Motor Collection - Old School Horsepower

[TRX-1-3]

The Missle restoration is top notch for sure! Amazing.

[dinglem]

Wow! Amazing stuff with rebuilding those motors - and I really like your motor display!

- What are the overall dimensions (LxWxH) of your display case?

Thanks - it's an old light Oak set of shelves my father made in his 20's.... so about 50 years ago.... and he has now added the tiered slot-in pieces for me.

It is 56.5cm wide by 18cm deep. No idea on the height, but probably a bit taller than it needs to be.

Rows are 9 motors then 8, with a radial offset between each of 6cm. Seems to have worked out about right. The back rows are double drilled with half spacings so i can line up just armatures if required.

I did a purple Missile recently too, which you can also see on the shelf.

[dinglem]

I was also very humbled to have been offered this selection of very special MG motors a few weeks ago. I was contacted out of the blue asking if i would like them for my collection. The owner was a Team Schumacher driver through the early 90's and used MG motors built for him by Mick Goddard. These range from 11 - 13 turn and were used at National level in the UK, and some were also special builds using 1.32mm gauge wire specifically for 4minute sprint racing in the US, with those motors having been used at the Florida Winter Nationals. The original owner has an amazing racing history and incredibly all he asked for in return for this massive haul was that i made a cash donation to charity. An amazing gesture indeed.

[dinglem]

I expressed an interest in this Reedy Gold Star when chatting to an RC guy over in Australia on an RC Fb page, and he said i could have it for free!!

It arrived recently, and i am totally WOW'd by the condition of it - probably one of the very best i have ever seen i think.

[jcwrks]

I expressed an interest in this Reedy Gold Star when chatting to an RC guy over in Australia on an RC Fb page, and he said i could have it for free!!

It arrived recently, and i am totally WOW'd by the condition of it - probably one of the very best i have ever seen i think.

My elementary school teachers used those same stars back in the 80's IIRC. That's a lovely motor.

[Bakauata]

Wow! Amazing collection and work.

Love those BMXs more though.

[dinglem]

Wow! Amazing collection and work.

Love those BMXs more though.

Hehe... thanks mate. There are more of both; motors and BMX

[dinglem]

In the floro MG collection I posted up further up the page there is a purple can back right which has an armature but the endbell is missing. Turns out the bearings were shot also.

I managed to source the correct EPIC gold low fin endbell from a guy over in Europe, who very kindly sent it over to me. I sent all of the parts off to my motor builder who gave the can a zap and magnet re-align, the comm was skimmed and the bearings and brushes replaced. Turned into a bit of a beast!

[dinglem]

Interesting discovery when opening up one of the pink Team MG motors... this one is an 11Triple, which unusually appears to have two different wire diameters. From what i gather there is an ideal amount or cross section of copper you can get on each type of armature, and if you are struggling to get for example a double wound using a wire gauge of say 0.8 if you put 0.8 and a 0.75 it will be a lot easier. I have heard of Mike Reedy doing such things but this is the first MG armature i have ever seen like this. Kinda cool anyway. I am by no means an expert and am just going on what I have been told by a motor builder who used to work alongside Mike at times, so if anybody knows better than please please fill us in.

They all have a spec hand-written on the can. The vast majority are 11Singles, with the wire diameters noted (1.18, 1.25 or 1.32). This one oddball has 11 x 3.

I have sent it off for a rebuild along with one of the 11Single 1.32 examples to act as a comparison.

[V12]

Two different wire diameters at the same armature is not that unusual. At least not for American made motors.

[dinglem]

Two different wire diameters at the same armature is not that unusual. At least not for American made motors.

Certainly not something i have seen previously anyway. I guessed people would know a lot more about it than me

[V12]

I have seen two different wire diameters even for very early Igarashi based motors. What I found is Checkpoint, Trinity and Reedy used two different wire diameters for sure. Maybe also Parma.

I think the idea might be not only two different wire diameters would be easier to wind, but they make a different power curve also. This means if a double 23AWG might be not working for battery duration and a double 24AWG might be not punchy enough a double 23/24AWG could be the solution. At least I found such specs for early Trinity Igarashi motors.

[dinglem]

Great info. Thanks. Not something I would usually look at for off-the-shelf motors, but this particular set were all 11 turn motors built specifically for a team Schumacher driver by MG motors in the UK. They all have subtle tweaks and variations documented on the cans, shorter stacks, some appear to be based on Trinity armatures, it seems like every one has something slightly different about it. Then there is the variations in wire diameter from 1.18, 1.25 to 1.32. The original owner told me the 1.32 versions were built specifically for 7cell 4minute racing in the US which is something out of the ordinary for us UK based racers. I have a lot of motors built by Mick (Mick Goddard - MG) and have never seen him use two different diameters before. I can speak to him on this as he is still going.... (bit deaf these days) but I can only imagine there was a specific race meeting he built this particular 11 Triple for.

Really appreciate your input on this as it is something I know nothing about.

[V12]

I had access to team motors several times. Sometimes these had been prototype motors which made it to production later. Other motors were special made for the racing team.
If there was a certain wind which worked really good, it could work on most track. But sometimes a track was very different or unknown, so there were variations made which could use different can, air gap or something. But going with just different wire diameter (what could include two different wires) made it maybe easier to work with, as other parameters stayed the same. Going with different can etc. could make it more difficult to find a perfect motor setup.
I think such motor variants were made especially for important races as Euros, Worlds etc.

The first one of my special motors I received at the 1985 Offroad Euros. Mike Reedy supplied motors to the Demon team which were different to other motors before. I got a Quad wind which was maybe the first Reedy Quad wind, at least for offroad.

[dinglem]

Whilst a couple of the above pink team MG's are off being rebuilt, here is another motor some of you may not have even heard of.

The guy rebuilding my motors is Glyn Ward, who was actually a good friend of Mike Reedy. Glyn ran Brampton Models over in the UK, and had a team of drivers racing for him (some of whom I raced against quite regularly at one time or another). Glyn eventually set about building his own motors, which went by the name of BRM. These were slightly after my time in RC by a couple of years, but I recently got my hands on a nice one and sent it 'back home' to Glyn for a rebuild.

I guess it is pretty obvious from the pictures, but it is a 12 Double.