MiniMicroTrackMonster

which is tougher what lasts longer

misasi

There is no answer to your question. It depends heavily on money and the vehicle. Both can be as tough and last as long.

MiniMicroTrackMonster

thank you very much hav a wonderful chrsitmas

SyCo_VeNoM

Its also dependent on a few other things.

Nitro you can drive till either your arm get tired of holding the controller, or you run outta nitro fuel, whichever comes 1st(probably arm being tired).

Electric your limited in run time to how many batteries you charge before you leave.

Nitro and electric both require some level of tuning, and you can completely destroy either if you screw it up. Electrics tuning generally is trying to get the right pinion,spurgear, and motor turns perfect. Nitro's tuning is more just fiddling with the needles on the carb before you run it.

Maintenence:
Nitro you have to put 3 drops of oil in it after your done to prevent rust. And after a few gallons some require a engine rebuild

Electric if brushed require new brushes after some number of runs(dependant on where you drive and how hard).

Electric (brushless) can generally beat nitro's in speed.

Electric you need chargers (dependant on how many batteries you want to charge at once)

Nitro to start you need glow plug warmer, fuel bottle, glow plug puller, and nitro fuel.

Nitro makes alot of noise (my savage sounds like a lawnmower) (Personally I like the noise)
Electric for the most part is pretty silent.

Nitro has a higher learning curve than electric.

There are more differences but those are the main ones.

Jeremy Z

Is the noise and smell going to be an issue where you're going to run it? For instance, if you're just going to bash it around the neighborhood, you may not make too many friends with Nitro.

With electric brushed motors, the trend is going more towards hotter disposable motors ($12-25 ea.) and when folks want to upgrade in performance, th ey usually upgrade to brushless motors. (except in wet conditios, brushed motors are more tolerant) I don't know how nitro handles wet conditions. With nitro, there's higher performance out of the box than a brushed motor electric, but when you want to upgrade, all you can do is put the biggest engine in that is possible and that's all you can do.

Nitros are more mechanically complex, as they have clutches starting systems, and a throttle servo for the carburator. To get the most out of electrics, you should either know how or be willing to learn how to solder.

High performance nitro requires less initial investment, but more maintenance investment. (e.g. fuel @ $30 a gallon) Electric require the purchase of a charger and at least a few sets of battery packs. This can raise the initial price by a couple hundred dollars, but the battery packs last for years.

Electrics can be made smaller, for indoor racing and lower cost. Nitros generally are not seen below 1/8 scale. As electrics get bigger than 1/10 scale, the cost for motors and appropriate batteries and speed controls goes up QUICKLY. It isn't such a big deal with nitros. A 1/8 nitro model costs less to get set up and run than a 1/8 scale electric. Generally speaking, 1/8 scale is more rugged than 1/10 and smaller scale, but electric 1/10 trucks by Traxxas and HPI are very rugged these days. They can be crashed and rolled quite a bit before something breaks.

Access

He might be asking which one lasts longer over time, ie. how many gallons can you run through a nitro engine before it needs to be replaced or rebuilt, and the same for an electric motor.

SyCo_VeNoM

well that thing about nitros not seen below 1/8th isn't accurate.

Now if your talking about nitro 1/10th scale buggies than its very accurate. Only 3-5 nitro 1/10th scale buggies exist to my knowledge (or that I could find) ones made by redcat, think Ofna has one, Duratrax has one, and last I think is Himoto(but I pretty sure its identical to the redcat one). Where as theres like a billion elec 1/10th buggies to choose from

Other than that the % of nitros to elecs models made seems spread pretty even in the trucks and cars.

There's even 1/16th scale Nitros. CEN, Kyosho, Sportsworks, Trinity, and Xray produce em.

Now I will say Nitros are very rarely seen above 1/8th because at that point normal Gas engines come into play(there is the Sagave 5T which is a 1/5th scale Nitro), And I'm sure its not possible to miniturize them to under 1/16th

And about the nitro Rebuilding. 1/8th scale LRP 30s(going to be my next Savage engine), to my understanding, if treated right can last over 8 gallons before needing a new piston and sleeve. A piston and sleeve generally are $50 or so. Some engine brands might need it sooner (Kingstar is notorious for poor quality they are in Savages K4.6 and K5.9 not to be confused with the HPI F4.6 made by Force) than others. I've heard of K5.9s lasting over 6 gallons though.

