Atomik Brushless Motor/ESC Combo Review

Hello everyone! Recently I picked up the motor and ESC combo made by Atomik RC/ Venom. I wanted to give a thorough review of the combo so I decided to use the electronics during the Pro-Line Surf City Classic. I used the motor and ESC combo in my Pro-Line Pro2 SCT.  

Before I get into the review, I would like to show the electronics I was coming from. I have a Reedy Mach2 7.5 motor and an Orion R10 Pro. The Orion and Reedy electronics have worked great for me in the past, but they are very expensive. For the racer on a budget, these electronics are simply out of reach sometimes. Luckily, Atomik Rc has their combo that can help you keep up with expensive electronics without breaking the bank.

Now Back to the Atomik Motor/ESC Combo. The Part number for this is  Part#13037. The Electronics come in a simple box that contains the motor, ESC, manual, sensor wire and warranty card. Be sure to register your electronics on the Atomic website in order to take advantage of their amazing customer service.

Looking inside the box, we have a very attractive pair of electronics. Everything is neatly packed inside the box and all the wires are already soldered for you.

The wires are very thick and feel good to the touch. Atomik did not skimp on the wire for their ESC and you get plenty of length to fit any vehicle you plan to put this in. There is a fan and some huge capacitors that come pre attached to the ESC. 

Here is a couple more shots of the ESC. The switch is beefy and it doubles as the programming button.  The heat-sink is a cool looking red and the case is a glossy plastic. 

The solder joints are very well done and are ready to take some serious abuse. Overall, the wiring on this ESC is solid and I am very impressed with the quality.

By far the best part of the combo is the motor. The bearings are butter smooth and motor feels solid in the hand. The solder tabs can be a little tricky to work with at first. You must make sure you get the solder to flow on both sides of the tabs to ensure a solid connection.

The motor is rebuildable and really looks amazing overall. There are not many vent holes which means that the motor is great at keeping dirt out and staying smooth. Although, the lack of vent holes means you must get your gearing just right in order to keep temperatures down.

Here is another shot that shows the sensor port and solder tabs. It is easy to adjust the timing on the motor using the three screws above the sensor port.

The programming card for the ESC is 16 bucks and is Part#: 1359. I found that the ESC had all the same adjustments as my Orion ESC which made it really easy and familiar to set up. The programming box is a must have for easy adjustment. Although, the ESC can also be programmed with the switch and beep tones and a little patience.

Performance at the Track:

I did several club races before the Surf City Classic in order to get the feel for the electronics. Just like my Orion ESC, the fan broke on the first battery. Luckily, the ESC does not get hot with a 2 cell lipo, so I did not need it anyway.

The motor has a lot of power and is very, very smooth. The power comes on nicely and the motor confidently accelerates. At first my gearing was off and the motor ran at 160 degrees F. After adjusting, the motor temp was at 135 degrees F.

The default settings for the ESC are way too aggressive, so I found myself turning down the punch to 3. I used 2% drag brake as well and found that the ESC behaved very similarly to my Orion ESC.

Issues:

I did find some issues right off the bat. If you run a high voltage servo, this ESC will brown out and you will lose steering for a split second. At first I thought I simply had a bad ESC, but I quickly realized that a Glitch Buster would fix the issue, and it did.

Atomik sells a Glitch Buster that works great and it is Part#: 1654.

Once The Glitch Buster was hooked up, the motor and ESC performed Flawlessly. Hopefully the BEC is upgraded in the next version.

The fan breaking was another small issue but I was not really that upset. I saved a couple of grams taking the fan off any way.




The Surf City Classic:
At the Surf City Classic, the motor and ESC performed great! My lap times were on par with my other vehicles that were using the Orion/Reedy combo. I did notice that towards the end of my qualifiers I would lose punch, making it difficult to clear some of the bigger jumps. A gearing change before the last qualifier seemed to conserve battery and give me all the punch I needed for the entire race.

I am running a Venom 3800 60C battery and it usually is enough for any race I have, but it seems that with this ESC and motor, only a solid 5 min race is attainable. The ESC is power hungry, which makes sense since you can run it in an 1/8 scale with a 550 motor as well. I think that the new Venom 4500 100C shorty packs will solve the power issue and allow me to have consistent 10 minute races. Furthermore, I am sure that if you are running a normal size Lipo that you would not have any issues.

