Discussion: Heng Long's 1/16 scale M1A2 Abrams RTR, Upgrade Edition!

[Woohoo\o/]

Getting some mods done. The bearings worked out perfectly thanks guys. I also added magnets for quick access.

[RCGuy83]

Hello fellow Abrams tankers! I wanted to share my experience and mods thus far with the M1A2 Abrams Upgrade edition. I've never driven an RC tank but have an extensive RC crawling, 1/8th scale racing, RC flying, and RC boating background. My goal was to beat on it good and hard to see what it can take. I am very happy to report that the stock tracks are holding up great off-road though I did buy the metal upgrades. I'm driving it like a rock-crawler more than a tank and it's taking anything I can dish out. Knowing I would want more run time than the stock 1,800mah pack could provide I bought an Admiral 2S 5,000mah pack to fit inside the tank. Though I could have knocked out the front wall in the stock battery location to slide it in I found that having it up front added a nice amount of weight to help the front end get better traction climbing things. In order to keep it out of the way of the turret rotation I used double sided tape to stick it down to the floor in the nose of the hull. I then stuck the speaker box right on top where it remains out of the way of the turret when rotating. I have yet to charge it and have about 3hrs of hard running on it. The tank is a blast to drive around and my 4-year old daughter is enjoying it as well (unarmed of course) since it's nice and slow. Now..... I just need to find some fellow tankers to battle in So-Cal.

NOTE: Per the supplemental page included with the tank I switched the FWD/REV movement of the tank to the LEFT stick which then puts the barrel raise/lower on the RIGHT stick. I really like driving it this way vs stock. Also of note on that same page is how to turn headlights ON/OFF which is down by simply holding the G button and moving the left stick up at the same time.

In the video below I tried to take it through a wide mix of activities from cannon targeting and firing, to dirt driving, to traversing rough terrain. A tank battle in this 'playground' would be epic. Biodegradable BB's are on the way!

[RCGuy83]

I experimented with FPV'ing the turret and driving/firing the tank. I am happy to report that it 100% changes the ball-game having serious potential for tank-to-tank battling. To say it's fun is an understatement but I need some adversaries! I used a simple stand alone FPV setup I made to be able to put on anything I want. Now that I see the potential I will wire into the turret a much cleaner FPV camera setup fed off the main battery pack. Imagine having 6-8 tanks FPV'd with all the drivers sitting at a table with 14"-17" monitors displaying their view.

[Rubicon99]

Hello fellow Abrams tankers! I wanted to share my experience and mods thus far with the M1A2 Abrams Upgrade edition. I've never driven an RC tank but have an extensive RC crawling, 1/8th scale racing, RC flying, and RC boating background. My goal was to beat on it good and hard to see what it can take. I am very happy to report that the stock tracks are holding up great off-road though I did buy the metal upgrades. I'm driving it like a rock-crawler more than a tank and it's taking anything I can dish out. Knowing I would want more run time than the stock 1,800mah pack could provide I bought an Admiral 2S 5,000mah pack to fit inside the tank. Though I could have knocked out the front wall in the stock battery location to slide it in I found that having it up front added a nice amount of weight to help the front end get better traction climbing things. In order to keep it out of the way of the turret rotation I used double sided tape to stick it down to the floor in the nose of the hull. I then stuck the speaker box right on top where it remains out of the way of the turret when rotating. I have yet to charge it and have about 3hrs of hard running on it. The tank is a blast to drive around and my 4-year old daughter is enjoying it as well (unarmed of course) since it's nice and slow. Now..... I just need to find some fellow tankers to battle in So-Cal.

NOTE: Per the supplemental page included with the tank I switched the FWD/REV movement of the tank to the LEFT stick which then puts the barrel raise/lower on the RIGHT stick. I really like driving it this was vs stock. Also of note on that same page is how to turn headlights ON/OFF which is down by simply holding the G button and moving the left stick up at the same time.

In the video below I tried to take it through a wide mix of activities from cannon targeting and firing, to dirt driving, to traversing rough terrain. A tank battle in this 'playground' would be epic. Biodegradable BB's are on the way!

Your rock crawling r/c background will be very helpful in both driving and understanding the benefits of upgrades. Mine sure did.

Think about adding the red 390 motors and rubber padded tracks. More speed, torque and 200% improvement in track grip = some awesome terrain driving fun.

Good placement of your battery that is where I have been placing mine for years now.

[RCGuy83]

New tankers be aware you CAN in fact change the control of the tank putting FWD/REV on the LEFT stick instead of the RIGHT. See the #2 step for how to do this. Keep in mind doing so in turn moves the cannon barrel raising/lowering to the RIGHT stick. You'll have to experiment and see which mode you like best. Additionally this sheet tells you how to turn the LED lights ON/OFF. Ignore the bottom #3 step for Dual-Current Driving System. Our model tanks are not setup for this.

[RCGuy83]

Your rock crawling r/c background will be very helpful in both driving and understanding the benefits of upgrades. Mine sure did.

