Castle vs Tacon vs Leopard motor review

[florianz]

hi,

I've been running the Leopard 4074-2000 for some months now and I'm quite happy with it. Best about it: it's not getting very hot, I would say less hot then the MR 3680-1600 I have had before.

I run it on 5s in a truggy. I miss a bit the torque, compared to the motors I have had before (losi celorin 1600kv, MR 3680 1600), but that's due to the higher kv. I really had to get used to the 2000kv.

What's not so cool are the motor wires, as they are stiff and winding ends, but the MR was even worse. The Losi had solder tabs, pretty comfy.

some pics here:
http://www.rc-monster.com/forum/show...leopard&page=3

the wrapping of the rotor is not "beautiful" but it works. I don't think it's carbon fiber.
It's not a high end motor, but a very good motor, for the money paid, has sufficient power.

So I finally had a chance to run all the motors. I could not get accurate data logs on them, as my Data logger was being maxed out. I saw bursts over 120 with all motors, but as I said, it's not really accurate, so I'm not sure just how high they went. I tried to log 1 battery in a parallel setup, and saw 91 amps, that would put the sytem at 182 amps, quite possible, but not confirmable. But also had trouble with the batteries not draining equal, so didn't feel safe doing it for all the motors.

Ran in my E-revo, geared 24/68 with Masher's 3.2, MMM, SPC 8000mah 4s. I have a hole in the windshield , for added air flow, and a dual motor mount, which gives more area for the mount to work like a heatsink, especially with the air blowing right over it. I ran each motor for around 20 minutes, of hard bashing off road. Radar was used for speeds, except with the Tacon, as I was by myself, I used a GPS. Ambient was between 70-72 for all the runs. I take multible temp readings, and don't just use the highest, but try to find the range it's going to run in. Generally by the time you're 10 minutes in, temps should level off.

Xerun 4168, 2250 kv.
Speed was 51mph
motor temp was varying between 120-125
The extra kv rating of this motor shows. It was the fastest, and felt like it. 5 minutes into it's run, the pinion came loose, so it got around a 5 minute break, it's temps might have inched a little higher otherwise.

Castle 2200. While my earlier pics showed the Castle version, I used the Tork version for testing. It has a little smaller overall can, but also has funky nubs, I guess you could say they act as cooling.
Speed was 49mph
Temp was between 115-120
I think the added strength of the magnetic field can be felt with this motor. It spools up a little smoother, and has more drag brake effect.

Tacon 2150
Speed was 48mph
Temp was 125-130
Spools up quicker then the Castle, but I saw no difference with torque.

So what can I say, all the motors perform very good at this speed. While they all have a slightly different feel to them, you'd have to run them back to back to distinguish them IMO. Though the other motors really need slightly higher gearing, to match the XErun.

My next test will be a higher load, I'll use some Big Joes, and see how the bigger tires and increased speed effects them.

Sorry I could not get more technical data, ;)

[snellemin]

The speed and temps reading are good data. Better then nothing. How was the spool up of the Xerun?

The Xerun felt more like the Tacon then the Castle, as far as the spool up control, it just hit harder then the Tacon. The Xerun was really the power house of the bunch. It would wheelie faster, and was more prone to spin the tires uncontrollably. I want to say I could really feel the higher kv of it, where the kv of the other motors felt more similar, if that makes sense. I just don't know how much running the higher speed played into that, but they are also so close, that I'm not sure I could hit a perfect gearing to match their speeds.

[snellemin]

Ah ok. What timing where you running the motors at? What if you added two degrees of timing to the Castle and Tacon to match the speed of the Xerun? See what the temp differences are at the same time.

I was running all factory settings on the esc, except cutoff voltage, so it had 10* of timing. I'll kick the timing up, and see if it makes a difference.

I went to 15* of timing on the Tacon, and it only added .6 mph, and that could have been the stronger tail wind it had. I didn't bother to do a full run for temps, since there was no real difference.

[snellemin]

Bummer. There is always the opposite version, which is gearing up and lower the timing. Are you having fun yet messing with settings?

I've had around 6 runs with my E-revo this weekend, more then I've had in the last 6 mos. Messing with the settings is just a great excuse to have more fun. ;)

Honestly I'm not to awfully worried about the minute differences. I really wanted to see if a $59 motor could really happily handle a Monster truck. I was quite skeptical, but I found out, yes it does, and does a fine job at it.

I just got back from the park with the Tacon. I was pushing it pretty much as hard as I could, lot's of open grass area's at wot, hard brakes, doughnuts, ect. It's my normal bashing spot with my E-revo, so I know what to expect from the Castle. After 25minutes, Temps held true to the 125-130 range. There was no point I thought, boy the Castle would have done better there. So far there's nothing I've found not to like about the motor. But we all know longevity must be factored in, so I'll have to see how it holds up.

I think if the Xerun had the bigger bearings it would be a better choice for the MT's then it is now. The performance seems to be there. Maybe a better choice for a SC.

[bruce750i]

Great info!
I have been running the Tacon 36 74 1300 kv in a rc8 on 5-6s with similar temps after 10min. I was happily surprised the motor wires were so flexible. The shaft spins easy with a slight notching effect. To bad the shaft side(front?) endbell looks pressed or threaded on(no crimp marks).

[x-y]

I have 6 leopard motors, 3 castle neu and 4 xerun ........ all with 4 poles ....... all are great motors and the difference of efficienct/temperatures/runtime is minimum ......

pd: the leopard 4074 new cost 60-75usd + shipping

[x-y]

definitely the leopard motors are awesome ....... Im using a 4065 2700kv for 1/8tte races with +300 batts and still working perfect (only changed the bearings 1 time)

also I have a 3650 3900kv in a 1/10tt 4x2 with aprox 120 batts and works great .....

also using a 4074 2150kv, a 4282 2000kv and a 4274 2000kv ..... all the motors works perfect and I dont had any problem with none


in the last year I sold all my castle-neu, xerun, tekin etc ....... and at this moment only Im using leopards, simply because are the better motors I had.......

if you see the vids of my chanel will see my cars ...... running only with leopard motors in the last year ...... and winning a lot of races ;)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSy-_ldjus4