new toy rtr bonzi 50 inch

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a while ago, when i sold my fg mt, some one on a forum asked me benckie whats the next project going to be ? land, air or water. I said mabe all of the above or none :)

well i took the boat out for a quick blast yesterday and i managed to run the boat on the water in the air and on land lols

a quick vid worth watching


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XphMkovscMo


some pictures


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try doing that with your large scale off road truck or buggie :) my wife thinks im nuts as i keep laughing about it, but i thought it was funny, full out of my controll all i could do is sit back and watch, the boat will live to see another day, but i will not run it untill i have installed my modifed pico.

i will patch this hull up as its not badly damaged and im surprised how well it stood up for what i would call a hi speed impact with a lake bank and a few trees at 69.6 kmh or 43.25 mph, im not working but i might start planing to next hull soon, but ill keep this hull running and try and learn as much baout gas boats as i can for the next boat build.

pitty my camera is crap as it was a good flip into the trees and the motor was stuck on full wot for a while befor it cut out, my wife turned off the camera and run for the rescue boat, good responce, but i just walked around the edge of the lake to pick it up, i thought it would be shattered into 1000 bits but i was still in one bit and still in a resonible condition.
 
Wow, just read your other thread. Man that is a bummer. I was wondering what went wrong. I guess I would rather go get it then have it bash into the rocks. Even though one of the members here had his stall and it went down the river and I don't think they ever recovered it? At least you know you have a basher now.
 
im not sure what whent wrong, i had no steering and it was stuck on full throttle, the boat has 2 fail safes one with the futaba 3mp 2.4 ghz with no throttle and straigh on the steering and a second fail safe for no throttle, i noticed the boat didnt turn so i let off the throttle and held full right turn but nothing the boat just keep going straigh.

i looked at my wife the mutter some thing like this is going to hurt just befor the impact you might be able to hear it on the video, my cheap digy camera it looks realy far away but its not at all, i have driven the boat 4 times further away, and made it to the bank on the other side and back no worries, its just looks far as my camera is great on pictures but piss poor on vid and sound.

to me the radio was well with in normal range and the rx battery is saying 6.84 volts and the tx battery is saying 10.7 volts, i have checked the radio gear nice and dry and all batteries are charged, the fail safe is working on the radio when its set, and the failsafe on the throttle servo is working, but the throttle servo seams not normal.

i don't personaly think it was the radio, i didnt get to have a good look at the boat, cause i took my daughter down the park cause we had a little bit of fine weather and i finshed mowing the lawn, as we have over 3/4 an acre.

the rudder was kicked back but not damaged and i was on a skying lake thats been de stumped and delogged, but it could of hit some thing on the water, but it didnt look or sound like it.

my money is on the throttle servo crapped its self and mabe shorted out and put the radio into fail safe, i had it set for straigh on the steering, the thottle serov is working but its not the same and seams a bit jumpy, ill have to investage more, but my moneys ont he futaba s3003 standard servo.

i still get a good laugh out of watching the vidoe and i think this is not a big deal, much easy to fix and much much cheaper then a buggy or a truck thats hit a tree at 70 kmh, some glue and ill be back int he water befor next week end and posting up some pictures and vids
 
well for under 48 bucks i was able to get soem white gell coat putty and some diffrent grip sand papper and some new scrapers.

i have totaly stripped the boat and ground out the damaged area and the trim tab screw holes with a micro grinder, ive done two coats of bog sofar, the gell coat putty is more of a off white so you can see the grind marks, where ive used the putty for a filler if you look up close and personal.

it still will look better then it was, i have lots of difrent fine snad papper to get a smooth finsh, and ill do some resurch on what type of paint i can use and i might paint he hull myself yet.

im still not sure if i will go all out and paint the hull as i think the white gell coat putty will do the job well, and ill see what the discolouration is like after afew days.

all up im happy as i know if my old baja 5b hit a tree at 70 kmh (43mph) i would be up for a good couple hounder bucks easy, for for under 50 bucks to patch this hull up isnt bad in my books.

i could of just used some expoxy glue in the she and not worried about all this, and that would of cost under 7 bucks for the repair job, but since its a nice boat still only 3 hours old and cost 3k i might as well got alittle more then she'll be right mate.

ill she how good she looks after ive done a couple more light coats and a polish sanding and ill post up some pictures, and if the weather isnt raining, cold and windy ill take the boat out with the new prop and see if i can hit 50 mph or higher.
 
