DIFALCO DESIGN TECHNICAL TALK

CONTROLLER FEATURES AND GLOSSARY

ACU-PIVOT TRIGGER PIN: Custom trigger pivot on all Difalco Design controllers has an adjusting nut to keep side play in trigger bushings to a minimum as oilites wear.

BRAKE RHEOSTAT, ECONOMY: Low cost rheostat with wider resistance range is a good choice for classes below Group 7. Rheostat looks identical to sensitivity rheostat.

BRAKE RHEOSTAT, PRO: Heavy duty rheostat takes more abuse from incorrect hookups. Has smaller resistance range for more precise control of braking and off position. Our special 2 ohm value spreads the real usable resistance range over the entire knob travel so you get more precise control than 3 ohm rheostats.

BRAKING: Reducing the amount of brakes your car has helps keep car speed up and smoothes out your driving on most tracks for higher lap totals. A must feature for Group 12 motors and above. Used for 16D motors on faster or oval type tracks.
NOTE: Because of our superior circuit design disconnecting brake clip at track or having a bad connection at red track post has no affect on transistor operation!

CHOKE (1/24 SCALE): Used in Group 7 and Eurosport racing to limit power to motors on high powered tracks. Difalco Design chokes have a relay to bypass choke setting for full power operation.

CHOKE (H.O. SCALE): Used in H.O. classes on faster motors to limit track power. Lower power makes cars easier to drive consistently on tight courses for higher lap totals. Our choke for H.O. is electronic and uses the main power transistor to reduce track power with a rheostat.

COAST (H.O. SCALE): Used in H.O. scale to keep small amount of power flowing to car when trigger is released. This small amount of power applied to the car helps keep car speed at a minimum and smoothes out driving for faster laps. Our coast is electronic and is controlled by a rheostat to adjust power. Used mainly on higher powered cars.

DIODE: Small black cylindrical device with silver band on rear of heat sink protects transistor outputs from damage in case of incorrect hookup or hookup to wrong polarity track. Silver band lead is screwed down to heat sink.

FANATIC FEATURE: Small blue pot on each wiper band to adjust individual band resistance. This feature sets our controllers apart from everyone else’s! Turn pots to change controller’s power curve, speed up or slow down entire sensitivity range to suit your driving style, track layout or car type.

FIBERGLASS FRAME: Our exclusive computer routed frame is extremely accurate, has a simple layout and keeps wiring neat. Frame is also screwed to rear controller handle for easy maintenance.

FLOATING WIPER BUTTON: Our wiper button floats unconnected in our specially bent wiper arm to automatically lay flat across the entire contact surface. This keeps button from jumping to different bands regardless of side pressure on trigger while driving. It is impossible to keep two flat surfaces aligned without this feature, just check out any controller without it!
NOTE: We recommend you keep your stock rounded button when installing an “E”motion module since electronic controllers do not suffer from wiper arcing like resistor or diode types. Installing a new flat wiper button will work fine only if you know how to set up a floating wiper arm correctly.

FUSE, “E”LECTRONIC RESET: Fuse will blow and disconnect brake circuit on direct shorts. Once hook up is corrected the reset fuse automatically starts working again! No need to replace, ever! Fuse is the small white square with two silver tabs that is soldered to brake post on rear of our frame. Also included in all “E”motion module kits.

HOOK UP: Transistor controllers are sensitive to the two different types of track polarities in use today. If you do not know your tracks polarity hook up the black and white clips only (not red) of your controller to the lane. Without pulling trigger touch cars braid to track with wheels in air. If car does not get power then you are on correct polarity track. Hook up red clip and race. If car gets power then you are on the wrong polarity track. See dual or negative polarity paragraph to switch controller for correct operation. DO NOT SWITCH ALLIGATOR CLIPS AT THE TRACK POSTS!

HOOK UP TIPS: Diode on heat sink protects transistor by sending power to lane if you hook up to wrong polarity track or reverse black and white clips by accident. If car takes off at full speed without touching trigger, unhook controller immediately to avoid car damage. Get in the habit of hooking up controller before you put car on track. Keep transistor heat sink and circuit board away from track terminals! Lay controller on panel and hook up controller with two hands to avoid sparking clips on wrong posts. No controller is protected against every different hookup. Taking your time and following these simple tips will greatly reduce any chance of controller problems.

MUSH BUTTON: Used to momentarily slow controller sensitivity. Used mainly in Group 27 and Group 7 racing on sticky tracks to reduce popping after de-slotting and track calls.

NICKEL PLATING: All our circuit boards are plated to eliminate corrosion on wiper contacts common on copper designs.

