Pt109

[Doug James]

I was in a Hobby Shop the other day and came across a PT109 by Proboat
It's a complete kit,just charge the batteries and go. Anyone know anything
about this ready to run boat?

[frankg]

:) The PRO-BOAT kit of the PT-109 is the exact basic model that was originally manufactured in China by MIDWEST Products and imported as a complete RTR boat under their logo. The PRO-BOAT version has a few upgrades over the Midwest Version in that it now has water cooled motors along with a water cooled electronic speed control, along with built in working running lights which have their electronic voltage regulator built into the electronic speed control.

The price of the PRO-BOAT version is was about $100 more than the MIDWEST version of about three years prior. The price has also had a major increase due to the increased cost of all imported products coming out of China.

M.A.C.K. Products sells the Pro-Boat PT-109 for $450.00 plus shipping on their web site. www.mackproductsrc.com :)

[spacephrawg]

I have one. Its fun. I deliberately bought mine dammaged on ebay so i could get it for cheap. Basically it was superficial dammage. I got it for around $200.

Anyone know if the stock motors are any good or should i upgrade?

[Ghost 2501]

spacefroggie, A former member of the potteries model boat club has the midwest one, completely stock, and it goes like a scalded cat! If it went any faster he'd need 35mhz radio as it would take off!

[Doug James]

Thanks for the information.I have been thinking about have something to just take out
to play around with and there seem to be a lot of people talking about the PT109 being
a fun time. I guess the other one I have been looking at is the Coast Guard RTR boat
from the Proboat people

[spacephrawg]

spacefroggie, A former member of the potteries model boat club has the midwest one, completely stock, and it goes like a scalded cat! If it went any faster he'd need 35mhz radio as it would take off!


Thanks for that. I just bought a replacement pair of the stock motors for it after the originals got fried due to some idiocy on my part. On another thread someone was pushing the Traxxas Titan 550 14.4v motors and I was like oh **** I bought the wrong thing. When I was running on the stock motors the thing was quite peppy. I had no complaints. thanks for the reassurance.

[spacephrawg]

In other news, Doug, if you're interested in adding extra details to the boat you might be interested in whatJohn R. Haynes (https://www.johnrhaynes.com/shop/index.php) sells. Your boat is 1/24th scale. John sells PT boat guns and things in that scale, and good quality ones at that. Better than HR fittings.

[RCBoater]

Another member of our club had one, and I liked the way it looked and ran, so I bought one, too. I think that the 109 is a bit overdone, so I wanted to convert my boat to a different model. Like SpacePhrawg, I got a damaged one- it only had superficial shipping damage, and I got it for $200. (Ebay.)

I spent about $100 on some John Haynes fittings. I bought Mk 13 roll-off torpedoes and launchers, 20mm, 37mm, and 40mm guns, a radar mast, and new .50 cal MGs. I'm going to convert my boat to a late war weapons fit- with a 3 color camo.

Some other observations-

- The plastic props are a little fragile-- both myself and my clubmate broke ours. He bought a pair of M4 thread 35mm Raboesch brass props-- and his boat runs great with them. (I'm going to order a set soon.)

- I find that the water cooling pickups are useless-- they are in the rudder shaft, and angled aft, so they don't pick up any water to speak of. I'm going to fashion some new ones...

- We both found that the built in battery trays are too far aft-- we run our boats with the batteries forward of the motors.

- I'll post some shots of my boat once the conversion is finished.
Hope this helps....

[Doug James]

Good information,I'm looking forward to seeing your shots.

[spacephrawg]

I was ok with the battery placement. What obvious thing am I missing? The boat appeared to float in the right orientation and everything too.

Also do you guys run your boat with the stock direct drive motor-to-shaft connection? I found that that set up produced a lot of vibration so I made a special mount further forward for hte motors and put in some graupner double U-joints and the vibrations decreased. I also replaced the shafts. Still some hum but not like it was stock.

[Doug James]

I'm new to this but could the problem be that you prop needs balancing?

[spacephrawg]

I'm new to this but could the problem be that you prop needs balancing?

Well it did the vibrating thing even when there were no props on the shafts. It did it when it just had the plastic stock props on there too. The brass props I have on there now aren't ballanced but there is no change in the vibrations one way or the other. The U-joints did reduce the vibrations a bit though.

[RCBoater]

I was ok with the battery placement. What obvious thing am I missing? The boat appeared to float in the right orientation and everything too.

Also do you guys run your boat with the stock direct drive motor-to-shaft connection? I found that that set up produced a lot of vibration so I made a special mount further forward for hte motors and put in some graupner double U-joints and the vibrations decreased. I also replaced the shafts. Still some hum but not like it was stock.

