[Machine]

hopefully someone can help me here.
Been tanking for 3 years now and have used just about every tank controller out there.
Some i like, some i don't. So Ive been searching for a good board to use in my upcoming 1/6 scale tiger build.
Was told the TCB would be a great option for such a build. SO I ordered it from Hobby King and it arrived yesterday. Going to set it up for 1/16 running as a test bed, but will swap out components as I progress with my 1/6 build.
Not knowing much about ECS's and such...I'm assuming i would need a high amperage ESC to drive a 12v motor. I'm going to guess that I would need at least a 30A ESC based on the rating of 28A. I plan on running 2x 12v cell batteries

Here are the motor specs:
   
Motor Type   Brush + Gear Decelerating Motor
Rated voltage: 12V
Rated power: 250W
No load current: 4.2A
Rated speed: 2700rpm
Rated torque: 0.80N.m
Rated current: 28A
Efficiency: 78%
Reduction ratio: 9.6: 1
Actual speed: approx. 310 rpm
Reference Max loading: about 80 kg
Speed : about 20km/h
 
 

[LukeZ]

First of all, motor specs are great but as I keep preaching here until I'm sure everyone is sick of hearing it, measure your current draw! There is no substitute for taking your own real-world measurements. Of course I understand in some cases (especially 1/6 scale) taking a measurement probably requires having a speed control in the first place since it wouldn't be safe to just hook up the motors directly to your battery. So there is a bit of a chicken/egg conundrum and you may need to buy something first, in which case the specs are the best you have to go on. But even after you buy a controller, still you should take a measurement so you know whether you are within reasonable operating conditions or not.

But yes you are correct, you will need to buy two standard RC car/truck brushed ESCs, or a suitable dual-motor serial controller.

Of the latter you could look at the Sabertooth 2x25 (two motors at 25 amps continuous/50 amps peak) or the Sabertooth 2x32 (two motors at 32 amps continuous/64 amps peak). Both can handle well above 12 volts so that is no problem.

Of the former (RC ESCs) there are a plethora to choose from. Castle Creations and Holmes Hobbies are two high quality brands but there are plenty of less expensive foreign brands as well. ESCs in this range are likely to have various settings and options which you may need to adjust for best use with the TCB, and it might be easier to do the setup on them with standard radio gear (ie, just plug directly into an RC receiver), and only after the settings are saved then connect to the TCB.

Remember when using an RC speed controller that has a BEC (virtually all of them), you must remove the center pin from the servo connector before plugging it into the TCB! There is more information about this in the Wiki.

I have been waiting for someone to use the TCB in a 1/6th scale model. Whatever controller you choose keep us posted and I will be happy to help you with any setup issues you encounter.

Out of curiosity what brand Tiger are you building?

[Machine]

Thanks for the response. I was actually looking into the sabertooth 2x32. At this point I really have nno idea the total weight of this beast when it's done. Would rather have the headroom then cut myself short on the draw.
TO answer your question, it is a scratch build and using components from FOA.

[Machine]

here's the body

[LukeZ]

The 2x32 should definitely meet your requirements and then some, if you don't mind the price. Theoretically the Hobby King XCar 45A ESCs at approximately $10 bucks each should also work, but for some reason it doesn't feel right to put something so cheap into a 1/6th scale model!

However you could buy one of those or a similar Chinese cheapo just to do some testing to determine your current draw, before you spend the big bucks.

Keep us posted on your build, I'm sure there are a lot of people who will be interested to follow along. If you have a build thread on some other forum you can post a link to it here so others can find it.