The rc world is still dominated by electric power and that doesn’t look to be changing any time soon. That fact means that nearly every hobbyist is going to need a good battery pack for his truck. Today we’ll be putting the hammer down on the latest Lipo battery from ProTek, a Supreme Power 2S 7.4v 100C 5600 mah pack. Does it have good power? Does it live when you jump it off the roof? Is it right for the basher crowd? Let’s find out…

From: ProTek
Direct Link: 7.4v 100C 5600 mah Hard Case Lipo

Review By: Cubby
Pics By: Cubby

Specs:

Battery Type: Lithium Polymer
Stated Capacity: 5600 mah
Cell Configuration: 2S2P
Voltage- 7.4v (8.4 volt max, 6 volt min)
Discharge- 100C constant (560 amps)
Weight (measured by BSRC with Traxxas connector)- 315 grams
Dimensions (measured by BSRC)- 47 x 25 x 138 mm
Balance Plug Type- None
Stock Connector- Two 5mm bullets and one 2mm bullet
Stock Wiring- None
Max Charge Rate- 2C/11.2 amps
Street Price: $99

What’s In The Box: You get the battery, stickers, two 5mm bullets and one 2mm bullet. The pack does not come with any wiring or balance plug.

Build Quality: Decent build quality, hard case seemed relatively thick and the bullet connectors were of a good quality.

Test Platforms: We used a Pro-Line Pro-2 tuned Traxxas Slash and a bone stock ECX Torment SCT. The Pro-Line truck used a Castle speedo and 5700kv brushless motor, a Hitec servo, and was controlled by a Futaba 4PK Super-R radio system.

Test Drivers: The usual suspects- Brian, Tim, Iron Mike, and myself.

Test Venues: DirtBurners rc track in St Louis Missouri, a state park, and various backyards and streets.

Driving Impressions: We got a lot of driving time in with the ProTek and it always proved to be an impressively quick pack. We went back-to-back with other “high end” packs of a similar capacity and “C” rating and the ProTek never failed to impress. The ProTek always seemed to have as much power, if not more, than every pack we compared it to.

While driving the ProTek in our ECX Torment it certainly made the stock brushed motor seem like it was the quickest it has ever been. In our Pro-Line Pro2 it supplied more than enough current to keep its brushless system pulling hard. The ProTek had intense punch off the bottom and seemed to keep on pulling forever on long stretches where you could leave it pinned. Overall the ProTek was arguably the fastest pack (of its class) that we’ve ever driven.

Downsides: The biggest downside was the lack of wiring and balance plug. Racer types can simply solder the included bullets on to the wires coming out of their speedo, but most basher types will want to add wire to the pack. That takes up more time to solder up and costs more money.

General Notes:

The ProTek had a perfect form factor and easily fit in normal sized battery trays.

The 5mm bullets are nice to have, they can handle a lot of juice for those crazy high current applications.

The first graph above shows the 1C discharge of the Protek, the next is how it performed under heavier loads, and the last shows how the ProTek stacks up against an Orion and a Gens Ace at 30 amps.

About The Graphs:

We used a West Mountain CBA discharger to performed a 1C/5.6 amp discharge to test capacity. Next we did a 30 amp discharge, then a 6C/32.4 amp discharge, and finally a 60 amp continuous discharge to see how well the ProTek held its voltage under a continuous load. The higher a battery can hold its voltage, the faster your car/truck will be. Ambient temp for all bench tests was 69 F, the pack was always charged on a Hyperion 720iNet3 at 2C/11.2 amps and voltage cut-off was always set at 3.0 volts per cell during discharges. We tested the ProTek wired with 10 gauge Castle wire and a Traxxas connector.

Discharge Notes:

ProTek lists 5600 mAh as its capacity, we measured 5695 which is 101.7% of stated. Being slightly high and less than 2% off of stated capacity is very impressive. Kudos to the ProTek crew on not over or under stating the capacity.

Overall the ProTek 100C 5600 was an impressive performer on the bench. It did not put out the highest voltage that we’ve ever tested, but it was right up there with the elite performers. Performance at 6C was quite strong and it was even more impressive under a 60 amp load. The ProTek put out some of the highest numbers we’ve seen for the first half of the discharge on a 60 amp load.