Overall, the ESC and motor were a powerhouse and helped my churn out my best laps this year. I narrowly missed the A main in the Pro 2 class that contained some of the top drivers in the world.


Rating:

For price vs performance I give this set up a 10/10.
-This ESC is amazing for the price. If you are on a budget, I would highly recommend getting this set up. I am actually going to continue to use the ESC and motor in place of my Orion/Reedy set up for the rest of the season.

For Build Quality I give this set up a 8.5/10.
-The fan breaking was a bummer but not that big of a deal. The heat-sink does move a little inside of the plastic case, but performance did not seem to be affected.

For Race Performance I give this set up a 8/10.
-The combo was a little too power hungry which requires a slightly larger battery for peak performance. If weight is an issue, then the larger battery can add extra grams very quickly. Needing a Glitch Buster to get everything to perform properly was unfortunate but is a minor set back when looking at the cost of everything. The power band was nice overall and the throttle feel was smooth and consistent.

Overall I give an 8.8/10
-The value of the Atomik Motor/ESC combo is phenomenal! If you are looking for amazing performance and reliability without breaking the bank, then this is the set up for you.

Good luck at the races! Remember, you can always ask me for help, just look for the Venom powered Pro-Line vehicles and the KLA logo at the track.

-Matthew Garcia

Pro-Line Pro2 Shock tower mod

Hello Everyone! This past weekend I was racing on high traction candy track and I noticed that my Pro-Line Pro 2 could use some more side bite in the corners. I inspected my rear shock tower and looked for a place to drill a hole.

Some tools you will need is a drill, a rotary tool, some safety goggles, a cutting tip, a grinding cylinder and a #36 size drill bit

The first step is to take a look at the shock tower. You will notice a indented circle. The circle is where you want to drill the hole. If you have the carbon stiffener attached, then just drill right through it. Make sure you take the shock off before you drill the hole.

Once the holes are drilled, you will notice that there are pre molded shock standoffs. The standoffs will get in the way when the shocks compress. You will need to use the rotary tool with the cutting tip to cut the standoffs. The goal is to get the shock tower to become smooth.

Here is a shot of the tower after the modification was complete. There needs to be a spacer to replace the shock standoff that we cut off. I looked in my box and noticed that one on the nylon nuts that comes with a new Pro-Line body would work perfect. The nut actually measured nearly identical to the amount of material that was cut off.  There are some shots below of the nylon nut and the size of it. You can use any spacer that measures about 4.6 mm. 

I made this modification at the track a few races before my main event. During the main event I ended up breaking, but the laps I did make were the fastest laps that I had ran all day. The truck was much easier to drive in high traction conditions and it cornered phenomenally. I will be testing the mod more in my preparation for the Surf City Classic!

Good luck at the races! Remember, you can always ask me for help, just look for the Venom powered Pro-Line vehicles and the KLA logo at the track.

-Matthew Garcia

JBRL Pegasus Hobbies

Hello Everyone! This past Saturday I raced the JBRL electric series at Pegasus hobbies. The track turned out to be very technical and sugar coated. The traction on the track was amazing! This was my first time driving on a high traction candy track and to be honest, it was some of the most fun I have ever had racing. I was really able to tune my vehicles and not worry too much about trying to find traction. I ended up racing Pro 2 and Mod Buggy. I ended up breaking in Pro 2 by dropping a pinion in the final and melting my slipper clutch and spur gear in the heats. It was a rough day for me in Pro 2, but I still had a lot of fun and I came up with some mods that made my truck handle better than it ever has. In Mod Buggy I finished 10th out of 12 racers. I was really happy with my first showing in Mod Buggy and I cant wait to race it again. My buggy really worked great throughout the day and I would really like to thank Venom, Pro-Line, and Buddy Blacksmith Designs  for creating such amazing products.



Here is a shot of the step up that led into a high speed sweeping turn. This Step up was very tough to hit clean and many people flat landed or got this obstacle wrong.

After the step up, this high speed turn caused a lot of people to traction roll, hit a wall or a pipe. The turn lead into the straight away.

 The long straight that was partially blind due to a larger double double in the middle of the track. The straight away was very fun and all the traction let you wheelie!
















This is a shot of the turns at the end of the straight. There where lots of bumps that would set you up really wrong and flip you over into the wall. The best line was really close to the pipe.

