newbie needing help with connecting 4 motors t one channel
 

Hi everyone Im newish to rc and definitely new to scratch building and im having some trouble figuring out how to drive the 1/16 scale ertl caseih quadtrac im planing on building. I want all 4 tracks to be drivin at the same time and speed so i was thinking of using 4 drive motors and connecting each to its own esc and then connecting 2 esc together via a y harness, and then connecting those 2 connections to gether with another y harness into one channel on the receiver.

So my questions to all of you is will is will this work and if so how do i eliminate having to carry 4 batteries, 1 for each esc?

if you have a better suggestion on how to drive the vehicle please tell me.

thanks for your time.

Re: newbie needing help with connecting 4 motors t one channel
 

Someone should double check this answer to make sure I'm not missing anything.

Your method should work, but make sure you only have 1 ESC red wire connected to the receiver (or together) so the BECs aren't interfering with each other.

Background theory:
ESC sucks power from the battery through the thick batter wires and supplies the motor and internal BEC. The BEC lowers the voltage to 5-6 volts and supplies the receiver with power through the red wire in the servo connector. The receiver supplies the servo signal back to the ESC through the white wire, and the return path for both red and white is through the black ground wire in the servo connector. We don't know how well the BEC plays when its output is connected to another power source, so to be safe, we don't want to connect it to another BEC.

Servo wires:
Cut or unplug the red wire in the servo connector from 3 of the 4 ESCs. Then use Y-harnesses as planned. You may lose some power from the BEC through all those connections, so consider soldering a custom harness.

Battery wires:
Connect the red wires together. Connect the black wires together. The ESCs should be connected to the battery in parallel.

Re: newbie needing help with connecting 4 motors t one channel
 

That plan would work.

But i'd look up the specs (stall amps) on the motors, then find a single ESC that has greater amp capacity than the 4 motors. Wire motors in PARALLEL.

If it's an articulated chassis that bends in middle to steer, you need 2 esc, different wiring layout, and channel mixing.

Re: newbie needing help with connecting 4 motors t one channel
 

It is an articulated chassis but i think i have a simpler solution, im going to basicsly stick a crawler's driveline inside wich hopefully will solve the problem caused by my inexperience. Plus i have an old gmade r1 rock crawler that i can rade for parts. Thanks for the reply and sorry for not saying so earlier.

Re: newbie needing help with connecting 4 motors t one channel
 

Good luck getting a crawler drivetrain to speak wiggle-wagon, driveshafts don't tend to like the chassis articulation.

I was going to suggest wiring it up like this.
http://rctruckandconstruction.com/sh...ad.php?t=12500

It's 4 motors are able to provide drive and steering, without a steering servo.