First run impressions of your RC10

[shodog]

I had been racing for about a 2 years campaigning a frog then a wildone and finally with a Fox. The fox was competitve but the few who had just bought the new RC10 were just decimating everybody on the track. Luckily my mom came to one race and saw how much faster the RC10's. She was competitive vicariously through me so when my Birthday rolled around my parents bought me a 6010 kit less bearings. I quickly built it up pulling and all nighter to get it running. I was so dissapointed as it was so much slower than my Fox. I realized that having the bearings makes a huge difference in this machine. At $80 for the bearing kit, you had to be a teenage baller to afford it. Eventually I got the bearing kit and everything smoothed out and got faster. So what were your first impressions of your RC10?

[xanadu]

I saw one at a hobby shop in 1986. I had a grasshopper and could not believe how high tech the rc10 was. Metal chassis and shocks, a clear lexan body, and a wing! I got one for Christmas and it was wrapped up under the tree, so I called a friend who's older brother had one and he measured the box so I could compare them. A 6010. I had to pretend to be suprised. Two days of building later, I drove a dream come true out in my driveway. I also learned the hard way while building, that a 4-40 nut will not screw onto a 5-40 top shaft. (after a trip to the hobby shop, wich was closed on Christmas day) That must be why the 5-40 nuts are gold.

[delsami]

i had a frog and blackfoot. my dad was new to the hobby and got a fox. i could drive better and could beat him with my slower frog. i was saving for a astute because the rc10 was $$$$. i got a rc10 for christmas and my uncle soldered up the wiper esc. I started racing and have been for 15 years. if i would have got a astute i feel i would have quit the hobby! all losi and asc at the track

[RichieRich]

I got my first RC10 a little late. It was a team car in the early 90's. One thing I remember was the sound. It sounded totally different than the Frog and Turbo Ultima I usually raced. Also, it was an amazing flyer coming off jumps. It looked awesome.

[treehugger]

i started with a tomahawk used, then traded it for a rc10 6 gear it was like night and day the kyosho i remember being straight line fast but the 10 went round corners better maybe it was the set up. i was a basher with a couple of buds,i went to a local bmx track now and again and one day i saw what i know now to be the 4wd mip rc10 conversion . my friends had just changed to progress but not being out done i cobbled together the trans from a progress into my gold pan with not much success until i went with 7 cells its funny i used to scream round with the msc glowing orange and the smell of burning ceramic my rc days lasted till 14 when i could get into a bars then my hobby changed to girls

[Charlie don't surf]

i started with a tomahawk used, then traded it for a rc10 6 gear it was like night and day the kyosho i remember being straight line fast but the 10 went round corners better maybe it was the set up. i was a basher with a couple of buds,i went to a local bmx track now and again and one day i saw what i know now to be the 4wd mip rc10 conversion . my friends had just changed to progress but not being out done i cobbled together the trans from a progress into my gold pan with not much success until i went with 7 cells its funny i used to scream round with the msc glowing orange and the smell of burning ceramic my rc days lasted till 14 when i could get into a bars then my hobby changed to girls

Belly up to the pub for a Shandy did you? I forget the term for being "of age" to do your homework at the pub-

and no tipping? what?

and one for you then

[Charlie don't surf]

RC10T ( sorry it was my 1st ) it was very smooth compared to my Brat! But I still came in 2nd to last in my very first oval race! not bad, the only person I beat had a TRX monster truck!
Then I went to off road the next week and it was untouchable at that track for the next 2 years
and for a noob it was perfectly raceable in box stock trim, I had one other set of rear tires other than the stock paddle spike ( I used when it had just rained at the track) and it was a great vehicle for a long time

[slotcarrod]

My very first RC10 was a used, torn apart Edinger that had some missing parts and no manual. I got it from a spoiled rotten kid that was a good friend. He gave it to me! I ran a Frog at the time and had some rc knowledge from that. So I fumbled with the RC10 and finaly got it running.

I quickly sold the Frog and never looked back! I still run AE today even though I have tried every other brand since then. You all know how sweet the RC10 runs! That's why we have this great forum!

[treehugger]

i started with a tomahawk used, then traded it for a rc10 6 gear it was like night and day the kyosho i remember being straight line fast but the 10 went round corners better maybe it was the set up. i was a basher with a couple of buds,i went to a local bmx track now and again and one day i saw what i know now to be the 4wd mip rc10 conversion . my friends had just changed to progress but not being out done i cobbled together the trans from a progress into my gold pan with not much success until i went with 7 cells its funny i used to scream round with the msc glowing orange and the smell of burning ceramic my rc days lasted till 14 when i could get into a bars then my hobby changed to girls

Belly up to the pub for a Shandy did you? I forget the term for being "of age" to do your homework at the pub-

and no tipping? what?

and one for you then

i was nearly 6' at 14 and growing i was the designated buyer we could only afford scrumpy on our combined pocket money most kids get in the pubs at 16 anyway