Measured Temps:

1C – 78 F
30 amps – 90 F
6C/32.4 amps – 91 F
60 amps – 99 F

Measured Capacities:

1C – 5695 mah
30 amps – 5578 mah
6C/32.4 amps – 5623 mah
60 amps – 5540 mah

Measured Run Times:

1C – 60:47
30 amps – 11:12
6C/32.4 amps – 10:05
60 amps – 5:34

Summary:

Time to Bash: D The ProTek doesn’t come with wire or a balance port. It takes longer to get the ProTek ready for the road than many of its competitors.

Car Show Rating: B The black hard case features a silver diamond design. The BigSquid Bash Crew liked the look- clean and modern.

Bash-A-Bility: A We experienced no issues at all with the ProTek pack. We submerged it in water, hit it at 60 amps continuous, it suffered numerous high G impacts in vehicles getting hucked to pavement, and it came through without suffering any damage.

Power: B On track it felt exceptionally strong, on the bench it put out solid numbers at the upper end of any comparable pack we’ve tested.

Value: B The ProTek comes in at a $99 price point and packs some serious power. The Protek outperforms some packs costing more than it does, but there are a few less expensive packs that are right in its league.

BigSquid Rating: B- If the ProTek would have simply came with wire its overall “grade” would have been much better. While racers might prefer to use their own wiring, bashers want everything they need right in the box for a typical install. Otherwise the ProTek 5600 was a rock solid pack that will impress you with its performance. There are a lot of slow packs out there and a lot of packs that are middle of the road for power, but the ProTek runs with the elite packs, it’s fast.

Part number for the Reedy 4S 4600 55C is #311 (cool band btw), they should start hitting hobby shops in late June, and they have a street price of $170. Check out THIS LINK for more information over on the official Team Associated website.

Want to catch up on more Lipo battery news? Check out THIS LINK right here on BigSquidRC.

Hey all, this week’s first ‘Ask Cubby’ letter is a LONG one, so I decided not to put it in the normal ‘hand written’ font thing because it takes up too much space, and a little difficult to read something of this length like that. Anyway, here we go… our first letter is from Dave, enjoy!

“Touching an old base regarding Cubbie’s LiPo discharge article from 5/2010 Hey guys, keeping ‘em flat on all four?

My guess – they won’t even start an econobox commuter car. It drives home the point better than “numbers on paper”.
Just a thought guys…keep ‘em coming.
Dave B.
BTW – please be careful if you try it….”

Cubby- Yo what’s up Dave, shoot Brian your snail mail for an uber BSRC sticker set. Long email with a lot of points involved, so I’ll start from the top.

You contend that battery “ratings are often times flat-out lies”. To you it might look that way, but here’s how it goes down behind the scenes. When Happy Flower Lipo Company wants to source a bunch of batteries they approach an Asian manufacture. This Asian manufacture typically has many different “lines” or “levels” of cells, and they typically group them by “C” rating. Happy Flower then selects the cells they want and cuts the huge check.

From what I’ve seen first hand in the industry, the “C” rating from the Asian manufactures is typically based on the design of the cell, not on its output. For instance, a 1000 mah cell that is said to be 100 “C” would be built with internals calculated to handle 100 amps, not tested to handle 100 amps.

Now when you Dave, get a pack in hand and it’s a 100 “C” pack, you may not be aware of this fact, you might think the “C” rating is based on being able to do 100 “C” in your car, but I do not know of any re-sellers that base the “C” rating on their packs this way. I might very well be wrong, if some manufacture out there does indeed base their “C” rating on actual bench/car tested output please complain to Brian that I lied and I’ll gladly post the correct info.

Next point, you say that there is no rc battery on the market that can “sustain a 65C load”. I’m assuming you stated this based on no testing and are just chucking it out there as an opinion, which is totally your right to do. My input here is that cells have come a long ways the last 5 years. I haven’t tested any cells at 65C on the bench, but based on the temps and voltage levels we’ve seen at lower discharge levels, I would not be surprised to see a pack that could live at a relatively insane current level. 3 years ago? No way in hell, but now days there are some damn solid cells/packs on the market.

We have equipment (West Mountain CBA w/amp) capable of testing a 1S 1000 mah pack at 120C continuous discharge. Back in the day I knew such testing was a waste of time as packs would routinely die on 20C loads, but I should find some time and see just what kind of continuous load modern cells can actually live under. I think the
result might very well surprise you and I.

About jump starting a car with a Lipo, there are a number of videos out there, including one we did a couple of years ago. We easily jump started a 6 cylinder Ford Taurus with a 3S Lipo. The 3S Lipo didn’t get hot and lived to power our rc cars for many cycles afterwards. Also, I don’t remember for sure what connector we used (we may have just soldered on clips), but we were using the stock wire that came with the pack.