 This is a shot of the double double that was actually really difficult. Many people tried to triple single out but that didnt seem to be very fast. The second double had a nice kicker on it and would really send you flying if you had too much speed. Many people got this obstacle wrong as well. I found myself flipping here a lot because of the speed I was carrying into the jump.

 Here is a shot of the double in the middle of the track that led into the step up. This part of the track was actually not too hard and very fun to get around. although it wasnt to hard, a lot of people still over jumped the step up.

Good luck at the races! Remember, you can always ask me for help, just look for the Venom powered Pro-Line vehicles and the KLA logo at the track.

-Matthew Garcia

Friday Night Racing at OC/RC

Hello everyone! This past  Friday I did some club racing at OC/RC. If you dont know, Friday is called "Fill em Up Friday" where you can pay for one race and race as many classes as you want! I decided to race my Venom  powered Pro-Line Pro 2 truck.

My truck was pretty dialed with Pro-Line Ions Product ID : 1191-17 , in the rear and Suburbs Product ID : 1171-17 , in the front. The track proved to be quite challenging and I found myself constantly having to pay close attention to all the of obstacles.

The double and turns that lead into the straight away where a big challenge for me. Over shooting the jump killed your momentum into the turn, but landing perfectly and turning too soon meant clipping the pipe. I had to try and set everything up perfectly and the only way I was able to do that was to take this part of the track slow.






The end of the straight also was a tough one. I had to try an perfectly land the high speed jump and carry that momentum into the corner jump, all without clipping the pipe. Eventually I got this part of the track down while keeping a reasonable speed.

Here is a shot of the rest of the track. The double triple section in the middle of the track has not changed much, but I still had to try to carry the momentum of the vehicles through the corners in order to stay smooth. I noticed that this track layout was fast and flowing. In other words, as soon as you get out of rhythm, you start to hurt your lap times dramatically. It was crucial to keep flowing like water. The only way I was able to stay in the groove was to slow down and concentrate.


Despite all the hurdles and tough obstacles, I qualified 4th in the A main and finished with a solid 3rd place. I am super happy about having a podium finish and I must thank Venom Batteries and Pro-Line for producing such amazing products!

Good luck at the races! Remember, you can always ask me for help, just look for the Venom powered Pro-Line vehicles and the KLA logo at the track.

-Matthew Garcia

Grass Roots Racing Series Finals, Thunder Alley R/C raceway.

Hello Everyone! Last week I attended the final round of the Grass Roots Racing Series and it turned out to be a very exciting race! I ended up pulling off a 4th place finish in Expert 2wd Short Course and 5th in Short Course Buggy. The Short Course Buggy class was full and a lot of fun. In 2wd Short Course, I was able to make a pass on the last lap of the 8 minute A main and I secured my 4th place finish. This was the funnest race I have been too in a while and I cannot wait until next year! 

My Venom Powered, Pro-Line Pro2 truck and buggy were certainly up to the task of the long main events and extreme track obstacles. I ended up using Pro-Line F11 wheels and Tazers in the rear and Hole Shots int he front. Holeshots : Product ID : 1180-02, Tazer : Product ID : 1185-02, F11 Wheels : Product ID : 2740-03

There was a large curved high speed straight away that lead into a very large double. The straight away really tested both the handling and the speed of all the vehicles racing. Not gearing the vehicle correctly didnt allow one to go fast enough down the straight, but too much gearing would make handling the curve very difficult. The turn at the end of the straight away was sharp and many people would slide into the corner, losing the needed momentum to clear the double.













Here is a closer shot of the double at the end of the straight. The gap was about 6~8 feet and landed right into another turn. The extra power provided by my Venom batteries allowed me to clear this jump without too much effort, but during the race I found myself unable to consistently clear the double with other trucks next to me. I ended up partially rolling this obstacle.

Immediately after the huge double, there was a corkscrew level change down into a Banzai step up. The obstacle was extremely challenging because of how easily a vehicle could flip while trying to make the turn. You may not see it in the picture, but that turn has large divots, making the turn even more challenging. Many people fell victim to this tough portion of the track. The step up jump after the turn was easy, but if  you were a little too soft on the throttle and cased the jump, your vehicle was upside down and the closest marshal was several yards away. 

After the tricky step up, there was a large triple that proved to be quite challenging. Mostly the 4wd vehicles tripled this jump. I chose the safer double single out.

These are two different shots of the jump.

After the triple, there was an off camber double that was also massive.

