Joined the Raminator Owner's CLub as of Yesterday.

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Had some time to spend on the Ram today.
First run after swapping the gear ratio from the 27P/23S (should have tried the 23P/27S first) back to the 25P/25S and swapping the 2-shoe clutch with the stock 3-shoe clutch on the TMR engine. I was able to enjoy running it again. I really need to dial the tune in on this. At the moment the acceleration seems to be uniform. Idle is ok, may need to be tweaked a tad. Considering the amount of smoke from the exhaust, may as well be a diesel than a gas engine. Still need to run the engine on the rich side as it is not yet broken in. Have yet to run a full tank through it. Only a quarter tank of fuel so far. Just could not get the truck to move with the 2-shoe clutch.

After few tanks of fuel, may consider a change in fuel/oil mix ratio. Perhaps 32:1 or 35:1 in hope to reduce any oil fouling of the spark plug.
 
Well damn, Since the last run I cannot get the engine to start unless I had the choke set and pressing down on the throttle lever on the carb with my hand. Difficult to prime the fuel. Must have an air leak in the fuel line or carb (may be plastic barb fitting). When I changed back to the 23/27 gears, I did not touch the engine, carb or fuel line. I can get fuel in the line with the choke on, but once I take it off, I end up with an empty line. May just ditch the high flow fuel set up and run fuel line without the brass parts. Tank is not pressurizing since it has two vents. I did check H/L needles, not sure where I need to set them as there were no recommendations for the HDA-48-1 carb. I did find with a search that both need to be 1-1/4 out. the high needle is still a female dog to set due to the angle of approach for any tools. I cannot get my hands in there either. May cut an access hole on the chassis plate in line with the high needle screw. Considering removing it so I can cut a slot for ease of rotating with a flat screwdriver. Hope to have this thing running again soon.
 
Forget drilling out the chassis. Considered that until review of what had to be drilled out. Not necessary.

Considering the engine was not drawing fuel, decided to look at something else. Turns out the 4 bolts holing a spacer and adapter plate were loose. Air leak issue. Had to remove the carb to tighten the 4 bolts. Should have put some thread lock on them, however, was not certain if this was the issue. Placed a thin layer of gear grease on the carb gaskets and reassembled. Without messing with the hi/lo needs or idle screw, choke off, first pull and the engine fired up and stayed running. Ready to rock and roll (y).

It is always something simple but easily overlooked. Not yet used to this carb setup. I should have realized this after swapping out the clutch as it was a bit more difficult to get started. Changed the gears in the trans and could not get the engine to start except for when the choke was on followed by 10 pulls. It would only run for a second. Think I am getting close to tuning to get it going before I realized I should check the screws on the intake plenum and carb. Time to annoy the neighbors again. Actually, a few have commented on my activities but not in a negative way. An older lady across the street (new neighbor) said she had fun watching me run my RC vehicles around the front yard (back yard is fenced in and a bit too short for Baja activity but the Ram will do just fine in the back yard).
 
Have some fine tuning to do with the carb but got this thing running in no time. The battery went dead on me when I was tuning. I did not have the spare charged up. Bummer. Well, the 23P/27S gears were a bit of a surprise. Since I am running it as a mild gear reduction, I did not expect the top end to be as fast. Will have to try the 25/25 again but will wait on that. I had the gears reversed when I started with the TMR engine only to find out the clutch was no good. The stock clutch is holding up well. May want to seek some higher tension springs or a different clutch at some point.

Figured this thing out to the point I am ready for the Grave digger version.
 
Primal RC Raminator V3. Figured I would get into this game sooner or later.

View attachment 82962

I can appreciate all of the comments from others that claim pictures do not do it any justice as it is difficult to gauge the actual size of this truck. Since I do not have a dedicated workshop, I have been using the dining room table for assembly. I have it well protected and the pads I am using (several layers) are fuel /oil resistant (material is an air damper gasket which is very tough stuff).

Considering I can fit two Bajas and one Vekta KV5TT on the table at the same time, there was not much room for the tools with just the Raminator by itself. Just for size comparison I have a front and rear Baja wheel on the table.
View attachment 82963

I soon realized I had the tires on backwards after taking the photos. I corrected that this morning. Soon to get its first start and short run. Everything else checks out.

View attachment 82964

View attachment 82965

Not sure how this will run. I will give the stock engine a chance. Not looking for high speed or anything like that with this rig. I have other 1/5 scales for the speed fix.

