a hoot. Hitting the window off the tabletop was a worrying moment, I thought that was game over, but no, back on the track and it was just fine. Don’t worry, I’ll break it later.
After practice I snorted some chocolate soya milk, for breakfast. So cool.
Just been reading Jimmy’s Oople Report, and he’s got pictures of Fabien’s ZX5 conversion, and it seems a Durango 2wd made the A Final yesterday. I knew nothing of this, I was far too busy breaking things to notice anything exciting or exclusive. Jimmy’s way more professional at this reporting lark than I’ll ever be, so I’ll leave it up to him to provide cutting-edge information.
This morning I was watching top heat practice, and Lee Martin was running a Tamiya 511X (correction, it’s 511 not 511x, there isn’t a Tamiya 511x, yet, and not until after a 511WE? or something. There is of course a 501x, that’s what was confusing me…) This foxed me somewhat, but again, it’s no news apparently, everyone knew.
Round 1 resulted in a quicker time than I did all day yesterday in 2wd. The car felt a bit soft, so I’ve increased the pack in my emotional dampers. Yannic Pruemper was in my heat, so four laps I was getting out of his and others way. (The ability sorting is possibly the only thing that could be improved at this event…)
Popped back to the hotel to collect stuff and found a button with a green star in the lift. I pressed it: it illuminated. Nothing more happened.
Round 2: Holy Snappage! I committed to the corner ramp a little too hard, fell off and someone whacked me one. The result, a broken front wishbone, snapped shock shaft and hinge pin bent to 30 degrees. Mark measured it. He carried a protractor in his pitbox, just in case.
Round 3: It stayed in one piece! I gave the track, and other drivers lots of respect, kept it steady and only had one roll in the whole run. Smashing. Discover my damping was too stiff at the rear in comparison to the front, so I’ll tidy that up. A faster time. Maybe even J final!
Rob’s round 3 was an okay run followed by giving it large up the death wall after the final buzzer and removing his front bulkhead. Good work Howett. Moss came to the rescue for the price of a curry.
Round 4: nothing happened, people raced, some got faster, we didn’t, we were too untidy. Oh, I did fiddle some more with damping and the car went ‘fine’. I think I’m sitting in the low hundreds from 127. So better than yesterday, and certainly less far behind the faster
The time came around for the finals, I was 9th in the K final, better than yesterday’s L final by a whole ten places! Woo! Rob was up in the heady heights of the H final, mark in the I.
My final run was spectacular if nothing else, I managed to go from 9th to 2nd to 10th all before the 2nd corner… I then faffed around for 5 minutes trying to break it, but failed! It held together and completed 5 minutes and a huge amount of fun was had.
Both Mark and Rob broke theirs in their respective finals…
So that’s it! We legged it quickly, and had a smooth drive home, buzzing from the best weekend’s racing we’ve had in years. Touring cars is SO much easier than this off-road malarky.
HUGE thanks to everyone: Maritime, Nicolas Petit, racers, supporters, etc etc.
2010? It’s all about the jumps baby.
(Look, even more photos of broken things, including protractors and sweets!)
Phrase of the day: emotional damping.
Petit Race 2010 Day One
Day 1 started at ridiculous o’clock – it began with a 5. We were at the venue just after 6am and the man with the voluminous voice was informing us gently of practice formalities at 6:30am, waking us all up nicely.
One round of in-heat practice was all, the first heat out at 6:45am. The track seemed fun, but hard. The corner platform onto the large tabletop was pretty immense, what you did on the way into the corner pretty much determining where you would land on the straight. And you’d be hoping to land on the straight, not in the wall, window, or on-coming track.
I broke it big style over the tabletop after a handful of laps, snapping a rear wishbone. I was not alone, many many people snapped off the table top, the most spectacular by hitting the window and shearing off the whole front end…
We were further awoken with driver’s briefing with many rules and many reasons to find yourself going home. Mainly involving smoking, drinking and fast food…
Round 1 and I was in heat 11 of 14. This was WAY too high a heat for me. And in round 1 I managed a total of 2 and half laps. Snapping it off the corner platform, breaking a shock top and a turnbuckle. Nice.
So basically I spent the whole morning wrenching on the thing. I put the 4wd together too.
Round 2 was better for me, as much as I actually carried on going around for a whole five minutes. Slightly dispiriting was the leaders had done 50% more laps than me…
Set up changes ensued, rebuilding rear shocks, change of front tyres and we’ll see how round 3 goes…
It’s 4 rounds and a final.
