HobbyKing Marine™ Scott Free Offshore Racing Deep V Racing Boat 730mm ARR

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I now have a prop !

Sep 14, 2017

Following on from my initial review when I noted that my Scoot Free came with one of the blades either broken off or only partly formed I am delighted to report that Hobby King have now sent me a replacement propeller so I will be able to test run the boat for the first time this weekend.
The NanoTech LiPo cells that I wanted to use for this boat are still out of stock ( well there is one shown in stock - but this boat needs two cells to run so this is no help) so I ordered the same cells but with an XT60 plug on as these are available from stock.
I have made-up a pair of conversion leads to plug in-between the speed controller and the XT60 equipped NanoTech cells and if anything this extra length of wire has made fitting the two LiPo cells into the boat a little easier - although this is still a VERY tight fit.
I have noticed that this boat does not come with any flotation aid so I will remove the motor so I can push some hard foam block into the bow to give a littler extra security in the event of an accident........and to stop it sinking!

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Good Boat, fun and easy

Aug 31, 2017

My scott free arrived on time and regular. The 3 blade propeller is not the best solution for me, i change it with a 2 blade 38mm*1.4 with 4,75mm hole, now has a great accelleration, the original prop suffer from cavitation. To do this i turned slightly the shaft. The boat is perfectly balanced on high wave, I sailed to the sea on high waves hull always parallel to the sea, BIG FUN! I use zippy compact bat 25C 5000mah great succes. The battery seat is very uncomfortable be careful when place inside battery. The outside antenna is missing i suggest to put an outer sealed tube with antenna inside to extend the radio range. The receiver receptacle does not exist, I created it with a piece of waste plastic.
I am very satisfied on this boat. It would be perfect by arranging things that do not go .

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Nice little boat

Aug 23, 2017

My Scott Free arrived quickly from the UK warehouse and in an undamaged box - but it did have a hand written sticker on end of the box that read "good to go" so I guessed it had either been inspected or opened for some other reason.
The boat was in good condition inside the box but I noticed than one of the blades on the propeller was only half formed - or possibly broken off but I could not find the missing part and so advised HK of the problem.
Several emails were received from HK who agreed to send me a replacement propeller ....and as soon as this arrives I will be able to give it its first run.
The boat looks a little smaller than I thought it would be with the hull being just 7 inches wide and 25 1/2 inches long (not including the extended rudder mount) and the shape makes it look smaller than it really is.
Inside the boat everything is very tight and as I tried to "test fit" a suitable battery I took some skin off of backs of my fingers on the sharp inside edge of the deck cut-out .
I wanted to buy some of the slim 2 cell 4000mah LiPo cells with the leads and plugs to match those that come fitted to the boat but only one was available from stock and as the boat needs two batteries to power it I opted for the same cell but fitted with XT60 plugs - not exactly what I wanted - but better than nothing I suppose.
A pair of short adaptor leads were made up to accommodate these batteries when they arrive and hopefully a propeller will arrive sometime soon so I can actually give it its first run and report back on how it runs.

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Fast and fun, easy assembly, tight fit for batteries

Jun 13, 2017

This is my first RC boat, and I've taken it on the water once. It was easy to do the minimal required assembly, and fun to run.

A brief dunk test resulted in less than a half-teaspoon leakage, and I didn't find any more water in the hull after running through a battery charge.

The batteries are a pretty tight fit; I am nervous I'll bend or scrape them every time I put them in/out, and in fact did nick the plastic sleeve on one battery (though it recharged just fine, no evidence of electrical damage). I haven't really needed to access anything near the stern, so I wonder if moving the opening forward would work better.

I like Heine's suggestion of attaching styrofoam on top to make it self-righting. At high speed, turning is very touchy, but I didn't end up flipping it (on smooth water). I'm planning to try it out on rougher water though.

I've had trouble with the water cooling; I didn't see water coming out the side, and the cooling tubes weren't full of water any of the times I checked it while running. (However, the ESC and motor heat sinks never got hot to the touch, just warm, so maybe it's unimportant, or the symptoms I've seen don't actually mean it's not working.) I can blow water back through the tubes from my mouth, so I don't think there's blockage. The included pickup's end sits directly behind the center of the propeller (whereas I see recommendations to place it nearer the edge and on the upward-rotating side); I may try replacing it with brass tubing I can shorten/bend, or try a through-hull pickup like Octura's streamlined pickup.

I'm curious whether the high rooster tail (vertical spray at high speed) means the propeller should be aligned differently; from what I read, that indicates inefficiency. There doesn't seem to be anything that can be adjusted on this model.

However, all those seem like fairly minor concerns; it's a lot of fun to drive around, moves quickly, and build quality seems high. With my limited experience, I would recommend others pick it up as a first boat.

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Fun boat easy to upgrade

May 28, 2017

Fun boat from the box. Swapped the stock 60amp esc with the Marine 120amp esc from HK. Now running on 2x3cell lipos. Insanely fast boat. Outrunning the Inception on calm water. Still need to track the topspeed but i guess it is around 90kmh. Also made the boat self rightend by adding a styrofoam on top of the boat.

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Customer Rated

Oct 01, 2016

This boat is great! Finished off very nicely. Shipped to me in two days!! Performance is really good. Would buy again. Very well done Hobbyking!

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Customer Rated

Aug 02, 2016

Fast Boat, requires attention when in rough water.

ESC burnt up on the 5th outing. Complete meltdown, smoked entire inner body. Luckily was using hardcase lipoly and flame did not penetrate the outer case.

Will be looking for warranty coverage of ESC.

Otherwise great boat.
HP

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Certified Buyer Rated

Jul 05, 2016

Great RC boat, good replica of the real one, very fast out of the box.

I have made some minor modifications to organize the hardware inside, the batteries trays are too small and tight to accommodate the batteries so I remove them and add Velcro stripes glued directly in the hull, now is much easy to put and remove the batteries out of the hull, I also changed the servo and ESC positions to have better weight distribution.

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Certified Buyer Rated

Jun 17, 2016

Great boat... Just make sure you've enough spare props as they do not survive "Combat-Ground-or-jumping-over-other-boats-Contact". Stock parts are ok. with 4S, but make sure you use 2 Batterys Parallel with at least 1800mah and 25C (I use 35C). Then its a quite funny boat.

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Customer Rated

May 06, 2016

Super Boot...macht richtig spa...optik ist Hammer