[longboardnj]

i started with a frog, then got into kyosho... had my dads turbo ultima for racing.. (loved that car).. i raced oval against rc10s and did well.. i remember disliking almost everything about the 6 gear trans ... when they came out with the stealth team car i had to have 1.. the black chassis and white plastic looked great...i painted the body a metalic blue,put in a esc and a racing stock motor with a very small pinion.. it was a great experience.. i didnt care it didnt have a crazy top speed,it was such a nice solid tuff rc i just loved having it...that slow setup didnt last long.. i got a new motor , bolink foam tires,and a pinion and spur to gear for top speed .. i could not get over how versatile this car was... you could run a high speed onroad car 1 run then go off roading the next run just change wheels and gears..then i got more into hanging out with girls and goin into nyc .. so i sold the rc10 to my buddy.. the funny part is after years of me bashing this car and years of my buddy bashing it (last i heard he was running a 9 turn!) he still has it and its still all together

[Ruffy]

I bought a Frog, early 1984 brand new and had been learning the in's and out's of building and being precise in driving an rc car by using cones as a makeshift track in front of our house, using the sidewalk as the straightaway.
I was preparing for racing with a local hobby shop that ran on natural terrain whereever they had a place to run, close to big spectator events, to also promote their hobby shop. Back then they were all Tamiya cars as the RC10 had not been released, or was even known about. This soon changed when the local owner of a Porsche dealership and his son showed up with the two ugliest cars I had ever seen in my life at that time, RC10's after a long-trip back from California.
The RC10's were ugly only because compared to the Tamiya cars which were shiny and full of bright stickers; their RC10 cars were slammed low to the ground and imagine the two bodies completely painted in a single copper color, including the windows. Not a sticker on them and with no wings at all and the rear of the body cut-off past the aft shock tower. It was an ugly site for everyone observing. I wasn't racing with this Hobby Hobbies Club (LHS), but observing because I had just found out that morning, to race you had to join their club, and their dues were 150.00 a year. That was a lot of money for me at age 17, so my GF (wife now) and I watched the races.
The classes they ran were stock and modified. Stock had to be two wheel drive cars and 6 cells, but Modified could be 2wd or 4wd up to 7 cells all in one class.
So out come these cars to race, about 8 total for 2wd Stock including the two nasty looking RC10's ( I had to ask what they were afterwards, due to their performance). During the 2WD stock race, it was easy to see the cars all in action and the amazing suspension the ugly RC10's had. Even though the father and son team could not drive too well (many mistakes), they still did very well due to the RC10's amazing handling. This hit me like a lightning bolt as I had just finished 4 years of Motocross racing, and new the importance of a good suspension system and geometry. Even though they did not win, due to their own incompetence and not the cars fault, I went over to them to get a closer look and asked questions regarding what type of car that was. I was very pleased to hear it was made in the USA!
Modified race: Out come a mixture of 4wd and 2wd cars, with modified 70.00 motors and 7 cell batteries. All the cars were 4WD tamiya and a Hirobo 4WD car, except these two RC10's. One of the RC10's was running a modified motor but with 6 cells, the other the stock AE motor and 6 cells ( stock setup). So I was curious as to how they would do against the Hotshots, Hirobo and Optimas racing against them. Modified back then was survival as the 4WD cars liked to "rub" alot. I was completely amazed when they took off, and right at the 1st turn the RC10's slowed down, the 4WD's sped past overshooting with rooster tails, and the RC10's both ducked inside and were off in 1st and 2nd. From there they just drove amazingly. The cars handled the rough untreated terrain very well, much better than any of the 4WD cars there, and looked smooth as silk. The only time the guys had a rough time, was when the RC10's came up to lap any of the 4WDs as the banging started. I can't remember if they won or not, with all the banging going on, but my mind new what worked and what didn't.
The next weekend, we found out a Hobby Shop about 2.5 hrs away got the 1st AE RC10 6016 kit from California, but it was very expensive ( with BB ), so my GF offered to pool her money with mine so that I could buy it. So I planned to skip school the next day to go buy it before it sold, and she decided to skip with me and we drove the 2.5 hrs to get the RC10. The car handled amazingly, it was perfect for racing, a far cry from my crappy Frog which I later sold. The rest is history, I have had so many of them year after year and married the girl that made it all happen, and understands my drive for it so well, 9 years later.

[DerbyDan]

Great story Ruffy!

Funny how many of you guys had Tamiya Frogs before trading 'up' to an RC10. I guess I started racing a bit later (about 88' I guess?), I had a Hornet, with which I turned up at our local club immensley proud... thinking that my super-fast Christmas present was going kick some R/C ass. Unfortunately everyone else were driving CATS, TopCats, Optimas, Losis.... and a lone RC10, so I was very quickly brought back down to earth with a bump!