In closing- Lipo batteries used to be the limiting factor in rc cars power system, but not so now days. In most typical applications Lipo’s stay cool, last a bunch of cycles, and do not dip to crazy low voltages. These facts tend to make the advertised “C” rating moot. Yes, I agree with you that the “C” ratings are mis-leading and don’t really convey much (if any) useful information to a potential buyer, and yes, there needs to be a better “rating” system. If I owned Happy Flower Lipo Company my packs would be labeled with their cell count, their cell configuration, their typical 1C capacity, and their typical output voltage under a 10C load. Sure, a noob can look at two packs and instantly think that a 65 “C” pack is better than a 20 “C” pack, but they have no idea what “C” is. Noobs just know “higher is better”, something we’ve proven to not always be the case with our shootouts. With my “Cubby Rating System (CRS LOL)” of listing voltage at 10C, a noob could also instantly see that one 2S pack rated at 7.45 volts is “better” than a pack rated at 7.38 volts, and he’d have at least a rough idea of what the numbers actually mean.

I have a xp1200 esc from my sc10 4×4 rtr and a 540sl 6100kv motor (not the micro) the specs on the esc say that it can handle the 6100kv motor would this be a good combo for a 2wd truck on a 2s lipo and will the esc really handle it.

Glen B.

Cubby- Yo what’s up Glen, thanks for the email. I have absolutely zero experience with the XP line of Associated RTR speedo’s, so I’m totally gonna wing it here. Enjoy!

In theory… ya, the XP SC1200 speedo should work fine in a 2wd 10th scale truck. It comes stock in the 4×4 SC10 RTR that is considerably more load for a speedo than a 2wd would be.

Can the XP SC1200 handle a 6100 kv motor? Its specs says it can and my pure guess is that you shouldn’t have an issue if you keep your 2wd truck geared appropriately. If you gear for 120 mph I’ll promise you that you’ll have issues (read- a fire).

Cubby’s helpful hint of the week- Using a 6100 kv motor is great for speed no doubt, your truck should be a rocket with such a high kv motor, but it is especially important to keep an eye on motor/battery/speedo temps if you want your equipment to live. Start with a small pinion and monitor temps as you gear taller. And… don’t go out and run for 12 minutes then check the temps, check every couple minutes during the run before things get too hot. The speedo should protect itself from overheating, but you don’t want to see temps over 140 F on either the motor or the battery. Also keep in mind that the taller (bigger pinions) you gear, the faster you’ll go, but the less runtime you’ll get. Have fun, go fast, and shoot us a massive wheelie pic of your truck when you get it going.

YOUR Cub Reporter

tech question…..im currently awaiting delivery of an hpi mini trophy truck …. my intent is to build a 4wi suspention rock crawler/trail rig i have misc. parts from an axial scx10 i bought used and beat more than sunk money into ..but anywho i want to use either the whole locked diff or the locker block in it in the rear only diff on the hpi would you know if it will fit? i want to run a vxl3s esc to the brushed motor statistically the vxl claims it will run a brushed motor my question is will it burn up the brushes faster than stock esc in the trophy truck?
Tim H. (via Facebook)

Cubby- Yo hey Tim, what’s up and thanks for the questions. How about last one first. Will a Traxxas VXL-3S speed controller burn up brushes faster than the stock HPI Mini Trophy Truck speedo? Yes, there might be a slight difference in brush wear between the two speedos, but I’ve never personally performed such tests, so I can’t say first hand if there truly is or not. If there was a difference I’d guess it would be very, very small. However, I will say this, if you are truly concerned about brush wear- take the extra hour and properly water dip (read seat/break-in) the brushes. Properly seated brushes yield much longer motor life, that I can assure you from first hand testing. And… if you ask a dozen people the proper way to seat brushes you’ll probably get a dozen different answers. My personal “standard method” (which came from Jammin’ Jim S) is dipping the motor in water while applying a low voltage load until you notice the color of the water starting to change. This can take anywhere between 10-45 minutes depending on the motor and voltage used.
Now, about your first question. If I read it properly, it sounds like you are making one heck of a unique trail truck. It sounds like you are making a trail/scaler machine (with a locked rear diff) out of an HPI Mini Trophy Truck. Good for you, unique projects are great fun. Will the locked rear diff parts from an Axial SCX10 fit in the Mini-Trophy truck? I have absolutely zero clue, nor am I going to tear two trucks apart to find out. You have both trucks in hand (or will soon), give it a try and let us know. If they aren’t compatible there is always the old standby of JB Weld to lock that rear diff solid as a rock. Good luck, and shoot us pics/vid of that beast when you are done.

