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By Mike Garrison
LiveRC.com
Whether it's wheel nuts, wings, tools, tracks, trinkets and/or anything in between, the LiveRC staff gives their testimonial and review of each every Thursday morning!
ProTek RC Euro LS-5 .21 Long Stroke 5-Port Competition Off-Road Engine
PTK-3500, $199.99
www.amainhobbies.com
ProTek RC has jumped on the scene in recent years with a wide variety of products ranging from tools and pit accessories to competition servos, batteries, and nitro engines. One of the newest products in the Protek RC lineup is the Euro LS-5 .21 Long Stroke 5-Port competition off-road engine. Protek RC first joined the engine game with the O.S. based Samurai engines over three years ago, however, the Euro LS-5 is an entirely new engine built by Novarossi instead. Where the Samurai is a 3-Port engine, the Euro LS-5 is a 5-Port instead. The LS-5 features a 16.8mm long stroke, 3.49cc displacement, steel rear bearing, 8mm slide carb, C6T turbo plug, large cooling head, and is available in two versions; standard ($199.99) and pre-run with minimal break-in required ($239.99).
The Euro LS-5 is not a replacement for the Samurai engine, but instead a budget friendly alternative that is designed for bashers and racers looking for a significantly cheaper option than the $350 Samurai.
To test the new ProTek RC Euro LS-5 engine I could have spent an afternoon at the track alone, with no competition, no stresses or struggles, and no demand for the engine to perform, or I could throw the engine straight into the ring to fight over the course of a long race weekend at the 2017 Summer Off-Road RIOT three-day race. I chose the latter.
Break In
Break in on the Euro LS-5 began early on Monday prior to the race. I dusted off the LiveRC nitro test buggy, removed the existing engine, and installed the LS-5. The LS-5 includes a pre-installed C6T turbo plug and a full venture set with 5.4, 6.0, 6.5 & 7.0mm carb inserts. The 6.5mm insert was pre-installed, so therefore that is what I left in the engine for the weekend. The LS-5 is tight – very, very, very tight. This is good in the sense that it has plenty of compression, but it also means that the break-in process includes a lot “locked flywheel” that the starter box can’t turn over. To help with this, I always use an engine heater for 10 minutes prior to starting my engines. Once the engine was warm enough to turn over I fired it up and bogged my way through four tanks of fuel on the starter box. The engine comes tuned for break-in, which means it is rich enough to barely run, but doubles as a fantastic mosquito fogger in the hot and muggy Midwest summer evenings.
After my four tanks and the death of thousands of mosquitos and nearby insects, I leaned the engine out just enough to run another three tanks running laps up and down the driveway. At this point it was dark, and the final break in with race tuning would have to wait for Tuesday. Immediately after arriving home from work on Tuesday I pre-heated the engine, fired it up, and began to tune it for the weekend’s race. In the end, I leaned the top end out almost an entire full turn, the bottom 4-5 hours, and turned the idle up an hour from the box settings. The car was screaming, still blowing smoke, and temping at 205 degrees. From here, I cleaned it up a bit and prepared to hit the track for practice on Friday.
On the Track
While running high speed circles in the driveway is great fun, Friday couldn’t have come soon enough, and it was finally time to hit the track. With my wife/pit girl, Britani, trained and equipped with tuning screw driver, temp gun, and spare glow plugs, I was ready to see what the LS-5 had in store. Being a “budget” engine, to be completely honest I planned to test the engine on Friday and swap it out for the high-end race engine that was originally in the car, in which I had it ready and waiting in my pits.
As I began learning the track and putting in the laps, the LS-5 felt surprisingly strong. The Fastlane Raceway facility featured a full-length 130-40’ front straight, which was ideal for putting the power down. I was very surprised by the LS-5, as it had no trouble getting up to speed with the rest of them. The LS-5 is like a wild girlfriend, it moves fast and it likes to scream.
I am a racer, and while recommended running temps of engines are 220 degrees for optimum lifespan of your engine, I base my tuning on performance first, and engine temp second. After a few quick pit-stops, we had the engine tuned just the way I liked it. The power delivery very crisp and punchy on the bottom, smooth throughout the mid-range, and ringing on top. After 30-minutes of running non-stop the engine came in with a temp of 248 degrees. Fuel mileage was upwards of 8-minutes on tank, which a wow factor by any means, but considering this is labeled as a “budget friendly” engine, I was very impressed. I also believe this will continue to improve based upon the fact the more time on the engine the better it felt, and the better the mileage was.
As race-day rolled around, the LiveRC test buggy had seen little maintenance or prep prior to the event, and therefore one disaster led to another. After landing myself a starting spot in the bottom of the C-Main on Sunday, I was able to quickly work my way up into the bump-spot, and things were looking up, for a very brief moment in time. After my pit stop the car began to feel as though it was running on. Instantly I blamed the engine thinking that it was leaning out, losing a consistent tune, and was going to be cause of this C-Main going from good to bad. As it turns out, it was quite the opposite. A worn-out throttle servo went on strike, and refused to properly return to neutral. As I felt this happening I called down to Britani in pit lane that I was pulling in, the car was about to have a run away. Ten feet from her catching the car in pit lane I pumped the brakes to slow down a bit, but instead the already angry servo got even angrier. The car took off blitzing past Britani, through pit lane, over the track barrier, into the parking lot, over the watering hoses, and finally stopped as it stuck under the tire of pickup truck. Britani ran to the buggy and with the help of bystanders holding it down she was able to corral it, kill the engine, and only receive minor burns in the process.
Before you ask, yes, I had a throttle return band on the carb. The worn servo locked itself into ¾ wide open position in which not even a pair of pliers could budge. I assumed the engine was probably ruined or severely damaged, however, upon inspection inside and out, the LS-5 shows no sign of damage and fired back up like a champ.
Pros:
Cons:
Final Word:
As I mentioned previously, I had very little hope for the LS-5 simply based off the fact it is a $199 engine that in the description says, “For a "budget friendly" engine, the LS-5 is the perfect option for all your racing and bashing needs. If you need quality, consistent results, and high performance - without breaking the bank.” My assumption was that “budget friendly” meant an engine that runs slightly better than a pull-start RTR, good for a once in awhile racer, and lacks significant power and performance. My assumption was entirely wrong.
Is the Euro LS-5 on the same level as a $500 O.S. Speed B2102? No, but for $300 less, the LS-5 provides more than enough power, run-time, tunability, and reliability for the average racer. I chose not to replace the LS-5 with my high-end engine after practice this past weekend, and its performance impressed me enough that I don’t plan to replace it anytime soon. Instead, I'll worry more about replacing my bad throttle servo to keep it under control.
Stay tuned for a follow-up review of the ProTek RC Euro LS-5 at the end of the race season.
Rating: 4 out of 5
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