Now 1/10th like I said my ($65) HPI NitroStar T-15 has gotten about 80% of a gallon in it(approximately 12-14 hours used) and still behaves the same as when I 1st ran it. And if it keeps going as is I think I'll get another 2 gallons through it before it pinch gets problematic. And when it does I'll prolly just buy another new engine(or send the piston and sleeve out for re-pinching) seeing it costs almost the same to rebuild it.

So it all really depends on the driver, and what your going to use it for.

BTW Jeremy that higher maintenance cost of nitro. Yes batteries might last for years (probably 2 before the chemicals in them start to degrade).but lets look at initial investment over long term. Nitro fuel costs by me $30 a gallon, a 2cell Lipo battery costs between $30 (shipped) to $60 for moderate performance ones. Unless you buy 1 battery and only use that one you will be under the run cost of nitro. But you generally need 2-3+ batteries. That can cost between $60-120 for 2 or $90-180 for 3 (again depending on quality and brand) + you need chargers to charge them all. Than when you shelve it you need to make sure it holds its charge. so for around 2 years for 3 batteries it can cost from between $90 to $180 vs buying around $90-120 in Nitro. (depends on vehicle how much you need like I said my 1/10th T-15 gets around 16-18 hours of runtime per gallon). The most you should go through in nitro on 1/10th I'd say is 2 gallons a year, then again it also depends on your engine just like with real cars.

and yes nitros are more mechanically complex but electrics are more electronically complex. Electrics you got an ESC, and motor you have to monitor for temps. I wil say though elec RTRs are more newbie friendly because they are more forgiving. A Nitro RTR if you fudge it up during breakin the engines toast (if you clean up a blown nitro engines they make excellent paperweights BTW ).

Also theres other ways to upgrade Nitros performance without replacing the engine. You can buy a better tuned pipe, some will give a 5% increase in performance over stock. Or kind of like electric replace the clutch bell(pinion is elecs counterpart) with a higher or lower toothed one (depending if you want more torque or speed). You can also lean the ammount of fuel going into the nitro engine (not recommended it could blow the engine). And if you want insane nitro power slap a 1/8th scale nitro engine and pipe into a 1/10th scale and it should literally fly off the ground

scoobs92

your driving is the answer to that queston its all how you drive it \bash it\race it

bronx boy

electric is low mantenence and can last a long time i have some cars from the early 1980s nitro can last just as long but you have to stay up on them they need to be tuned differently each day its not hard once you learn how and these days with the brushless who knows how long they will last it is starting to temp me into getting one i hate change but its getting real hard to resist

piddlefoot

Electric lasts longer.
Electric is tougher.

Electric motors dont require after-run. Something alot of people are slack with.
Electric cars are cleaner and dont get  fuels onto the plastics or tyres to degrade them.
They are also plug and play, very easy.
You can store an electric car in a shed for a long period with less hassle than a nitro one.

Electric is tougher because they have less parts a lower centre of gravity, better balanced chassis, and a  stronger chassis in most cases.
A tougher car, is a car that by default will last longer in most cases.
You cant beat electric here.

An electric brushed motor is very simple by comparison to a nitro one, and will out last it by years.
A brushless motor will outlast them all.

scoobs92

lower center of gravity why would electric sit lower and stronger chassis nitro tend to have metal i havent seen too many metal stock electrics i like both but ive seen nitros that are 10+ years and are still going as if they are new they both have goods and bads

piddlefoot

If l can use the E-Revo as an exsample.

The E-Revo chassis is a tubbed resin type, far more flexible than that of its cousin nitro revo with the alloy chassis. It does not stay bent.
l have tamia cars about 20 years old, there electric.
l have a shed full of nitro, the running cost of maintaining about a dozen nitro cars at once is a little crazy after a few years.
Electric is soooo much cheaper to maintain.