I am pretty sure someone has emailed about SMC Lipos, but if not, I am. I have owned a few SMC 2s packs and just ordered some more and I have had really good luck. I have also followed the SMC Lipo Battery Lipo thread on rctech.net and there are a lot of good things being said about them. The reason I am sending this email is because I think they sell and produce a better battery than the gensace 5800 that won the lipo shootout. Their batteries are also less expensive. Now before you jump to conclusions, I have owned many gensace lipos and I really do like them, I just think these smc lipos have an edge. Anyway’s, it would be nice to see SMC lipos in your next lipo shootout. Also, if there isn’t a shootout planned in the near future, I think posting a link about these batteries would be helpful to the bashing community. Good batteries at a cheap price are hard to find sometimes.
P.S. – I really do enjoy your site!
DMW

Cubby- Yo hey DMW, shoot Brian your snail mail for a free BSRC sticker pack. Hopefully you are as good of a spokesman for BSRC as you are for SMC Batteries. We haven’t reviewed any SMC batteries for a while so I have no clue if they are any good now days or not. I don’t know if we’ve contacted them lately, but I’ll put Brian and Kevin (our new ad rep guy) on it to see if they are up for a solid third party review. If they are truly after a piece of the enormous basher market maybe they’ll hook up with us and advertise. Btw… we do have a couple of Lipo reviews coming up in the very near future, two packs from A Main Hobbies/ProTek. We started the review process a couple of weeks ago, maybe one of the reviews will be ready in the next week or so. Not to spill any beans, but what we’ve learned about their packs should make for some interesting reading for you guys. Lastly on the Lipo topic- I have been awfully impressed with the last Pro-Match Lipo we reviewed. No, it doesn’t put out the most voltage we’ve ever seen on the West Mountain, however it has done something I consider to be more impressive- it has put up with crazy amounts of abuse (for over a hundred cycles) and still puts out solid numbers while always stayed well balanced. The pack I’m talking about is their 2S 5000 mah pack that we’ve used for numerous truck and charger reviews. We’ve subjected that pack to multiple runs at 60 amps on the West Mountain, we’ve charged it at 20 amps (multiple times in a row with no cool down period), and run it in high draw 8th scalers, yet today, after over 100 cycles, it performs like a champ. That is truly the most impressive thing a Lipo can do in my eyes- to withstand hard use and still last.

Thank goodness it’s Friday, another long hard week in the books. How about a TGIF Mystery Link?

Hi my name is Bruin and I own a Helion Dominus 10r. I still have my stock 1800 mah battery in it and I read your latest lipo shootout. You had the Gens Ace 5800 2s lipo ranked first and I was interested in buying one. I have looked all over the internet and I can’t find any sites that sell them and if they do they are out of stock. Do you know where I could find one or any hobby shops that have them in stock?

I live in Rexburg, Idaho and they just got rid of the nearest Hobbytown USA to me in Idaho Falls so I pretty much have to order everything online now. If you could please reply I would greatly appreciate it. I would also accept any advice like a diffferent/better lipo I should get or any upgrades etc… Thanks

Cubby- Yo hey Bruin, sounds like you are having the same problem a lot of people are, not being able to find the Gens Ace pack they want in stock.

I’ve often said the biggest problem Gens Ace has is keeping their packs in stock. They put out a decent battery at a reasonable price point, but they’ve got a lot to learn about inventory management. So what should be your plan of action? Buy from someone else that has their act together and keeps their product in proper supply.

So what’s an affordable Lipo that is easier to actually lay your hands on? Venom. Venom has come a long ways with the quality of their batteries in recent years, and while they may not have won one of our shootouts, they are solid packs that will make your Helion M U C H faster than the included Ni-MH battery. Oh and even more importantly, it’s typically pretty easy to lay hands on one that suits your needs. Venom is carried by both of the “big two”, Hobbico and Horizon, so whether you are buying from an LHS (sucks to hear you lost yours) or buying on-line, the chances of finding what you need is much greater.

Squid Live #16
I don’t watch the show. it’s a bad timing kind of thing… but I did watch the re-run of #16 (couldn’t sleep and had nothing better to do). Thought I’d send a few comments, just to let you know, it didn’t lull me back to sleep, and that the nonsense is at least somewhat entertaining.