Possible changes:
  • Change in steering servos to AGF 100kg.
  • Upgrade to a 2s-Lipo battery. Not sure what brand. 7000mAh up to 8000mAh.
  • Upgrade to a better radio. All I need is a receiver so I can add it to my main radio system.
  • Add more shocks. Waiting on seeing how this will perform as is.
  • Better body mounts. May wait until I break something first.
I have also been looking into the pocket-bike sites to see if there are better carbs and choke setups. It is the choke that may be of concern as I have seen many videos revealing the choke plate can move and close off the intake when running the vehicle. Thought about drilling a small hole in the lever and add a spring to keep it in the open position.

So far, I am impressed with the design of this vehicle. It is more impressive in person than in photos. Not as heavy as I thought it would be. Sure, it is a beast at 80lbs but seems easier to manage with the body off than the Vekta KV5TT which weighs considerably less. That opinion may change when I get it down the steps into the garage. Big tank, need to get more fuel. Will add stickers to the body before I run with it installed.
Brand new Raminator V3 and I am ready to give it up. Nothing but problems. Newest problems. Brakes have locked while installing Super Bee Kill Switch. No matter what I do, Rebind, remove total power to vehicle by switch and unplugging battery, brakes are locked and fully applied. Wont budge. Any advice on howbto get my brakes released.

Thanks
 
Brand new Raminator V3 and I am ready to give it up. Nothing but problems. Newest problems. Brakes have locked while installing Super Bee Kill Switch. No matter what I do, Rebind, remove total power to vehicle by switch and unplugging battery, brakes are locked and fully applied. Wont budge. Any advice on howbto get my brakes released.

Thanks
You should be able to mechanically release them. Just undo the stop collar on the brake wire to release them or remove the servo horn. Is the servo jammed up or something? Does the receiver think there is no signal thus its going into fail safe mode thus locking the brakes?
 
You should be able to mechanically release them. Just undo the stop collar on the brake wire to release them or remove the servo horn. Is the servo jammed up or something? Does the receiver think there is no signal thus its going into fail safe mode thus locking the brakes?
I added some presurre and was able to turn the horn with a wrench to back off pressure and free the wheels. But the servo itself is not responding to brake command from transmitter, even though the throttle is. Is there a way to test burned out servo or failsafe theory. If the servo is bad, can you recommend a good replacement.
Brand new Raminator V3 and I am ready to give it up. Nothing but problems. Newest problems. Brakes have locked while installing Super Bee Kill Switch. No matter what I do, Rebind, remove total power to vehicle by switch and unplugging battery, brakes are locked and fully applied. Wont budge. Any advice on howbto get my brakes released.

Thanks
tle works fine though.
You should be able to mechanically release them. Just undo the stop collar on the brake wire to release them or remove the servo horn. Is the servo jammed up or something? Does the receiver think there is no signal thus its going into fail safe mode thus locking the brakes?
I am pretty sure the brake servo is dead. I plugged in a different servo at the receiver, channel 2, then also at the brake servo cable. The replacement servo works fine. So i need to order a servo the same size (dimension) as the stock primal rc PM1373 HV servo that will just drop in place. Any recommendations.
 
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I added some presurre and was able to turn the horn with a wrench to back off pressure and free the wheels. But the servo itself is not responding to brake command from transmitter, even though the throttle is. Is there a way to test burned out servo or failsafe theory. If the servo is bad, can you recommend a good replacement.
Brand new Raminator V3 and I am ready to give it up. Nothing but problems. Newest problems. Brakes have locked while installing Super Bee Kill Switch. No matter what I do, Rebind, remove total power to vehicle by switch and unplugging battery, brakes are locked and fully applied. Wont budge. Any advice on howbto get my brakes released.

Thanks
tle works fine though.

I am pretty sure the brake servo is dead. I plugged in a different servo at the receiver, channel 2, then also at the brake servo cable. The replacement servo works fine. So i need to order a servo the same size (dimension) as the stock primal rc PM1373 HV servo that will just drop in place. Any recommendations.
Hello,

Sorry to hear you are having issues with the brake servo. It can be easy to burn this servo out if you brake for long periods of time or turn the truck on and the failsafe pulls the brake without you realizing. To avoid this, always turn the radio on first, then the truck. And shut the truck off first before turning off the radio. You may be tempted to remove the brake failsafe, I would avoid this! When you loose radio connection and the 80lb truck is going 20mph towards a car or human, you will want some brakes!

As for replacement servos, any 1/5 scale servo will fit. We have some on our website, a nice upgrade is the 100kg servo we have for the brakes. This servo is brushless and less likely to burn out. Link: https://www.primalrc.com/product-prpre011

Remember, even if you buy the fanciest $250 servo, they can still be burnt out from holding full brake for a long time. I also like to drive our truck with very little brake and instead just let the truck coast while turning. You can also add some expo to the brakes to make lightly braking easier.