ive been using my bonzi hull and practicing my air drilling methods and seeing what works for drilling hulls and what don't work.

ive figered out what don't work pritty dam quick, im glad ive got a big tin of boat bog to keep patching it up :-[

ive found using nails to drill the hull works well then don't grab or chip the gell coat, by the 12 th hole in the hull i think im on to it.

ive also came to the conlusing getting hi of the expoxy is not good the hang over just isnt worht the buzz.

the second conclusion is that i will be paining the bottom and the rear of the hull and installing some new trim tabs.

drilling the radio box for the seals to run the modded pico wires was easy and no cracked radio box, so ive had a win there.

ive got my slightly small s270 prop, so im hopping to pull some more revs out of the old girl, and i think i will fibre glass refornce the crash site and repaint, i just faxed off my dole form, so i should be good to go and by some stuff tomorow (thanks krudd)

ive replaced the 4 vitton o-rings in the exhaust coupler and have chocked the pipe for a more snug fit and i think the water leak on the coupler will be fixed, but i quess time will tell, i also whent against every ones advice and installed an auto bailer, thats was realy fun, my first 10mm drill on in the hull, but i had to do it baby steps untill i got upto 10mm.

the weather is cold wet and raining, since the so called start of spring and the weather chick says it will be like that till end of next week, so im taking more time with the boat and stuffing around but every thing is moving forward

the bashed up bonzi will be back and should be even faster well mabe if i get the angle of the dangle right
 
so just incase, i have replaced the throttle servo with a hs-525mg standard sized servo, good little servo 0.13 & 4.1 kg @ 6v, i have also replaced the rx switch, and battery conections and tripple checked all wiring and water seals to make sure.

i have also installed a modified pico as a failsafe, so i can set the radios failsafe to turn of the engine, hold no throttle and straight steering incase it goes out of range or low battery, and if the rx over heats and if the battery plug disconects the engine will be automaticly shut off (we use these lots in large scale off raod cars) and since i opted out for paying extra for bonzi to install a kill swtich i can use the third channel to turn the engine off when i ever need to.

today i brought a fibre glass repair kit to renforce the inside of the hull near where the large gellcoat chip was and some paint to finsh of the hull and cover the gell coat putty patches i have made, i also (from my last post) installed some new trim tabs so tomorow (saterday moroning)

i will start on preping the hull (bottom side only) for painting, a kind forum member in australia has sent me some throttle pivote posts for the throttle cable as i broke one when swaping the throttle serov out, so i will alos be installing blue alloy servo horns the the hitec mg servos, as after a hi speed flip (well hi speed to me for a boay 40 + mph) i striped a plastic steering servo horn :confused4: i think that was more becuase i forgot to loctite the screw int he servo harm as it was a little loose.

the weather has been realy bad over here the first 18 days of spring as been cold and raining pritty much none stop, and will contiune into next week if i belive the weather man, so im hopping around tuesday ill get a couple hours break in the weather to run a tank of fuel (gas) thru the boat.

ill keep playing with the set up, as in calm glass like water ive been able to reach speeds of to to 43 mph and if ruff water (well ruff for an rc boat) ive been able to hit 50.77 mph or 81 kmh in australian terms, not to bad for a first time gas boat user with a rtr boat, bonzi said around 40 to 45 mph out of the boat.

im looking forward to trying out this s270 prop as its slightly smaller then the b275 prop thats on the boat and so far ive only been able to reach 15 150 rpm with a ritch carb tune, i know the carb is ritch as the engine never gets warm sounds very crackley and the quite pipe is full of oil this pipe has more oil in then one of my tuned rc large scale trucks or buggies thats had 40 tanks run thru it, and the boats only been run for just over 3 tanks just over 3 hours of use and the oil im using isnt ment to make any smoke but it is with the carb setting on the 813 1.5h and 1 1/4 low.

realy enjoying the rc boats and for me its a great family affair :)
 
ouch, when i first saw the vid last week i thought thats a right off, now seeing pics of the damage you've got off lightly bud.
upgrade your camera and lets see more vids as it looks cool, can't wait to see the paint job your going to do.
 
i lost control of my buggy once before (ad like you fitted a kill switch before taking it back out lol) and i made a lot more damage than that matey you're very lucky

nice boat though and some great vids!
 