Think about adding the red 390 motors and rubber padded tracks. More speed, torque and 200% improvement in track grip = some awesome terrain driving fun.

Good placement of your battery that is where I have been placing mine for years now.

Thanks man! Not gunna lie she could use a scotch more low end grunt to climb. I too will be looking into better power plants. Shoot a link to the motor's you're looking at. I cannot leave anything stock and if it's cheap and greatly benefits performance I am all in!

[Rubicon99]

Thanks man! Not gunna lie she could use a scotch more low end grunt to climb. I too will be looking into better power plants. Shoot a link to the motor's you're looking at. I cannot leave anything stock and if it's cheap and greatly benefits performance I am all in!

I already have dozens of the RED 390 motors. Motion I understand will be caring them soon but until then the best place to buy RED 390s is EBay: “Heng Long 390 motors” will pull up a good number for sale.

[Hoomi]

FedEx estimates my Abrams should arrive on Friday.

[Hoomi]

She arrived today, and I took her out for a test spin this evening. I loaded some airsoft pellets in, but I couldn't get it to shoot them. I need to recheck the instructions and see if I missed something in the controls or set-up.

Edit: Found the "check out" steps in the New Tanker thread. Will try that tomorrow!

[Woohoo\o/]

Decided to stiffen up the tub. The front of the Abrams is low so I couldn't allow the bar to extend all the way however it is rock solid.

I have a question. I want to DIY my own 360 turret. Is this possible? Do they sell a universal slip ring I can get from Amazon or local tech store (radio shack/best buy) ? Things are going real slow due to the covid19 virus.

found this on Amazon. Will this work?

https://www.amazon.com/Taidacent-Connector-Conductive-Collector-Transformer/dp/B07NW7BTH7

[Hoomi]

Is there still any open Radio Shack stores anywhere?

[Rubicon99]

Decided to stiffen up the tub. The front of the Abrams is low so I couldn't allow the bar to extend all the way however it is rock solid.

I have a question. I want to DIY my own 360 turret. Is this possible? Do they sell a universal slip ring I can get from Amazon or local tech store (radio shack/best buy) ? Things are going real slow due to the covid19 virus.

Don’t worry to much about 360 rotation and wiring. Just make sure you neatly bind the wires together with small zip ties or even tape. You can get a good number of full rotation before any wire binding even starts to occur. The simple thing most folks do is to just remember to counter rotate the turret back the same number of turns to keep the wires from binding. Even if the wires do start to bind your turret rotation slip clutch gear will start to engage as the turning tension increases. This makes for a good warning that something is wrong.

The wire slip rings are good, but even they have binding issues from time to time. The top tier r/c tank manufacturer Tamiya does not even use wire slip rings in their tanks and all their tanks all have 360 deg turret rotation.

Stiffening the hull is a good idea especially if you intend to add all metal road wheels, upgraded motors, heavy metal/rubber padded tracks, more powerful battery, balancing weights and then run the tank hard. All my HL Abrams have some form of lower hull stiffeners. It is not necessary for the “plastic” tanks as the Abrams hull works like a “unibody” when all six hull screws are installed and tighten correctly. But with magnets only holding the upper and lower together like you are running the stiffeners become a must.

[Woohoo\o/]

Yes in Florida (cape coral) there are a couple left.

Rubicon you're right. Okay so would lengthening the wires help with rotation or just simply having the cables neat do the trick? Again thanks as always.

[Woohoo\o/]

Rcguy yes I can confirm fpv is a game changer. I did it with my old Abrams. It's like the game world of tanks but real life with rc tanks. I'm hoping this will become more of a thing such as fpv drones.

[Rubicon99]

Yes in Florida (cape coral) there are a couple left.

Rubicon you're right. Okay so would lengthening the wires help with rotation or just simply having the cables neat do the trick? Again thanks as always.

Depends....Slack yes, but not flopping around. Most of the time HL stock wires are good lengths. Might have to increase the length of one or two only. Usually I lengthen the IR bulb and barrel flash(if installed) wires because these are the easiest to pull out place should there be a bind.

[Woohoo\o/]

Okay wonderful. I will get home and start getting into this.

[Woohoo\o/]

Will I see an increase in speed running a 2s Lipo? I'm assuming so since I used to work at a hobby shop and that was the first upgrade to stock traxxas brushed cars. Made quite a decent boost in speed/torque.

[Rubicon99]

Will I see an increase in speed running a 2s Lipo? I'm assuming so since I used to work at a hobby shop and that was the first upgrade to stock traxxas brushed cars. Made quite a decent boost in speed/torque.

Not really because the stock HL Li-ion battery puts out a similar peak voltage as a 2 cell Lipo ~8.4v. I think you are thinking of a 7.2v NiMH vs 2 cell Lipo in which case there would be a slight speed increase.

[Woohoo\o/]

Ok yeah I kinda figured

[Woohoo\o/]

Poor mans mato tracks. It'd be nice to have metal tracks but can't right now lol because if I go mato rubber/metal tracks I'll also need to upgrade to metal sprockets. Just too much money. I will eventually go all metal.