PLUG AND PLAY: Our wiper band resistors plug into electronic sockets allowing you to slow down, speed up or alter the way the power comes on as you pull the trigger across the wiper bands. Just plug in a different value resistor. All “E”motion Pro and Pro Plus modules and controllers have this feature. Resistors are free from Difalco Design.

POLARITY, DUAL: Dual polarity controllers will function on both positive and negative wired tracks. Color coded connectors are set at factory to positive polarity. To change simply disconnect top connectors (top means closest to handles), flip top connectors over to opposite side and plug top white connector into bottom black connector and top black connector into bottom white connector.

POLARITY, NEGATIVE: To change positive polarity Pro Plus and Fanatic models to negative polarity only operation you must exchange the two jumper wires from the transistor. DO NOT JUST EXCHANGE BLACK AND WHITE CLIPS AT TRACK! Unsolder the jumper wires from the transistor at the main wire connections only. Now simply reverse wires and solder to opposite main wire, that’s it! Keep small (white, black and white/purple) wires in original locations. You can use this procedure instead of adding polarity kit DD217 if you do not race on opposite polarity tracks often.

POLARITY, POSITIVE: Standard as shipped from factory. Difalco Design Pro Plus and Fanatic single polarity models can be switched easily to negative polarity by swapping two connections at the transistor. Difalco Design Pro models are not easily converted and you should pick a Dual Polarity Pro model if you race on negative polarity tracks.

POLARITY, TRACK: Positive polarity (gate) means an ohmmeter shows a “+” (power terminal is positive) when measured between the tracks power terminal and the brake terminal (red ohmmeter probe on power terminal). Negative polarity (gate) will show a “-” (power terminal is negative) when measured this way. The large majority of tracks today (80% - 90%) are positive polarity.

POWER CONTACT: Our controllers feature a large triple silver plated power contact. Unlike all other designs our contact floats so it can automatically align with the trigger contact. Having more surface contact means our controllers can get more track power to your car!

RELAY, “BLAST” FULL POWER: Relay is mounted 6” from alligator clips and when activated allows full power to go through relay over only 1’ of wire. Normally track power has to travel from white clip up to handle, through higher resistance contacts and wire then back down to black clip. Since Difalco Design controllers are extremely efficient we generally recommend this feature if you race, or plan to, motors over Group 12 type to see a benefit. Our DD704 relay kit will improve any motor if you add it to a controller with stock 14 gauge wire.

SENSITIVITY RHEOSTAT: Varies how much power the transistor puts out over the wiper bands. The faster the motor the more power needed to drive it. This rheostat controls the overall sensitivity and is separate from the individual resistors on the wiper bands which control the power curve of the controller. “E”Motion controllers and modules are approximately rated at 1 to 3 ohms when compared to resistance type controllers. Rotate knob to find best sensitivity setting for your track and car type.

TRANSISTOR: Electronic device to control flow of power to car. This is the diamond shaped silver device with the round center mounted in heat sink. The main advantages of electronic controllers are that there is no high power on the wiper contacts like resistor or diode controllers, this eliminates arcing and reduces maintenance. The other advantage is you can control a wide range of motors with the same controller.

WIPER BAND POT ADJUSTMENTS: (Fanatic models only) Blue pots are labeled from #1 to #10 on front of circuit board. Pots are factory set to the third “notch” embossed on the pots face. Pots pointer has two small dots that show pointer direction. Turn pot with screwdriver clockwise (looking at pot from rear of controller) to reduce that bands sensitivity or counter clockwise to increase sensitivity (direction is marked on front on circuit board).
TIPS: Use pots to soften controller feel on first few bands to get around that one tight turn. If you race mostly faster type motors (above Group 12) turn all pots up a couple notches to quicken entire controller then adjust individual bands from there. If you race 16D to Group 12 motors try turning all bands down a notch to soften entire sensitivity range.
IMPORTANT: Pots are only meant to make small adjustments to power curve! Use large pot for main sensitivity control. You should not have to turn small pots past the halfway mark to get a lot of sensitivity increase (see label on front of board). Never turn blue pots to full counter clockwise position.

WIPER BANDS: The individual bands on circuit board used to increase power to the car.
NOTE: One of the first things we did before designing our controllers was to ask racers what features they wanted. A famous mid-east motor builder said “more wiper bands for smoother power control as you drive”. All Difalco Design controllers have ten bands for smaller steps and less jumpy power application.

WIRE, 10 GAUGE SILICONE: All Difalco Design controllers use heavy 10 gauge wire to reduce power loss to your car. Don’t be fooled by clear 12 gauge stereo wire that looks heavy duty.