Bad servo? Or power issue?

Ill start off by saying I'm newly back in the hobby and this is my first crawler, so if this is a normal thing please dont beat me over it, lol. This brings me to my issue. I'm having problems with the steering on my temper. I didn't really notice the issue till recently. I am running 1.9 vanquish method wheels with 875 slw hubs, beef pattie wheel weights in the front and 1.9 rc4wd roklok tires. I have upgraded to the Tazor 280 motor as well. Other than that its stock. The issue seems to start happening around 75% battery. During throttling the servo seems to have zero issue until obviously the battery is drained. But while out of throttle the servo is either sluggish or will not turn at all. If you wobble the steering a few times it will sometimes work, but in most cases that doesn't help. Btw this is not under heavy load. Id say more low to medium load not like the wheels are jammed up against or in something. Does this sound like servo issues? Or more lack of power going to the servo? Or the servo browning out the esc?

So the steering servo is not operating properly while the car is stopped, correct?

The stock servo is pretty weak and with the addition of larger, heavier, grippier tires, the servo might just be overwhelmed.

Still, the behavior you are experiencing seems weird. I would expect the servo to not turn properly while applying throttle. But your description makes it sound like the opposite is happening.

My apologies if I'm misunderstanding.

My Temper is set up with two S603 servos (the stock servo) for 4-wheel steering but I'm also running a Hobbywing 1080 ESC. That unit provides 6V (as opposed to the 5V output of the stock ESC/Rx combo unit) and that made a HUGE difference in the capabilities of the servos. Even with increased power, they are still relatively weak and will struggle with steering when the car is in the rocks.

i_r_beej said:

So the steering servo is not operating properly while the car is stopped, correct?

The stock servo is pretty weak and with the addition of larger, heavier, grippier tires, the servo might just be overwhelmed.

Still, the behavior you are experiencing seems weird. I would expect the servo to not turn properly while applying throttle. But your description makes it sound like the opposite is happening.

My apologies if I'm misunderstanding.

My Temper is set up with two S603 servos (the stock servo) for 4-wheel steering but I'm also running a Hobbywing 1080 ESC. That unit provides 6V (as opposed to the 5V output of the stock ESC/Rx combo unit) and that made a HUGE difference in the capabilities of the servos. Even with increased power, they are still relatively weak and will struggle with steering when the car is in the rocks.

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You understand that correct and agree on the weird factor. My friend and i both have tempers so we did some voltage checking on the esc/receiver and strangly end up loosing the servo usage all together. I ordered up a Stock replacement and I'm debating on getting the Hi-tec HS-5645MG or the savox SW0231MG. Any other suggestions? Im not sure if the savox is to much for the stock electronics. I ordered up a 1200mah nimh battery as well. Hopefully this all will sort out the problems. If not, I will probably have to step up and upgrade electronics $$$ lol!

Yeah, the ESC/Rx sounds like a defective unit.

However, this would also be a good time to upgrade the electronics. I recently installed a Hobbywing 1080 ESC and Spektrum SR210 Rx (and used my old DX2E Tx) and the Temper drove like a new car- the Hobbywing ESC is that good.

As for a servo, the SW0231MG is a good unit. I'm considering getting a couple Spektrum S6180 servos. They're about the same price as the Savox. (And I can continue using the 23t aluminum servo arms I have)

So the replacement esc/receiver came in, this one has a brake set between forward and reverse. Not sure if I like it yet. I decided to test it with the stock servo first and see if the new esc got rid of the problem....Nope. I ended up going with the Hitec 5645mg servo over the savox, because of the annoying hum the savox has and couldn't be happier. The steering issues are gone and performance is greatly improved!!! After a few runs to make sure the new servo was ok I removed it and waterproofed it. Time do some more river crawling!

Granther said:

So the replacement ESC/receiver came in, this one has a brake set between forward and reverse. Not sure if I like it yet. I decided to test it with the stock servo first and see if the new ESC got rid of the problem....Nope. I ended up going with the Hitec 5645mg servo over the savox, because of the annoying hum the savox has and couldn't be happier. The steering issues are gone and performance is greatly improved!!! After a few runs to make sure the new servo was ok I removed it and waterproofed it. Time do some more river crawling!

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How did you waterproof your steering servo. I still have the stock steering servo. I also put some different wheels on it thinking about getting a better servo to handle the extra weight

Here is the tire and wheel combo I have. And if some one can identify them I would like to put them on something else

RC4WD mud slingers on some unknown RC4WD rim?

xlDooM said:

RC4WD mud slingers on some unknown RC4WD rim?

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Thank you as always

Granther said:

View attachment 1684

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what suspension are those? they look neat

psyblade said:

what suspension are those? they look neat

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Those are the hot racing shocks for the temper. They work every wel but i ahd to use both springs in them to get the performance i was looking for.