The centre of gravity.
A nitro motor is typically around  80mm to100mm high, and top heavy, it also has the added weight on the engine crank of a clutch.
The electric motor is much smaller, has no clutch attached to crank.
The nitro motor in 99% of cases is not mounted in the centre of the chassis, unbalancing it.
The electric one is not quite in the centre either, but its alot closer, achieving a better balanced car overall.

So using the Revo and E-Revo as an exsample, straight out of the box you will notice the E-Revo sits alot lower, more like a Truggy or buggy.
When you jump nitro revo its rear heavy ,takes effort to keep level and land perfect every time.
When you jump E-Revo it sits level in flight with no effort. Landing is easy.
When you put the power to the ground the E-Revo [ useing batteries that compare to nitro speeds, Nimh, ] the E-Revo still beats nitro revo on any surface, tells you the chassis is better and the car gets more traction.

Having thought more about it, a Flux would be a bad exsample, they have a high centre of gravity due to there suspension, not a fault, just a different design, so this princible doesnt work for all makes and models, but if you compare a Flux to a 4.6 savy, l own both, you will find the Flux a better truck overall, bar the sound.Nitro is grouse for its noise.

They do both have goods and bads, but he asked, whats tougher and what lasts longer, in my opinion its absolutely electric, for cost over time and durability.

l have never, in over 20 years of driving electric and nitro, re-built an electric motor ! Ever !
l have however re-built dozens of nitro engines over the same period of time.
On top of that lve had to pull engines down from brand new to seal them, and pull them down to maintain and check them, its alota work and time.

supertib

A nitro truggy will smoke a E-revo.handles better, jumps better, accelerates better and has far better handling.... Nitro Truggy for the win...

Here is Nitro vs BL

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lr7vp8P9IqY

Nitro rocks, its lighter, jumps with more control and has way better track manners....BL is cool, but not nowhere near what the fanboys are claiming....

bronx boy

electric is a lazy mans toy if you like tofiddle with cars all the time get a nitro if you like to bash till you break something go for the electric i have both when my godson is busting my chops that he wants to play i give him the electric when i dont want to get dirty and smelly so way the differences and get what you want

piddlefoot

Supertib a nitro Truggy will not smoke a brushless revo with the right batteries, and by the way the land speed record in RC is held by a brushless electric, not a SLOW nitro machine.
Simple fact is mate, your nitro engine cannot produce anywhere near the same torque right through the rev band.
Nitro IS slower.
Your truggy will absolutely smoke any revo on a track, erm, a truggy is a cross between a Monster Truck and a Buggy, ie, Truggy, they were designed to race on tracks.Which in comparison to the E-Revos top speed are very small tracks, l dont know of a single comp track around here where the revo gets to top speed.The truggies do, low gearing, for a track race.....

Put it on a road the E-Revo brushless in a line will utterly SMASH the truggy.And wheely at 80klm/h too !


About that video, thats a joke mate, pretty poor comparison, l drive against nitro truggies every weekend, and am YET to see one beat the revo across the paddock and back, which is about 120m long. LIPO OWNS NITRO. You will see. Time is on electric's side, our batteries will only improve and cars get faster, just how much more development can be done on a nitro engine, and you all forget that a battery can deliver more energy per second than any nitro fuel can.Your behind the 8 ball.

But if you want to believe nitro is truelly faster than electric, go for it, its your wallet.

Supertib, my Associated truggy, brushless, will smoke ANY nitro truggy you own. On any truggy track. On any road.
The electric truggy revs far more than the nitro one.Electric owns for speed.


PS, bronkboy, all those fuel chemicals you like tinkering with so much and think is great for the youngster to get into are known for a fact, to cause cancer. Alot of that is avoided with electric.
And call me lazy if you like, would l be rude if a called nitro drivers stupid for wanting all the extra hassle and danger of nitro for less speed and reliability and the seriously real risk of cancer ?

l do own both, but it clear whats the better machine, tougher, and faster.

l like driving the HPIbaja ss too.My baja will smoke your truggy, LOL, after l run it over with the baja ! hahaha

SyCo_VeNoM

umm dunno if you ever read the tag on electric wires. they say Handling this product is known to cause cancer...

