After having some troubles playing VRC, I started to look at my hardware to see if there was some gains to be had there because while I’m not a great racer in real life, I’m also not terrible  I wound up doing a lot of research regarding the relative speed and latency of various tx/rx brands and models. The most concrete measurement I could come up with is the PWM frequency sent from the receiver to the ESC & servo(s). PWM signals are often must faster than PPM signals that are used by buddy-box or direct servo control systems. This is important in regards to playing VRC.

I gathered results measured by myself and others using the SkyRC Program Box. It is not a foolproof measurement of end-to-end latency – the delay from when you give a controller input and the ESC reacts to it. But it’s a clear metric, and part of the overall latency we can measure easily.

Much of this may not even matter to you. The average human reaction time is on the order of hundreds of milliseconds. For transmitter latency we’re talking about tens of milliseconds or less. Also, the transit time even the fastest servos are around 50 milliseconds, so that is another part of the equation that is difficult to reduce. But just because the measured latency is less than what we as humans can react to, it doesn’t mean these delays can’t be perceived, even if it’s just in the way something feels.

I can’t always get to the track to actually race, so the next best thing is playing Virtual RC Pro. I can practice or race at anytime, no matter what my family’s schedule is or what the weather is like. I initially had some trouble playing VRC, so I put this together to document how I was able to improve gameplay, and my driving. The first part of this is about getting VRC set up and working well. The second part is about racing electric on-road cars in VRC (that’s what I drive at our local tracks). But there may be a buggy in my future so subscribe to get those updates as well!

What’s the point of switching to bigger bore springs on a standard bore shock? Some say the wider springs provide a different feel, but mostly I did it to be able to run a spring rate softer than the softest Team Associated Green (12lb./in.) springs. Softer springs are especially helpful for tight (read: small) high-traction indoor carpet track racing like we have here in Minnesota. Most of the guys that do this mod switch to Yokomo springs, so that’s what we’ll cover.

This little power supply from Ready Made RC is a tremendous bargain. The specs are fantastic on paper – but it doesn’t pack quite as much punch as advertised. I have two large capacity (5200mAh) 6S batteries that I use to power my electric lawn mower. This power supply buckled after just 2.5 charges  Here’s how it went…
Continue reading →