Hope this helps!

PS: Use code PRPCD5 to get 5% off that servo on primalrc.com :)
 
Brand new Raminator V3 and I am ready to give it up. Nothing but problems. Newest problems. Brakes have locked while installing Super Bee Kill Switch. No matter what I do, Rebind, remove total power to vehicle by switch and unplugging battery, brakes are locked and fully applied. Wont budge. Any advice on howbto get my brakes released.

Thanks
Edit: Did not see all of the replies until after posting, for some reason I only had view of the one post I responded too.

Did the brake servo work ok before changing the kill switch? Check your servo connections on the receiver as well as at the other end of the wire harness to verify the brake servo is still tied into the throttle servo at the engine side of the wire harness. CH2 should only have the connector with the single white wire plugged in.

The issue you are having could be with the transmitter and receiver. You will need to make changes to the fail-safe settings and for the CH3 kill switch function. However, there may be something else going on. To start, you will need to download the user manual for the Flysky FS-GT5 if you are still using the stock transmitter and receiver. https://www.flysky-cn.com/gt5 You may need to reverse the signal for the KillerBee and alter the fail-safe mode function.

I would check the brake servo is working properly.
  • With the engine off, does the brake servo move in the correct direction or is it always on brakes?
    • You can disconnect the steering cables and try the brake servo on one of the steering cable plugs. It should move with the steering wheel on the transmitter. If the servo still holds on the brakes, I would assume the servo is bad.
When you installed the killer Bee, did you reuse the existing connections? The titan kill switch is different as it has two signal lines (CH3 and throttle). It monitors the throttle signal and will kill the engine if the signal is too high (reason I went to killer bee kill switch).
You need to eliminate the one Y link that is used to tie in the Titan Kill switch. Use the killer bee directly connected to CH3 and the single white wire on CH2 (throttle) position. Check for operation. If brakes still stuck on, confirm the throttle actually works correctly. You either have a brake servo issue or it is connected to the wrong plug at the other end of the wire harness. If the brakes release when you change the forward/reverse function that would mean the brake servo is plugged into the wrong cable plug.

Are you still using the stock servos? If yes, I would contact Primal Customer Support through email, you may have an issue with the brake servo if all seems to check out.

I am currently using the KillerBee kill switch. Not difficult to install. I wanted to use my transmitter I already had: Flysky Nobel Pro. It took some trial and error to get the fail-safe to kill the engine and hit the brakes if signal loss occurred. Everything works great. I did have some minor things to work out as I replaced all of my servos with AGFRC, throttle servo needed signal reversal and was always opposite to the brake servo (luckily the brake servo was programmable so easy to correct it).

20220909_100737.jpg

I had the truck running great with the stock engine (image below). The image above, was taken after change-over from the stock engine to the TMR version and bart pipe. You can see the kill switch wiring routed up from the bottom of the image. Zip tied to the cross member the brake servo mounts too. Since I was using the stainless-steel shielding, I finished it off with some heat shrink tubing that I covered over the EMI filter that comes with the Killer Bee kill switch kit. Since I had to use an extension cable to run on the opposite side of the chassis, I used heat shrink tubing over the connection and then added the stainless-steel covering over that wire harness.

As for install, best to get the extension cable set from killer bee along with a clip-on EMI filter due to the extra-long cable run. I ran the kill switch cable on the other side of the Raminator (exhaust side) since I had issues with the cable running with the other servo wires. Also had to mount the kill switch outside of the metal battery box. I had issues with radio dropping out when the kill switch module (killer bee or titan) was inside the battery box. The Titan kill switch was doing some weird stuff and would not kill the engine when the radio signal was lost or receiver locked up.
I found the stainless-steel braiding at McMaster-carr. Not sure it was needed but I had plenty of electrical noise issues and decided to shield everything and separate the ignition noise from the servo lines.


20220807_201032.jpg

It is probably best not to use the Titan kill switch wires, sure they are already in the cable harness but there is no EMI shield or filter close to the toggle switch where it needs to be. Running along with the servo wires is a good way to get noise issues from the ignition coil. Sure, the stainless-steel cable cover may be overkill. However, it will hold up to heat from the engine and exhaust much better than the nylon cable shielding.
I added some presurre and was able to turn the horn with a wrench to back off pressure and free the wheels. But the servo itself is not responding to brake command from transmitter, even though the throttle is. Is there a way to test burned out servo or failsafe theory. If the servo is bad, can you recommend a good replacement.
Brand new Raminator V3 and I am ready to give it up. Nothing but problems. Newest problems. Brakes have locked while installing Super Bee Kill Switch. No matter what I do, Rebind, remove total power to vehicle by switch and unplugging battery, brakes are locked and fully applied. Wont budge. Any advice on howbto get my brakes released.

