Motor Collection - Old School Horsepower

[dinglem]

Just for reference, here are two early pre-Yokomo endbells which have been converted to slot brushes. This service was offered by Checkpoint and sold through Bolink.

I have located these two after much hunting but still haven't sealed the deal to get my hands on them yet....if anybody has such an endbell kicking about then please do let me know. Proper old school motor modification. These would have been a massive step forward from the old flat bent metal pressure plate brush systems previously seen, mainly because they were rebuildable and you could adjust spring tension. I guess the guys doing this went on to modifying the early open endbell motors using this same method.

Nobody really looks back at the onset of motor mods and these early worked-over Igarashi and Mabuchi motors, but i find that era fascinating.

[MarkyDents]

Picked these up a ways back now, is the one on the left a Team Checkpoint as well ?

[dinglem]

Yes it is.

Got pics of both ends? Base should have long slots.

[juicedcoupe]

As winds dropped due to better cell availability, then larger brushes may have proved advantageous.

Trinity P-94 and later Kyosho motors come to mind. With square 4.9 and 5mm brushes, instead of 4X5 mm stand-up and laydown designs.

I could see the advantage of larger brushes being particularly useful in 7 cell stadium trucks, as their increased surface area would provide better current handling and cooling.

[V12]

I have my original WetMag IV which came with the engravings from when i opened the packet so I can confirm they were there from the factory.

They all look the same. I have a WetMag IV, WetMag II and an I now all of which have them.

I actually make a point of looking out for the markings now and if i buy others i will ensure they are the marked examples.

The markings were made at the Losi factory indeed.
I have no idea why some motors were not marked. But I think the missing markings were just a thing of randomly forgotten or the motors were made by an other person than their motor builder Randy Hunter.

[V12]

Picked these up a ways back now, is the one on the left a Team Checkpoint as well ?A752F24D-83FA-463F-9B14-46AAB0917CE3.jpeg

As long as this motor got slot brushes.
A few of the Checkpoint cans were sold to Fantom who sold them along with their modified armatures.
But these motors came with a standard size brush setup.

I have such Fantom motor but did not found the time so far posting at the museum.

[V12]

Just for reference, here are two early pre-Yokomo endbells which have been converted to slot brushes. This service was offered by Checkpoint and sold through Bolink.

slot igarashi.jpg


I have located these two after much hunting but still haven't sealed the deal to get my hands on them yet....if anybody has such an endbell kicking about then please do let me know. Proper old school motor modification. These would have been a massive step forward from the old flat bent metal pressure plate brush systems previously seen, mainly because they were rebuildable and you could adjust spring tension. I guess the guys doing this went on to modifying the early open endbell motors using this same method.

Nobody really looks back at the onset of motor mods and these early worked-over Igarashi and Mabuchi motors, but i find that era fascinating.

Have not been much at the forum for a couple of months and find lots of interesting postings now.

Regarding your posting about Checkpoint and BoLink.
When Jim Greenemeyer of Checkpoint went into making R/C motors, he made also BoLinks top of the line modified motors. These were sold as 'BoLink Stage ... ' motors. Their full name actually was with a number added, Stage 1 to Stage 5 overall. The Stage number represented the work which went into the specific motor.
I think they were quite the same as his own motors beside the sticker.
The highest Stage number was a full modified + the brush conversion.
I´m just not sure currently if all of his motors were sold through Bolink. But the special modular endbell was available through BoLink for sure.
https://classicrc.wordpress.com/motors/checkpoint-2/checkpoint-igarashi-modular-endbell/

I have such endbell along with the card header.
But such endbell conversion as a standalone part is super rare, especially the BoLink version.
All of the Checkpoint stuff sold through BoLink with BoLink sticker or card header is super rare, because it was just for a very limited time frame.
Later Checkpoint stopped making motors for BoLink.
There are a lot of facts about Checkpoint which are not known to most guys today.
The older guys who have been involved with slot cars might know them.
But it is a different story and offtopic here.

Actually the main reason for inventing the modular endbell with slot brushes was the fact, the original brushes of Igarashi motors were not really suited to carry a lot of current. The compound used for making those brushes was not up to the specs needed for the job, for hot modified armatures.

The metal plate spring used for the original brush system was not very good either, but this was not the main reason. Because you could reinforce that flat spring to carry more current or make it stiffer as it had been done by other companies as Delta.
But making the modular endbell was something different and much more work involved. So it was quite expensive even back in those early days.

I found a couple of the modular endbells, brushes and springs. But don´t ask me how many years I spent for searching. And how much $

But I´m addicted to those early motors. Especially the Igarashis as such original motor was never intended for R/C use and motor builders had to invest much more knowledge and work in those, than for any others later.
My favorites are Delta, Checkpoint, Trinity, Parma Ferrari, Sping, the crazy Moebus motor which goes even one step further than the Checkpoints.

