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I'm newly back into the hobby and am updating an RC10 to some modern electronics. I have to make a decision about connectors.

Is there a practical difference between Deans and XT60 connectors... any reason to chose one connection system over the other?

Thanks,

Scott

Deans Ultras were very popular back in the ol' days but IMHO, they're a pain to solder. Soldering a round wire to a flat contact requires a third hand tool and even then, it's not fun. The solder job can end up looking chunky if it's not done neatly. You need to heat-shrink the joints. Furthermore, it *is* physically possible to short out opposing Deans connectors if you reverse-connect them...not a good thing for your ESC. If you mess up a solder or accidentally solder things with wrong polarity, you have to desolder the whole thing and start over. Lastly, you have to watch out to not buy el-cheapo Made In China clones of Deans Ultras, which are even worse...just getting the contacts warm with your soldering iron will cause the metal spades to slide out of the orange connector housing. I did Deans but after discovering EC3's, I won't go back.

I re-did all of my cars with EC3 connectors, which are like bullets but have blue connectors that are impossible to reverse-volt. It's much easier (with only two hands) to solder a round wire inside a round cup. Once soldered, you snap the connectors inside the blue housings with a precision screwdriver tip. I find it helps to warm the soldered connector bullets up a bit with a heat gun before pressing them into the housings. If you do them right, you don't require heatshrink. If you screw them up, it's possible to pop them out of the housing and snap them back in. Here's a good video showing how easy they are to do:

http://www.maydayrc.com/neat-way-to-solder-ec3-plugs

Thanks for that info and link! Those EC3 connectors look very easy to use.

I'm a 20+ year Deans plug guy, you can't teach an old dog new tricks. As Coelacanth says avoid the cheap Chinese copies.

RC10th wrote:I'm a 20+ year Deans plug guy, you can't teach an old dog new tricks. As Coelacanth says avoid the cheap Chinese copies.

I'm an old dog too, and I like new tricks...if they're better tricks.

variant45 wrote:Is there a practical difference between Deans and XT60 connectors... any reason to chose one connection system over the other?

Thanks,

Scott

XT60 can handle up to 60A constant current, as for the Deans plug, It can handle lower current, as for the exact AMP, even deans don't have a specs rating for their products but it is noted that its rating can handle the same rating as a 12awg wire. coz it cannot dissipate heat generated with high system loading. roughly at around 40A continuous rating.

other than that maybe saving a few grams off deans vs a XT60.

I still prefer Deans or Anderson connectors, those new ones look stupid on an old car imo

If you try to plug in a Deans backwards, all I can say is that you deserve the result. I can't image it being possible without purposely trying to do it and even then I don't think you would get a spark. 4 pin Deans yes, but not ultras. I guess they need to ask you if you can pass a square peg/round hole test first lol

All my 3S Aircraft stuff is wired with XT60 or EC5 for the big 12s stuff... I'll probably go with EC3 when I go lipo in the cars.

Thanks for all the responses, decided to go with the EC3's after watching the video linked by Coelacanth

Scott

I switched to Dean's from the green Race Prep connectors a long time ago.

It makes it nice when most of the people you run with use the same connectors that way you can share batteries/charger/motors/etc.

I run Dean's with 3s and have never even had them get warm.