We just thought the boat was trimmed down a bit by the stern at speed-- I didn't notice much difference at rest. Now that I'm adding a comparatively heavy Haynes resin and metal 40mm gun on the stern, I'll need to move the batteries as far forward as I can.....

We both the use the stock connections for the shafts, and haven't had any trouble.

Mike, my clubmate, did rewire one of the motors to run in the other direction, so he now has contra-rotating props. Out of the box, the boat turns very sharply to starboard, and not so well to port. Mike'sboat now turns equally well in either direction. (Contra-toating props are not scale- the real boats had all props the same.)

[Rex R]

drive vibration:
it could be that your shafts have a small bend at the motor end. my hammer ep sounded like it had an outboard motor on untill I replaced the shaft. turned out that the original shaft had a slight bend right where they had ground the flat for the motor coupler grub screw.

[spacephrawg]

I replaced the shafts actually. The thing hums less but still hums. I dont think I had the problem with it turning more to one side than the other. It seemed even to me.

I have the haynes 40mm but haven't installed it yet.

RCboater: when you put the batteries in the forward part of the hull, do you velcro them down or something? how do you keep them from knocking around?

[RCBoater]

RCboater: when you put the batteries in the forward part of the hull, do you velcro them down or something? how do you keep them from knocking around?

So far, I just lay them in the bottom of the hull, unsecured. The wires on your standard nicad pack are just long enough to allow you to place the batteries forward of the motors. The batteries can't slide further forward, and the slope of the hull bottom causes them to both want to stay close to the center line.

When my other mods are complete, I'll probbably install some velcro to keep them from moving around.

Right now, I am in the process of fixing the deck. I used my dremel tool to cut away the raised torpedo mountings in the deck. This left me with some large holes in the deck to repair. I epoxied some wood beams underneath to span the holes, to serve as a backing for the auto body putty. I am now filling in the holes, with a couple of layers of 3M auto body filler (the light blue stuff).
Once the deck is filled, I will install the bases for the various weapons, and then repaint the model.

Here' a link to a build on hyperscale.com of the 1/35 scale Italeri kit. I'm using that as my inspiration:
http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c45/CWO3/PT%20BOAT/DSCF0138.jpg

This model ws build by Mike Witous-- you can see more of his work on Hyperscale.

My model won't have the rocket launchers-- but it will have the rest of weapons fit as seen in the picture.

[spacephrawg]

because of where i had to put hte motors, i dont think i'll have room to put the batteries forward. How does your boat ride with the batteries in the front? I bet it planes less, am I right?

I am planning to do the same deck work actually. I have some really thin brass that i was going to use where you used the wood. I have a lot of bondo. I've done the brass patch/bondo thing elsewhere on the boat already and with good results.

Whats your opinion on bondo vs. any other kind of body filler?

[RCBoater]

because of where i had to put hte motors, i dont think i'll have room to put the batteries forward. How does your boat ride with the batteries in the front? I bet it planes less, am I right?

I am planning to do the same deck work actually. I have some really thin brass that i was going to use where you used the wood. I have a lot of bondo. I've done the brass patch/bondo thing elsewhere on the boat already and with good results.

Whats your opinion on bondo vs. any other kind of body filler?

Our boats plane about the same, with the bow maybe a little lower-- I just think the boat looked more like the photos I've seen of the real ones.
(It is not a big difference, and one I'll probably lose once that heavy 40mm is installed.)

I used the 3M blue putty-- becasue that's what I had on hand. I had bought a big tube of it to use as a seam filler on my plastic models. If I had bondo on hand, I would have used that-- the solvent based putty I'm using shrinks a bit when it dries, so I have to build it up in multiple layers.

[spacephrawg]

Interesting and interestinger. I seem to remember that Kmot had a special setup for his boat that involved having 4 batteries in it, and the 40mm on the forward deck for some reason. He said in another thread that the boat gets going so fast it almost jumps out of the water because it planes so much. I don't know the details unfortunately.

Good to know about the blue putty and shrinkage.

[spacephrawg]

So how do you reverse one of those stock motors? Just reverse the wires? Please pardon the dumb question.

[RCBoater]

So how do you reverse one of those stock motors? Just reverse the wires? Please pardon the dumb question.

Yes-- that's all you need to do. Apparently, the stock motors run equally well in either direction.

[spacephrawg]

Thanks. Again I apologize for the ignorance. I'm an art major. I know all about how to make things look good, not so much how they run.