Mardave V12

The Mardave is a simple 1/12th car for indoor carpet racing. These are run in a separate class at Southport as they are cheap, simple and easy to drive. I bought mine as the racing is fun, close and well attended. Almost always there are 2 heats of the Mardave class with a wide range of abilities. THeres always someone to chase!

The car

The Mardave V12 is supplied as a kit for £51.95 rrp. Add a set of radio gear, Ni-Cads and a charger and £120 is more realistic. This should get you up and racing though, and the spares are easily available and cheap. My advice is to ask at your local club and they will direct you to a good hobby shop who know what to get.

Like all mardave cars, the v12 is simple both in design and to build. THis should be fine for the novice to RC car racing to build. Just take your time and read the instructions. You will need a flat bladed screw driver, pliers, knife and some superglue as a minimum.

The chassis is a alloy plate which is very strong. All components simply screw onto this plate with identical screws. The front suspension has a simple setup, with the hub carriers allowed to slide up the king pins for suspension travel. No damping or spring adjustability is present. Steering is provided by tie rods operated straight from the steering servo, with a basic servo saver included.

The rear of the car features a plastic pod which contains the motor and rear axle. No differential is used, and the gearing is a simple pinion and spur gear setup. The rear axle is solid, like an old live axle setup. Smooth carpet means that independent suspension is not really needed. The whole assembly pivots at the front on a ball joint, and is sprung with 2 coil springs and a friction damper. The damping and spring preload can be tweaked on this system. Nylon bearings are included with the kit, ball races are £5ish and well worth adding.

The electronics are taken care of by a simple mechanical speed controller and an included 540 motor. This gives 3 speed forward and reverse control and is a good cheap way of getting started.

Upgrades

Many possibilities for modifications and upgrades exist for the mardave v12. Motors, speed controllers, tyres and batteries are all good places to start. There are also a few things I would recommend doing during the initial build for the sake of reliability and performance.

Things to do straight away:

The included track rods break easily and are a pain to adjust. Mardave do a kit with proper ones in, V7MOD - High Strength Track Rod Mod Kit £2.50
Fit ball races - they will wear longer than the nylon bearings and give better top speed and run time, V8EB - Rear Axle Ball raced Bearings (2) £4.45
I fitted a better Servo saver, of the Kimbourgh type. This was £3.75 from my local store. It did need cutting down to clear the body mounts, but with the track rods it really does steer well now.

Make it faster:

Fit a Electronic Speed Controller. I use a M-Troniks Tempo 15. It costs £25 and works well, giving me more control and saving a lot of weight. I am happy to £5 more for the higher rated one, as it will be useful as a spare for 19t racing on my buggy. Plenty of other controllers are available - ask people you race with or you local shop.
Fit a faster stock motor. There are several other options to the included motor. I use a Hunter Systems RS540-SF Motor which cost £9.95. Its quite a bit quicker than the original motor.

Make It Handle

Flip the front wishbones over and add around 2mm of washers under the front to add some castor to the kingpins.
Use Grey front tyres and soft medium rears, or follow the advice given in the link section.
The servo saver and track rod decribed earlier helps the steering.

Mardave V12

The car

Upgrades

Links