Nitro in all truth under normal running conditions I doubt would cause cancer (unless your sitting there getting high off the fumes maybe eventually it might but sometime after you die from poisoning...). That cancer thing is Nitromethane in pure form in a confined space for extended periods of time... and from what I read its low on the chart cause chances are you will die from poisoning 1st...

And you whole brushless revo argument is based on a finely tuned revo running with an overkill in batteries. BTW how long can your revo go top speed? I'm guessing 5 minutes max till its dead, and your waiting while it recharges, while the nitro drivers still not even 1/3rd through his tank going top speed.

Truggies are a cross between Stadium Truck and a Buggy...

I swear piddlefoot your post just get more and more ridiculous the more of them I see them... PLEASE do some research and not spout random garbage. Or stick to the Traxxas forum and post how great your revo is with like minded individuals...

Chris_RC

There is a reason 1/8 nitro is far more popular than 1/8 electric.........

When you go to a big race, if you combine all the classes, there is probably 200 people running nitro and about 10-15 running electric.

Nitro engines can improve alot, it is called fuel mileage. Few years ago getting 8 minutes runtime was alot. Now, at race speed guys like Drake could get 13 minutes runtime (ROAR 2009 Nationals) on a 125cc tank. 1/10 cars only have 75cc tanks and engines like the Trinity .12 Draked edition could get ~14 minutes runtime on 75cc! Imagine how much runtime you could get on a gallon of gas.

And I really don't care what is faster on a straight line, if I wanted to go fast I would of got a touring car or dragster. When racing on a track, nitro's are lighter than electrics and they have been around since the 80's, while brushless conversions have only been around since 2008 or so gaining popularity in 2009. So the platform of nitro's are more proven and result in faster laptimes. You don't need to go faster than 35mph on the straightaway really, and the smooth useable powerband of nitros gives more traction than the on/off switch powerband of electrics, not to mention the tires will not wear nearly as much because of all the wheelspin.

Give it up piddlefoot, your E-Revo sucks and can't match a nice buggy or truggy. Comparing an E Revo to a Revo is a bad comparison, a better one would be the 8ight-E 2.0 and the 8ight 2.0.

SyCo_VeNoM

agree my MT1.9 with a nitro star T-15 gets 15-20 mins runtime with a 75cc tank so I would thing the .12 would get a tad more(could be wrong)

Only bonus I see in electric (which is why I got some) is the ability to run in any weather. Personally I don't feel like retuning my nitro to the winter weather where I live seeing it could be 40 one day and -10 the next and theday after 35 again.

cummins driver

My Feedback: (31)

Dude, you really need to give it up Electric is not superior. It has a couple of advantages, but it also has disadvantages. And a buggy or truggy will murder your e-revo in anything that has to do with handling too.

Saying nitro fuel causes cancer is a horrible argument. Do you realize how many chemicals and things go into a battery? You are clearly just extremely biased with no tolerance to someone else having a difference of opinion.

Nitro's have just as many positives as an Electric does. And is FAR more exciting to run IMO. They have feel and character to them, very much unlike an electric vehicle. No charging batteries, no worry of lipo's exploding or catching on fire and burning your house down or your r/c to the ground.

If something goes wrong with your electric setup, you pretty much have to replace the whole ESC, motor, battery, etc... If a nitro engine has a problem, its usually repairable for $20 or so.

How can you call that video a joke? They are both the same truggy, only one is brushless, and one is nitro. I dont know if it hurt your feelings or your ego that the nitro was right there with the brushless the whole time, but the video doesent lie. Lets see video of this purely awesome piece of engineering revo that you own beating a nitro since you do it so often. Surely you have video of it?

Heck for that matter i havent seen a post yet where you posted a picture of anything you own. Lets see a picture or video of ALL your electric and nitro machines lined up since you say you have both. All your gallery has pictures of is a 1/16th revo(is that your brushless revo?), a 3.3 revo, and an off brand 1/8 MT.

Eric

SyCo_VeNoM

cummins he probably can't post a pic of anything but maybe a revo.
He's owned muliple Savage nitros a few Savage flux's(he hated every one, makes sence hate the 1st buy a few more...), as of today a HPI baja 5b, a couple losis, and his pride and joy the Revo brushless that is the fastest and most indestructible vehicle ever made, and can drive on anything and anywhere.