To be honest compared to the other cars being raced - the rather brick-like RC10 looked rather sluggish & was in fairness by then, (being an early 6 gear car) a bit outdated..... but I do remember how dependable is looked both in its handling & reliability - it was actually always one of the top running cars.

I've actually as far as I know never actually driven an Ali-tubbed RC10 - so my first 'run experience' will hopefully be with my re-built Worlds Car later this year

[Ruffy]

Well, let me add to this story.

A month passed and I made one of the area's 1st real RC tracks (reading magazines I copied them), and started with a small group of friends racing 4 minute heat races for fun every weekend. I did very well from the onset, winning 99% of each heat and track arrangement I could muster up.
About 6 months later, I went to watch another Hobby Hobbies Club race (same group from above and at the time the only local organized races by anyone). This time I went with 3 of my friends, and Girlfriend (wife) and we all brought our RC10's just in case, as I was going to see if they would allow us to race, for a race fee, not the 150.00 to join. Like a challenge race, my group (3 of us) against their entire club, because they always touted themselves as the best club with the fastest racers around (which is why they charged so much for this elite group I bet).
Well after some coaxing they said that we could race that days races in the modified class for some money. I told my friends let's do it but they weren't confident in themselves to do well and chickened out, because they kept saying we would have to race against the 4WD cars in modified and watching them practice, those cars were really raising some rooster tails. So they said "Ruffy, you race. You beat us anyways and see what you can do against the 4WD's". So I registered, and while I charged my batteries I watched the practice and noticed the terrain was very loose and rough and even had an area with gravel that kicked out small stones and all the cars were loose. The track continued to get worse and worse, as I charged (took a long time back then and I got there late, so I got no practice in). So I was going to get two heats to race and practice at the same time. So right there I looked at my GF and decided to run my stock motor with 6 cells, since more power was getting the cars into trouble. So I put away my 7 cell pack and mod motor and raced with a stock.
By the time the 1st race was done, the official count was I had lapped the entire field by 15 laps. After the 2nd race, I had lapped the entire field by 18 laps winning the event. The track was a very short set of twisty loops.
The RC10 car was amazing, fast, and absorbed the terrain well, granted I had to dodge a few 4WD's in the races and didn't overshoot a single corner (for fear of being rammed by a mad modified hotshot) nor did I do anything stupid, as it seemed they were out to slow me down one way or another, but by the 2nd heat race, I had figured out exactly when and where to time my passes to minimize the "rubbing is racing" theme they had in store for me.
I found out a few weeks later, from one of their club members, that they had a quick short meeting where the owner of the club said not to let this outsider win, and to hit me as many times as they could so that some guy named Richard (their fast guy) could win.
Either way, racing locally in our area changed forever. I kept creating good true racetracks and started hosting free practice races weekly, and the store hosting this club's racing slowed until it died. They no longer saw themselves as the elite after that day one past member told me, and more of their members started to join my free weekly group racing/practices for fun as the word spread farther and farther.
My tires of choice for this historic day, were the Tamiya Holiday Buggy rears and Proline Knobby fronts on the only rims out, the stock original ones. Thank God for the 3 piece rims as I didn't have enough money to buy many rims back then.

[m_vice]

This is a great story Ruffy and it took me back to my story.

I remember when I was a kid and some older kids that came to visit my neighbor brought with them a Hornet and a Grasshopper with shiny 540 motors and I fell in love with the hobby. I remember asking my mom for one for Christmas but got a nikko 4x4 Mascot and my brother got a Lobo. My parent would not spend the $ for the good stuff so I understood that the only way was to work a get some cash after visiting a LHS and seeing all the Tamiya they had ( I am thinking this might be the same shop Ruffy visited, Hobby Hobbies) I remember a all black Frog that was on a shelf and I loved it. After a year of working the neighborhood paper rout I bought a use Tamiya blackfoot (because it had the same frame as the Frog) form a school friend. I remember I started a R/C club in my High school and we had race days and I even got a local shop to sponsored a weekend race. It was E-Z Hobbies, a shop Ruffy used to work for.

I think it was a year after, my brother and I had enough money to get some new rides and he got a RC10 and I decided to get a Traxxas Bullet (what a mistake) the performance on the RC10 was clearly superior at the track (this was a track that Ruffy built back then). Later that year my brother lost interest in the hobby and I took his RC10 and made it my racer. It was all Associated from that point on, I remember making that car a Team car with the gold chassis and later getting a New Team Version with the black chassis. I never got a worlds car, only moded my Team Car to keep up.
Racing this car was a lot of fun and I actually remember a lot of the races when Ruffy was kicking A$$ with his RC10 and sometimes he had some custom parts on it (He was the top racer at the time). I actually started wining some A-mains after he left to race in Florida and ended up getting sponsored.
I raced my RC10 in stock and mod class and got a 10T to run in stock and mod class and raced them both for years.
It was great times for racing.