RS80D problems [TANKS]

[Thomas Lum <tlum-at-mac.com>]

The 1/7th scale Abrams has suffered a major setback.  I purchased an  
RS80D speed controller from David on or around November 15th.  It sat  
in the box until this weekend when I finally finished enough of my  
tank to begin powering it up.  I ran it yesterday off ground (on a  
stand) and dialed in the controls at which point I ran it on pavement  
to see how it performed, everything worked great!  Today I again  
wanted to run it with new chassis pieces added at which point it ran  
fine for 10 seconds then began to only respond to 1 channel (out of  
2), then nothing.  I tracked the problem back to the DX6 BR6000  
receiver and realized the speed controller wasn't getting a signal  
from the receiver (the status light was solid and not flashing), so I  
switched out to another receiver I knew was working and sure enough,  
the status light blinked once per two seconds (even though I had  
hooked up 2 channels), I then tried the DX6 BR6000 again, nothing.  I  
tried my other receiver again and as soon as I applied power to a  
channel, the RS80D caught fire!  I blew it out and removed it from my  
tank.  If it's my fault, fine, I'm an idiot, but for it to work fine  
and then act erratic, then nothing and then catch fire, I'm wondering  
if it's something else.  I emailed David immediately and he responded  
that same afternoon but he was less than helpful.  He basically  
blamed it on me, said it was...

"If the unit caught on fire there is usually some metallic debree on  
the board.  Check for a loose strand of wire on the board near the  
mosfets. Most likely it shorted out a mosfet and caused the  
controller to fail. Unfortunately it sounds like it is not repairable."

Thanks...so I emailed the guru of repairing ESC's, Mike Phillips to  
see if he can fix it, basically he said he won't work on the Rs80D  
due to the expense and labor involved in only that specific  
controller.  Guess I should have done a little more homework before  
buying an unrepairable controller.  Mike suggested the Sidewinder  
from Robot Power, any other suggestions under $410???

Tom 
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