It seems whenever anyone recommends a non-revo he will say he owns one of whatever the person recommended and say its trash and tell them to get a revo because it can't keep up with his vehicle...

Honestly it sounds more like he's trying to justify spending that much money on the revo...

I only feel sorry for the newbies to the hobby trying to get honest opinions because his info is generally very erroneous, extremely biased, and overall unhelpful. example guy asks for nitro monster truck he posts 4 posts saying get a revo with lipos, and savages suck cause there fragile... Guy says thats nice still want a nitro... 2 more post with BS on nitros and how his revo is even the cure for cancer...

Ok I made the last bit about cure for cancer up, but in a way he's saying ppl who use a brushless revo that convert from nitros are being saved from cancer. So I guess its not that far off

Forgot to add: And I've never seen my nitros almost explode from running. If improperly set all it will do is damage a piston and sleeve. Guy on elec forum has a brand new Rustler VXL he used the wrong discharge rate of a lipo in, and the thing almost took his brand new truck up with it. Only way I can see that happen on a Nitro is if you spill the fuel all over the vehicle and decide to start it on fire

supertib

Guys watch this video........ How could anyone not like nitro when it sounds this sweet !

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5qi_ImnmgI

Now doesn't that sound awesome ? sure some brushless are faster, but really what good would more power do anyways, this nitro is already way overpowered !!! viva la Picco !

piddlefoot

Yea sounds wikid.
Cannot argue against that.

But the topic question was whats faster and what lasts longer.
Sry for upsetting some people in here, lm just passionate about what l talk about and was responding to comments.

If you want to compare an apple to an apple, nitro truggy v electric truggy, the answer to the topic question remains the same, electric is tougher and lasts longer.

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Access

The skills involved in driving a modern high-power electric are different than those involved with driving a nitro. You can't just put down one, pick up another and expect to drive competitively. When driving the electric, you need to do everything you do with the nitro and then you need to control the throttle b'cos otherwise all that instant power will only get you into trouble. But if you learn the limits of your vehicle and the limits of the track, driving accordingly, you will beat the nitro.

Honestly every once in a while someone asks this question and people have to justify their mentality or the choices they made. Don't spend your holiday arguing or trying to prove your point, folks.

piddlefoot

Yes access they dont comprehend the true power of LIPO electric.So much more driving skill.....

Nitro fuel, Cummins driver, is absolutely cancerous, better understand what you use, or in the long term you will suffer. Very skin penetrationable, be careful digger.And never splash it into your eyes.Very bad in eyes, eyes will absorb chemicals faster .
Fact is, useing nitro you cannot really avoid getting heaps of that fuel on your hands, regularly.All adds up mate.
And l in 30 years have never been exposed to the internal chemicals of a battery, of any type.
Pretty obvious whats actually safer long term. And only complacent people explode LIPO's.......Those same people have nitro fires....

Your comments about repairs are laughable cummins, seriously run nitro, 5 cars for 5 years on a race track, and 5 electric on a track for 5 years, electric utterly owns it for repairs and cost, joker.....All that crap about the ESC, how is an ESC more unreliable than your twitchy servo.....hahahahahahahahahahaha l'll update the photo bucket just for you chum, ok, fa18 there somehwre to, 1.7m long. cheap chopper etc, The sheds 6x6m all RC.Anyways enough of the nasty accusations ay, whats the matter have l hit a nerve ? Will a picture calm you down ? l will fix it this week sometime, got kids so, need time to clean up shed for the pic etc, give us a week ok.

Didnt respond to your post yesterday for lack of time.

l will post a pic of my beloved associated LIPO brushless beast that will OWN any nitro one [ truggy/buggy ] out there on a road for speed race, easy.
And the E-Revo's, flux, hyper 7's kyosho ram, and truggy, boat, chopper  bla bla bla bla bla bla yudda yudda yudda pleb pleb pleb. ! ok ?

Chris_RC

If you are roosting with a nitro car an electric car won't accelerate any faster on a dirt track, it will only be more uncontrollable.

piddlefoot, the materials used to make batteries are far more toxic than nitro fuel.