Oh, what are the top guys doing? It seems to be all about Elliot, Shin and Lee… I wont ask Shin for his RB5 setup, as I suspect his thumbs are a touch better than mine…
Round 3 was better, enjoying the run and then went large over the tabletop and snapped the rear wishbone, again. Checking out the quick guys it seems they don’t go large and land it on the down ramp. I’m not yet sure how one does the throttle control to do that…
Mark’s getting it done for a GQ it seems (oh no he didn’t), I’ll be more like LQ…
Round 4 was a repeat of practice: I broke a rear wishbone.
So the scores on the doors…
I was 9th in the L final. There was only 4 in the M final. How amusingly shit!
Mark was in the I final. Rob was in the J final. Gray was in the H. (We had money on Gray being in the B. How wrong we were!)
The finals happened without event, things broke, Rob came third, nothing much else happened.
Then we all got a bit tired and went back to the hotel after watching the A finals. They were jolly impressive, so quick, and so consistent. Impressive stuff. I had to think that touring cars look easy in comparison…
Oh yes, we also wrenched away on 4wds in some sort of attempt to make them work for tomorrow. Looking forward to it. I reckon the damage will be even bigger.
Maritime is just brilliant, well run, tight ship, good communication, ace food, easily the best carpet venue in the UK.
Look! More photos!
Petit Race 2010 Day Zero
We got here. We managed to not get lost, apart from in both Fleet and Clacket Lane services… And also stopped all 4 lanes of the M25 for a moment, missed gearchange, cough.
Maritime circuit its on Chatham Historic Dockyard, easy enough to find, turn left at the big boat.
We hung around for a bit until climbing the stairs (via the window) to possibly the best indoor carpet facility in the UK. Loads of pitting, bagged some tables, and wondered in amazement at the cafe, toy shop and then a jolly quick looking track.
Mark’s wondering how you go round corners on a vertical wall…
It was still being built, but pictures show they layout, additions from last year include no straight and a bridge…
Pizza Hut provided comedy hats, and the hotel provided the smallest twin room I’ve ever seen. Complete with a no-walled wardrobe.
Timetable starts at 6am doors open, Mark and Rob practising before 7am and for some unknown reason I’m in heat 10 of 13… Yeah right, I’ll be dropping down then…
Look, photos!
Phrase of the day: High 5!
Countdown has begun!
So the RCLazy team is off to Chatham in Kent for the PetitRC race this weekend.
My tyres aren’t glued. Si’s car is in bits and Robs is… well being sorted by Rob.
Who knows what will happen but we’re competing for the coveted GQ spot.
Wish us luck for the weekend. But not too much, it’s the RCLazy way.
Mark
[ If we're not wrenching all weekend we'll even try to post an update or two. S. ]
The award for the most ridiculous purchase of 2009
Simon is keeping quiet about this so I have to stick my head into the firing line.
Si [well, it was Gray, achully - s.] stripped his Kyosho RB5 rear hubs at PDA a few weeks ago and in true rcLazy style we opted to purchase some strip proof alloy items rather than throw good money after bad and replace with plastic fantastic items.
Cue an email to RC Champ, who incidentally are the politest and most helpful Japanese RC Shop ever. Possibly in the world.
A price for the goods and postage was agreed, some Yen changed hands and all was good. And then I actually checked the exchange rate.
Ouch! £61 for 4 alloy rear hubs! Never mind no more stripped hubs, should arrive in time for Xmas fun at PDA. Woop!
Err no what actually happened was a delay at Coventry whilst our tiny package of toy RC parts was presented to the almighty commissioner of Her Majestys Revenue and Customs for 4 days.
Then on Christmas Eve eve the letter arrived. Curses! Caught out for the princely sum of £8 VAT and more importantly a simply splendid charge from Parcelfarce of £13 for administration.
So after a return journey up the M27 in rain of biblical proportions, the new shinies were in my grasp.
Dutifully texted Si the glorious image of shiny blue hop ups. He was very excited. But I did then have to tell him that his two shiny hubs had cost £41.
I know we have to pay the taxes etc and i’m really not moaning about that. It’s just one of those D’oh! moments when you realise you could have bought 10 plastic hubs for the same cost and that Parcelfarce are ripping you off for administration charges.
Anyone beat that?
Right, i’m off to order a Sand Scorcher…
Buy Lazy Things !
We’re On eBay
