TOPIC:

I got my Wild Willy out of the basement and let it see its first daylight after nearly 35-ish years! (YEA!)
Thanks to shapeways and this forum I was able to replace some of the parts that were very fragile after sitting for so long.

I don't recall how it performed new, but it seems like the motor is tired.
I could roll it back in reverse and it'd pop up on the wheelie bars, but sit right back down again.
It will not do a wheelie from a dead stop.
It also takes a few seconds to 'wind up' to top speed when accelerating.
I am using a 2200mah 7.2v ni-cad pack, with the original motor and original manual speed controller.


Thoughts on how to make it perform better?
I want to keep the original speed control in it.

I've seen the 'glass of water' trick to clean motors...is that an option?
Are the brushes worn out (I did run it quite a bit when it was new) - can these motors be rebuilt?
I do not do LIPO's...I don't know enough about them, and respect them enough not to dive in the deep end without getting educated first.

I do plan to keep this a 'runner'...so a new motor is fine, and does NOT need to be period correct.
I have my original motor (the tired one) if I ever retire it to shelf queen status.

Thanks for your thoughts.
-Garrett

Hi Garrett, good chance the NiCd is toast, can you test with another battery. I had similar problems with older batteries. Full throttle umpf nada. They just dont give high amps, slow throttle it rolls, full forward pfffft. Btw i dont do lipo either.

Good suggestion, start simple, try another pack.
I bought 3 identical packs less than a year ago, but I'll try the other two before swapping anything out.

I should add, mine is a LWB.

I want mine to run like this!!

Hey all!
Sorry for being out of the loop for a bit, I have been laid up for a bit with some back issues , maybe laid out would be a better term, don't worry though, it's not the first time it has happened, although it has been a few years, I am getting back on my feet and can sit at the desk again, just don't feel as young as I use to . It is funny how many things I like to do that require me to sit for periods of time to accomplish, like typing on a forum or working on an RC car project. Its kind of a trade off, if I take enough pills to let me sit for awhile I don't feel like doing much except sleeping Oh well, some therapy and rest and stretching exercises are paying off nicely now....
Oh ya , the Wild Willy question????

Just my thoughts of course but here they are.

How are your wheel bearings? After 30 years or so the grease can tend to get a bit stiff, give everything a spin, are they turning freely? if not re lube them or just replace them, Wild Willy uses regular skateboard type bearings in the wheels so easy to find and cheap too.

Take the motor out and hold one wheel, turn the other and see if the gear box is turning freely, if not find out why. Does the motor turn easily in your fingers too? Be sure your gear mesh is not too tight when you put the motor back in. Lube your motor bushings....

As far as I can remember, the glass of water trick was only to quickly seat the brushes on a new motor, I was never a big fan of it as it is messy and I worried about getting all the water back out of the motor bearings etc.

Is you speed controller going full travel? are the contacts clean and solder joints good? How about the battery plug?

And about those batteries, I don't think you need to jump to li-po, Wild Willy was just fine with a 1200mAh hump pack so 2200 will be great if they are fully charged. Is there something else you can run a battery in to be sure it is not just quickly running out of charge or has taken a peak memory as ni-cads sometimes do.

Also where is the battery located?? a modern 6 cell pack will not fit in the stock location and that is important for the wheelie action. Can you think of another car with the battery weight so high and towards the back? That's part of the magic here too.

Those are just my quick thoughts ( and I only needed to get up and walk around twice so that's good for me ) Sorry if some of these questions seem too basic, but sometimes it's those things we just take for granted and never check . It also reminds me that I have not run my Wild Willy in quite some time so I had better get at that too.

Good luck!!

Heat & age can demagnetise the magnets, but TBH i don't know how you could go about remagnetising them at home, I haven't tried it but theoretically you could swap them out with ones from a later silvercan ... however those motors aren't really rebuildable - you might be able to bend the indents back enough to get the endbell off, but they tend to break off when bending them back again.

One thing to watch for with a replacement/upgraded motor on the Wild Willy is that the pivoting of the gearbox/proper fit of the motor depends on the motor having that specific type of endbell (large raised circle) & even slightly longer motors won't fit - though shorter ones can if you can make up an adaptor.

Overall, batteries are a good call - and Lipo would not be a fix in this case, it's analogous to fitting a +50 BHP Nitrous kit to a 4 pot engine instead of finding out the reason it's only running on three cylinders ...