Thanks for the feedback guys! Neu, or Lehner of course (go Europe! :)), sounds nice, maybe one day,... after selling one of my kidneys :). 6S use here was because the motor was only rated 6S (due to excellent rotor quality I quess). Also I'm a bit paranoid of frying my XL2 and want to give it some head-room, also under heavy breaking Voltage bumps (
pdf alert). I do have a 7S pack already though, just no >6S charger yet. Might only be a marginal gain in Current reduction, but better than nothing.
You guys really think the kv is the problem? In the end what counts is the Power a motor is able to deliver right? Kv just determines over how wide of an RPM range that Power is spread out. I can't imagine a big fat Castle 2028-800kv, spinning below 30k RPM max, would not be able to pull even taller pinion/spur combos than what I used?
I think main factor the motor died was just the poor quality. If you look at a snip out of one of the logs posted above, you can see that the load with that gearing, even at start-up, actually isn't all that high: 60 A average, 160 A max... should be peanuts for a proper motor, no?
I already have a 1527-1500kv size motor (TP4070 - "poor-man's Neu 1527") in my truggy. It's geared for ~91 mph no-load nominal and it needs very careful throttling and rolling starts to stay under 200 A (6S); it's pulling over 220 A frequently with that gearing (logs below), but it holds up well. I'm really impressed with the performance of that motor, but I more-or-less built the GT2 around the big-block motor mount, so it needs a 56 mm diameter motor :). TP56xx are likely candidates, but not sure yet about kv and size (weight). Would have been nice if Castle had a motor between 1717 and 2028 size.
http://www.rc-monster.com/forum/show...06&postcount=8