Team Orion Carbon Edition
3600 Race Spec

(deutsche Fassung: hier klicken!)

Orions Carbon Edition 3600 Race Spec is part of a hardcase lipo series, that is well known since 2008's Nurnberg Toy Fair - we've introduced the whole range in this topic (german language).

The 3600 Race Spec is Team Orion's (to date) hottest hardcase lipo in the "Carbon Edition" series, with the entry level "Experience" (3200mAh) and the intermediate "3200 Race Spec" below. Compared to these, Orion's 3600 Race Spec features Kokam's latest "H5" generation of lipo cells, and according to Orion, it's good for currents of up to 90A (the "25C"-designation means currents of 25 times the pack's own capacity)

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Team Orion's Carbon Edition series sports bulges on the bottom side, that imitate the profile of your good old nimh side-by-side pack. Protuding a mere 2,5mm, those bulges however aren't especially pronounced which means that the 3600 Race Spec will hook into the corresponding slots of the chassis, but you may need to rise battery posts a little. (though the lipo does not exceed the typical nimh-pack dimensions)
Additionally, you may want to work on the battery strap to clear the center balancer terminal. (more on that for later)

The 3600 Race Spec's protective (and gorgious looking!) plastic shell is made out of two halves which are glued to the cells inside, so potential hits are spread across the biggest possible surface.
Additionally, the two halves seem to be glued together as well, so there's no seam visible. The whole casing feels very sturdy and extremly well processed - something which you can expect from an 99,90 Euros (MSRP) lipo.

click here for a bigger picture

Here we see Team Orion's 3600 Race Spec being put into Tamiya's Durga DB01 Buggy. Due to the small bulges on the underside, the battery sits a little higher than a conventional side-by-side pack. So, the battery posts are raised for 2mm. The piece of kitchen roll paper below is used to cushion the lipo so it's nice looking hardcase doesn't get scratched by debris. Additionally, the dremel had a go at the battery strap so it clears the Race Spec's balancer port. Cramped as most 4wd buggies are, the supplied plugs allow the leads to be soldered onto in a 90° angle to keep everything nice and flat.

As we deal with Kokam's H5 lipo generation that we already reviewed in their 3200mAh form the strikingly similar performance doesn't come as a surprise:

Team Orions 3600 Race Spec unleashes an extreme punch from the get go. Towards the end of the runtime, the battery only dumps moderately fast which is typically for Kokam's lipos. I've seen lipos stalling faster, like some Trakpowers. In between, the pack delivers more power than current 1/10 offroaders can handle on most surfaces. Doubled up und wired in series, the 3600 Race Spec would even look good in bigger vehicles like Traxxas' E-Maxx an moderately powered bl-converted 1/8th scale buggies.

While loading Orion's Race Spec lipo, the advantage of 1p-configurations becomes obvious: the cells' voltages drift far less than in a typical 2p-configuration. Thís not only means less work for the balancer, but it also results in higher voltage until the battery dumps.

The table below shows Team Orion's 3600 Race Spec lipo compare to various other lipo batteries. The lower energy density (Wh/kg) is due the elaborate casing. The pack (together with Kokam's 3200 H5) features one of the highest measured effective capacity ratings of 98%. This is only surpassed by the 3200HD cells, which in fact are the predecessors of Kokam's current H5 generation, which themselves trade a noticably higher C-rating for a little less effective capacity.

offroad-CULT Lipo Benchmark Lithium polymer batteries in comparison   » Kokam 3200 HD (2s1p) 200 Grams 3300 mAh eff. capacity 103% 122 Wh/kg » Kokam 3200 H5 (3s1p) 286 Grams 3150 mAh eff. capacity 98% 122 Wh/kg » Orion 3600 Race Spec (Kokam 3600 H5) (2s1p)* 228 Grams 3550 mAh eff. capacity 98% 115 Wh/kg » Stefans Liposhop SLS ZX-3700 (3s1p) 306 Grams 3670 mAh eff. capacity 99% 133 Wh/kg » Trakpower 4900 (2s1p)* 284 Grams 4700 mAh eff. capacity 95% 122 Wh/kg » LRP Vtec 5000 (2s2p) (Ergänzung) 259 Gramm 4370 mAh eff. capacity 86% 123 Wh/kg » Yuntong 5200 (2s2p) 285 Gramm 4790 mAh eff. capacity 92% 124 Wh/kg         Explanations: Weight: measured weight including wires (non hardcase lipos) or without wires (hardcase lipos) Effective capacity: measured capacitiy under typical 1/10 offroad use with 6,5 volts cutoff threshold. Percentage value: effective capacity compared to the battery's nominal capacity. Wh/kg: energy-density, derived from weight and effective capacity. hardcase lipos are designated with an asterisk behind their name and configuration

Weighing an mere 228 grams, Orion's 3600 Race Spec is bound to shake up the weight balance in some rc-cars. Especially 2wd models are prone to this, so you might use a heavier steering servo or add some lead wheight in the front bulkhead to get the wheight distrubtion right.
Other than that, Orions lipo battery reduces a vehicles total weight up to 15 percent, which has quite an impact on acceleration and handling (if careful setup work has been done)
And if you're restricted to a minimum weight, you're still free to shift the weight balance more freely than with conventional batteries.

Because lipo batteries are quite a new thing to the rc-car scene, we'll refrain from a quantitative evaluation (1-10 points) for now. With long-term experiences still absent, that simply wouldn't be legitimate.

Text and pictures by Aaron Banovics
This article has been published on offroad-CULT on 03-23-2008.

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