[Phin]

What brand/size slot car motors were these brushes from? I have a pack of Bolink Stage IV brushes + springs, and was going to repro my own endbell if I can find the right brush holders.

[V12]

There was not just one brand. At some point I knew the size but don´t remember now. But also I´m not a slot expert. Just knew what Jim told me or what I found. But old brain is fading.

Usually slot brushes don´t have a shunt wire as it´s with R/C motors.
There were a few but not much. From what I heard the shunt wire was just clamped to the brush by the brush spring.
Checkpoint did have slot brushes with shunt wires.

BTW do you have photos of your Stage IV brushes and springs?

[dinglem]

There is a lot more history behind several of the well known RC motor builders, all originating from the 70's slot scene.

I started delving into this and ended up buying an original Mick Goddard (MG) 550 slot car, fully hand made from brass bars and plates. Super cool. Mick was big in the slot scene before moving over to R/C and his slot motor building reputation went with him. if you go into the slot car section on this very forum you can see the car chassis and one of the signed M. Goddard Mura motors complete with heatsink. If you look at the prototype flat sided MG can i have you can see how that heatsink design was carried over.

I have a few motors signed by Mick, in answer to the question above they are Mura motors. When you look for those on historic slot car forums you will find a decent supply of the correct brush hoods.

Regarding the slot motors - Team Checkpoint was one of the big names in 70's slots way back when, but Jim Greenemeyer actually bought the team name as a successful entity from founder Bill Streube what i can gather.

The trend of actually etching the builder and spec name onto the armature segments was a thing back then.... i have several highly regarded slot armatures from Thorp and Steube. I have quite recently seen an early Trinity RC armature which was similarly engraved.... very very cool indeed.

Not many folks delve this far back into the pre-RC history and the reasoning behind many of the top builders using slot brush conversions - they didn't just 'try it'.... but instead it was based upon their years of experience using slot car motors at a high level.

What is fascinating is the Steube name i mentioned above. That armature i have is quite prized in the slot car world, as the builder, Bill Steube, was the founder of Team Checkpoint, and the team was created when Gene Husting put together the "Rod & Custom" race series. If you can find a Steube or 'Big Jim' slot armature today they are worth strong money.

I can only imagine that is it no coincidence then that the MG and Checkpoint motors are the two who have the engravings of the spec somewhere on the motor as a carry over from these slot car days. This is also another reason why I hold the MG stuff in such high regard as Mick had a very strong reputation in the slot world way before his involvement in RC.

[Phin]

BTW do you have photos of your Stage IV brushes and springs?

Here ya go:

[dinglem]

I have been watching a set like that on eBay since forever.

I do have quite a few new Checkpoint Platinum brush pairs now though, to enable me to rebuild these slot brush motors i have. I am up to 5 open endbell modular slot brush motors now, plus 6 Platinum Series motors.

[V12]

Yes Team Checkpoint was founded by Bill Steube and Jim Greenemeyer was working there.
At some point Bill wanted to retire and Jim bought the name then. That´s what I heard from Jim himself.

But Bill and his son Mike later started a new company Pro Slot.
In the UK there was also a company Pro Slot, but they were not related to the US company.

I have seen several Pro Slot armatures in the last couple of years and they look very close to the old Checkpoint slot armatures.

It´s crazy but most of the early R/C pioneers actually came from slot racing.
Associated had their roots in slot racing, owned a race track and sold tires and chassis.
Bill Morrisey and John Thorp and many more.
And my personal favorite driver ever ... Arturo Carbonell, also was a high class slot racer.

[coxbros1]

Well I had to know, so I tested...we have a Revoltion "killer" 14 x 2 in our stable....it runs good but nowhere near the Brutus...the comms been cut several times it appears plus I cut it...it turns 27,500 rpm....so I changed to brand new bearings and put a Trinity/Kyosho modular end bell on it with slot brushes, set the timing where it pulled 3amps at 7.2v...it cranked 28,800 rpm...and was SMOOOOOOTH!....I immediately put the factory end bell back on and set it to 3amps....27,300rpm and it wasnt as smooth....well now u have it, these are the facts

[V12]

Regarding slot motors, I have exactly one armature.
Brandnew in tube and still in bag.
I bought it a couple years ago because I wanted to compare with R/C armature and because it´s one of my favorite motor brands ... Checkpoint.
It is one of the rare Checkpoint armatures of the Greenemeyer era, because he stopped selling slot armatures soon after he went into R/C motors.
At some point he told me he still made a few slot armatures and motors, but just for team drivers, not for sale.

The armature is a Stage IV 16T with all the mods available. And of course the red painting which was typical for early Checkpoint and the engraved symbols at the armature stack.

I have seen Thorp slot armatures as well, but didn´t buy because the Checkpoint was my favorite.
Now I regret not buying the Thorp.