This obstacle proved to be a challenge for a lot of people. many people got this jump wrong and ended up on the pipe, or upside down.  Here is two different shots of this jump.

After clearing the off camber jump, there was a massive step up that would send vehicles high into the air.

After the step up, one had to face the washboard section. Getting the right rhythm on this part of the track was crucial. I saw many people lose positions by getting this obstacle wrong. 

The washboard led into a simple S turn. This part of the track was not too challenging.









The S turn did lead into another step up jump that took some finesse and power to clear. The step up jump led into a hairpin turn and then down onto the straightaway.

Here is a shot of the Short Course buggy class A main. As you can see, this race was stacked.

Overall, I was very happy with the performance of my vehicles and I would like to thank Venom Batteries  and Pro-Line for the support and for producing such amazing products. Now it is time to start getting ready for the Surf City classic!

Good luck at the races! Remember, you can always ask me for help, just look for the Venom powered Pro-Line vehicles and the KLA logo at the track.

                                                                  -Matthew Garcia

Venom Medion LiPO Charger and PS350 Power Supply Review

Hello Everyone! Recently, I purchased the Venom Medion LiPO Charger and PS350 Power Supply combo, Part#: K0019. I wanted to share my experience an thoughts about this product. First off, the charger comes in very premium packaging, and the contents inside certainly do not disappoint.



Here is a shot of the charger after pulling it out of the packaging. I must note that the anodized red aluminum casing and all the accessories that accompany it all have a premium feel and look. 

After un-packaging everything, I plugged in the charger and started to play around with the different settings and features. The charger comes jammed packed with all sorts of charging options. You can cycle your batteries, prepare them for storage, balance them, and much more. 



After playing with the charger for a while, I noticed that the button on the power supply had stopped functioning properly. To be honest, I was  bummed that the Power Supply had such a flaw, but I will say that it did perform flawlessly otherwise. I quickly contacted Venom and I was promptly sent a replacement Power Supply. The customer service was top notch! My confidence in Venom products was strengthened and I am more than happy to further invest in their products. As many enthusiasts know, batteries and chargers are a huge investment and knowing that the company fully backs up their products is a very good feeling. 


My first test of the charger was conducted at the JBRL OC/RC race. With 200+ entries, the track was a cacophony and the perfect place to test the speakers that are built into the charger. The speakers had plenty of power and I was able to pump up the jams and enjoy my music despite all the ambient noise. 












In addition to looking awesome and playing my tunes, I wanted to figure out if the charger provided any noticeable advantage over my old charger.




Here is a shot of both chargers, side by side. Using the same Venom 3800 60c shorty pack, I first charged it with old charger. 

When the charge was complete I took note of the battery voltage. After charging was completed, I ran the battery until the car shut off. I would not recommend running your RC vehicles until the battery runs out, but for the sake of this test, I ran the battery dry. I noticed a lot of power and a good amount of punch when running. As I got closer to the end of the battery, I noticed that the power and punch had diminished a bit. 













I was able to run 47 laps, with my fastest lap being a 23.38. I was practicing running the fastest laps I possibly could. 

After I was done with the first test, I recharged the Battery using my Venom Medion  charger and again I took note of the final battery voltage. As you may see, there is a .05v difference in the charge. I then ran the battery again until it was completely dry. I noticed right away that the battery had more punch and more power off the line. I will mention that the increase in punch and power was not a massive one, but it was a perceivable difference. I also noticed that the power and punch of the battery did not diminish as much as I reached the end of the run. In other words, the charge from the Medion charger had slightly better performance than my old charger. 

Looking at the run, it can be seen that I got another 47 laps, but my fast lap was 22.98, which was .4 seconds faster than the first test. I know that the average lap time is what is most important for racing, but for this test, I wanted to focus on the fast lap. 

In conclusion, I am very happy with my upgraded charger. With the good looks, good jams, amazing customer service, numerous charging options and the slight increase in battery performance, the Medion charger was a great purchase! I give the Venom Medion LiPO Charger and PS350 Power Supply combo an overall rating of 9/10 and I would highly recommend this product to a friend. I did not get to test many of the other functionalities that the Medion charger offers, but I am sure that the other functions will perform brilliantly. 

Good luck at the races! Remember, you can always ask me for help, just look for the Venom powered Pro-Line vehicles and the KLA logo at the track.

                                                                  -Matthew Garcia