charlieboy said:
i lost control of my buggy once before (ad like you fitted a kill switch before taking it back out lol) and i made a lot more damage than that matey you're very lucky

nice boat though and some great vids!
Click to expand...

the boat already had 2 failsafes :boat:

now it will had two still but one being a pico
 
regarding rc boat painting

well after speaking to a couple of boat shops (1:1) and a couple of paint shops

i was told you can just use

1 enamel paint

2 two pak paint

3 two part expoxy boat paint

the paint shop in bunbury will mix up and match the hull paint colour and make up spary can tins for me if needed for under 30 bucks each, if i leave them the hull for a couple of hours to match the paint up.

now i know what can be used, its very simple and i have checked out alot of good piant, colours and sytles and even metal flake so a good paint job isnt that unrelistic.

i was told you can even use applience paint (fridge or freezer paint) it hard wearing and last a long time and can be brought from bunnings.

so painting a hull is no difrent and pritty much the same as painting any thing, the more time and money you spend on it the better it will be and the longer it will last
 
well i have patched the gell coat cracks, with gell coat putty, today i renforced the inside of the hull on the inside of this



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with 3 layers for fiber glass, and i have repainted the bottom of the hull using enamel paint inspray cans.

ive been finshing off the electric,s and double checking every thing again, once the paint has dryed i re sand and recoat once that drys i will install the new trim tabs in the holse i drilled the other day, and epoxy in the auto bailer and install some plasict wrap around a couple of the water pipes that have been rubbing on the engine rails and as soon as my throttle pivote posts turn up i should be good to go if the wether permits
 
next hull as this ones only getting done in gloss white, ive done one coat i want to touch it up, but its raining here today so ill wait for a better day
 
well the weather is still crap here, so i have given up on trying to get the paint work 100% ill settle for 90 to 95% in my books, im slowly putting the boat back together.

i ended up spending around $100 aud on patching the gellcoat, renforcing the fiber glass and repainting the boat, but this will gives me enought stuff to patch the boat another once or twice if needed.
 
benckie said:
well the weather is still crap here, so i have given up on trying to get the paint work 100% ill settle for 90 to 95% in my books, im slowly putting the boat back together.

i ended up spending around $100 aud on patching the gellcoat, renforcing the fiber glass and repainting the boat, but this will gives me enought stuff to patch the boat another once or twice if needed.
Click to expand...

hopefully you wont need to mate :no:
 
a little update on the bonzi.

the prop that came with the boat has a small nick out of the blades, so i brought a new S270 prop and ive sent it off to Ken from Retallick Engineering in australia to get in balanced and sharpened.

i have done all the renforcing, gell coat patching and hull repainting that i can in this weather and ive settle for 90% perfect on the paint.

ive installed the auto bailer, new trim tabs and reinstalled the exhaust tips as one was ripped of the boat from my little onland trip.

it was a mission to reinstall the black rub rail, it was 1 foot to short once removed and my heat gun no longer works so i boiled it on the stove and was able to streatch it to fit, my wife was laughing at me as some of the stuff i do in the kitchen, boiling baking engine parts, using the gass burners for heavy solder work and so on, i hide what i use the washing machine for like my airfilters and so on.

ive installed my moded pico engine kill switch and run wiring for it and mabe some quick release fittings so i can remove the raido box and or motor with out removing the whole lot.

i have also run all new wiring for the electrics and replaced the throttle servo with a fast hitec servo and installed throttle pivote post that i broke when removing the motor (thanks Steve your a life saver)

i have installed 4 new rubber orings in the exhaust coupler, the old ones look fine, so ill put more preasure on the pipe when installing the motor and im hopping my water leaking for the exhaust will be fixed.

all i need to do now is silicone the gas tank back in and strap it down with a couple of large cable ties, run some plastic cable wrap over a couple of water pipes that where rubbing on the engine rails and re install the motor and water pump.

unfortunaly the silicone i had in the shed been sitting to long and has gones off and i thought i had cable ties but ive ran out, and i have to wait to get the prop back from Retallick Engineering so i don't think ill be able to run it till the start of next week.

the weather is warm and resonibly sunny today, it would be a nice day for a faimly bbq and a couple of hour at the lake with the boat.

any way here are some pictures of the patched up hull, the installed pico and the new gear installed on the back of the boat, it turned out ok for a back yard benckie bodgy job, ive had fun and learnt alot, and would not be affaid to build a boat now.



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