First off that Red Cat S-tryk-r, interesting idea for a rc vehicle, glad they finally got it to market, but couldn’t they have had somebody with some art or industrial design capability at least give them some clues about how something like this should look. Come on now, I mean – one word: UGLY! make that two words: STUPID UGLY! They can do good looking, you didn’t mention the Pagani Huayra, but it is a RedCat so I understand. Now belt drive is cool, it smooths out the shock to the drive train, yea it’s going to be a nightmare to work on but that’s just something that you would have to live with for a Canam style bike. Your only other option for a three wheeler would be a Mardave sidecar racer (spec racer – lame) or some Vaterra you guys are done bashing with (change that, the Vaterra would probably only have one wheel left).

As to bashing with a Corally… problem is after getting things good and wet the sand kicked up by the paddles tends to pack up on the belt and pulleys and before you know it the belt is all stretched out, corners rounded off and the belt starts slipping.

TS

Cubby- Hey now TS, interesting email ya sent in.

Ya, our G+ shows can be interesting at times. At the very least they give us a bit of a chance to hang out face to face. While I may go on and on about meeting up in the uber BSRC offices, the staff is actually all over the place so we don’t really get to see each other that much. We meet up here and there for reviews and shootouts, we also meet up for trade shows and bash events, otherwise the work done here is via UPS and the net. Any time I get to give Brian or Adam crap I consider to be a good time.

I’m not a fan of RedCat. Every time I’ve been exposed to a RedCat vehicle first hand it was with a pile of soon to be rubble, and they haven’t been what I’d call “cordial” to us by any means, so what is there for me to like? That doesn’t mean that times have changed and their new gear is actually worth owning, and that doesn’t mean that they’ve decided to overlook the negatively I’ve written about them and want to hold out their hand to start over, who knows. What I do know is we don’t get any of their product for review, so even if it is quality gear we have no way of knowing it. And… I do know we’ve extended our hand by covering their booths at trade shows and by posting some of their press releases.

With that said, I like their S-TRYK-R. In fact several of the BSRC Bash Crew do. Why? It’s a matter of this- we’ve owned hundreds of cars over the years and are attracted to something completely new and different because we are bored of the “norm”. The S-TRYK-R might be a POS, but we’d actually put up with that if it was so different to own that it was a “new” experience for us.

YOUR Cub Reporter

The CUBE200 is a DC only charger and can charge at up to 6 amps on each of its 4 ports. If you race a lot of classes, or simply bring a half dozen cars to the local bash spot, one 4 port charger goes a long ways towards saving space while still keeping all your packs charged.

The Racers Edge CUBE200 can charge up to a 6S Lithium pack and has a maximum discharge rate of 1 amp. It also comes with a blue backlit LCD display, a 5v 1 amp USB output, and a 5 year warranty.

Looking for more information on battery chargers? If so, check out THIS LINK right here on BigSquidRC.

If you are looking for a high-end battery to power your bash machine the crew over at TrakPower has a new line-up of hard case Lipo’s. These new Lipo’s pack more punch with 80C discharge rates and they come with either 4mm bullet or genuine Deans connectors.

The new models include-

* TKPC0505 2S 7.4V 4600mAh 80C Hard Case 4mm ($69)
* TKPC0395 2S 7.4V 5600mAh 60C Hard Case 4mm ($99)
* TKPC0510 2S 7.4V 6000mAh 80C Hard Case Deans ($99)
* TKPC0515 2S 7.4V 6000mAh 80C Hard Case 4mm ($99)
* TKPC0520 2S 7.4V 7200mAh 80C Hard Case Deans ($119)
* TKPC0525 2S 7.4V 7200mAh 80C Hard Case 4mm ($119)
* TKPC0530 2S 7.4V 6000mAh 80C Hard Case Saddle Pack ($99)
* TKPC0535 4S 14.14V 6800mAh 80C Hard Case Deans ($199)

For more information just hit up the Official TrakPower Website, and to read more TrakPower news here on BigSquidRC THIS is the link you want.

Some of the primary features of the EcoPower include- AC/DC, charge rates up to 10 amps, and charges Lipo, LiFe, and NiMH. The 610 is a 200 watt charger that can charge up to 6S Lipo or 18 cell NiMH.

Part number for the Electron 610 is #ECP-1002 and it has a street price of $99. HERE is the link that takes you directly to the Electron 610 on A Main’s website.

We’ve made it through yet another work week, why not check out a BigSquidRC TGIF Mystery Link?

We reviewed the iMaxRC X200 a few weeks ago, hit up THIS link to read the full review.