Thanks
tle works fine though.

I am pretty sure the brake servo is dead. I plugged in a different servo at the receiver, channel 2, then also at the brake servo cable. The replacement servo works fine. So i need to order a servo the same size (dimension) as the stock primal rc PM1373 HV servo that will just drop in place. Any recommendations.
It sounds like the servo is dead. You can order a replacement from Primal or if you opt for an alternative, make sure it can be programmed in case you need to reverse its direction. If it is programmable, make sure you get the programming tool for that servo at the same time.
 
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Nice looking upgrades all around! Sorry to hear about your run away issue, glad no one was hurt and nothing was damaged.

If you already contacted [email protected] about your servos I can definitely take a look at them. I may do a tutorial soon on a potential fix to make our stock 100kg servos more reliable.

And yes the sway bars will be changed for Grave Digger. You can actually bend the ones you have now if you want to fit reservoirs.

McMaster part# 5537K14 may be the stuff to try to fix the interference issues. Something else that is an easy fix is adding a hose clamp around the spark plug boot. Somehow this fixes the interference issues for some people. It basically clamps the boot down tight to prevent it sliding off and touching the frame.

I'm still testing these electrical issues myself as well. I've never suspected the kill switch to be the culprit but I can test it out. This probably isn't the case for you, but sometimes the electrical issues are just simple things like end points or people turn the ABS on and burn out servos in seconds... but assume its a wiring issue instead. Definitely not the case in your situation, you seem to be pretty knowledgeable on electronics. I would be interested to see what you do to fix the issue when you have time. :)
Owen, i burned out my two stock steering servos today, only my second tank of gas through my Raminator V3. I just lost steering, thennit sounded like gears grinding/stripping inside of them. Is this an adequate replacement for them. AGF 100kg. If so, do you have a link where i can purchase two.
 
Nice looking upgrades all around! Sorry to hear about your run away issue, glad no one was hurt and nothing was damaged.

If you already contacted [email protected] about your servos I can definitely take a look at them. I may do a tutorial soon on a potential fix to make our stock 100kg servos more reliable.

And yes the sway bars will be changed for Grave Digger. You can actually bend the ones you have now if you want to fit reservoirs.

McMaster part# 5537K14 may be the stuff to try to fix the interference issues. Something else that is an easy fix is adding a hose clamp around the spark plug boot. Somehow this fixes the interference issues for some people. It basically clamps the boot down tight to prevent it sliding off and touching the frame.

I'm still testing these electrical issues myself as well. I've never suspected the kill switch to be the culprit but I can test it out. This probably isn't the case for you, but sometimes the electrical issues are just simple things like end points or people turn the ABS on and burn out servos in seconds... but assume its a wiring issue instead. Definitely not the case in your situation, you seem to be pretty knowledgeable on electronics. I would be interested to see what you do to fix the issue when you have time. :)
Can anyone tell me what is a good replacement steering servo for the Riminator V3. I have some how burn out my steering servos while working on my second tank of gas to the truck
 
How do i get them warranted. Thanka



Get them warrantied then sell them for better servos. Agfrc 78kg servos are a very nice upgrade for them

Hi John. Do you know of a preferred site where i can sell the new servos. Got mine yesterday. I am not gonna install them just to get a few hours of runtime. Taking your advice i plan to sell them and buy upgraded ones unless there is now a fix for the unreliable 100 kg HV 13103s for steering
 
Nice looking upgrades all around! Sorry to hear about your run away issue, glad no one was hurt and nothing was damaged.































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































If you already contacted [email protected] about your servos I can definitely take a look at them. I may do a tutorial soon on a potential fix to make our stock 100kg servos more reliable.































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































And yes the sway bars will be changed for Grave Digger. You can actually bend the ones you have now if you want to fit reservoirs.































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































McMaster part# 5537K14 may be the stuff to try to fix the interference issues. Something else that is an easy fix is adding a hose clamp around the spark plug boot. Somehow this fixes the interference issues for some people. It basically clamps the boot down tight to prevent it sliding off and touching the frame.























































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































I'm still testing these electrical issues myself as well. I've never suspected the kill switch to be the culprit but I can test it out. This probably isn't the case for you, but sometimes the electrical issues are just simple things like end points or people turn the ABS on and burn out servos in seconds... but assume its a wiring issue instead. Definitely not the case in your situation, you seem to be pretty knowledgeable on electronics. I would be interested to see what you do to fix the Issue when you have time. 































































































































































































































































Hi Owen,































Have you released a video on the potential fix to make our stock 100kg servos more reliable. If so, please share the tutorial.
 
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