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This will be my first time building a new in box rc10 in about 30 years. I am building this up with a graphite chassis I picked up and didn't have a specific build for. The front end went together well. You can see some small voids in the front A-Arms. The pieces are opaque, not clear. If you really want to make a stand out build it looks like you can polish each part to crystal clear.

If you are going for 100% in the aesthetics of the build, each screw hole needs to be pre-tapped. Using the screws to tap the plastic wears the black finish off the hardware. You can see a slight bit of wear on the shock mounting screws.

It's also important to drive the screws slowly as they heat up enough to cause burns. That couldn't be good for the plastics, so I slowed it down.
The only give exact amounts of each hardware. This is a pain considering e-clips and retaining rings are spring like. They could have included a few extra clips like the kit originally came with.

I have been collecting Edinger parts for a build so I used original outdrives, white idlers, top shaft and diff parts. Since you can see the idlers it's a bit of extra to see. I don't plan on running this so I am putting no grease in the gear box. I'd expect the black diff grease to look like a mess if it ever got out. I was going to use original bushings but the new ones really shine brightly.
This is as far as I got today. The old style instructions were better.

You're speaking my language! I guess I won't be the first to re-chassis a CC. Looking good!

That would look epic with carbon towers, but it's gonna be a tough act to follow either way. Two thumbs up!

This was not a great build. I wouldn’t recommend this kit to anyone that doesn’t already have an rc10 collection.

The instructions are poor, all of the descriptive text from the original is gone. The pictures are ok, but the text would really be necessary for a first time build.

The plastics are problematic. Nylon has a a lot less friction than the clear plastic in the kit. This makes the screws very difficult to drive as the parts were designed for a different material. For most of the parts you can get by. For the set screws on the front arms you can not. These absolutely have to be pre-tapped. The set screw for one of the arms got so stuck that my handlers driver snapped at the bit.

The diagrams for the tie-rods are not to 1:1 scale.

The instructions call for the liberal use of lock-tite and there are reports from Facebook that it makes the plastics brittle.

You are only given exactly enough parts to build the kit. I lost an e-clip. Roll pin, and a retaining clip on my build. Since associated doesn’t offer any of the hardware I would have been 100% out of luck if I didn’t already have a collection of those parts.

It does look nice and I bought this as a shelf decoration. I’ll need to fix up the camber links.

All of the metal parts are 1:1 interchangeable with the Cadillac parts I had. They used different bushing in the rear outer hubs that eliminated the need for the cone washer.

The tires , body and stickers look and feel great. I don’t see any problems with the chassis pieces(but I haven’t assembled them)


The instructions show the ball cups as half hex, but they are full hex in my kit. I am not a fan of these cups but they look quite good and vintage.

The kit looks great. If someone were to take the time to polish the parts until they were clear it would be a next level look. I think that would really show off the internal of the transmission.

I’ve got a body for it on the way.

JosephS wrote: ↑Thu Jan 04, 2024 7:55 pm The instructions call for the liberal use of lock-tite and there are reports from Facebook that it makes the plastics brittle.

Lock-tite makes a formula for use with plastics. It is literally CA glue.

But yes, using the metal formula on plastics will damage them.

juicedcoupe wrote: ↑Fri Jan 05, 2024 5:14 am

JosephS wrote: ↑Thu Jan 04, 2024 7:55 pm The instructions call for the liberal use of lock-tite and there are reports from Facebook that it makes the plastics brittle.

Lock-tite makes a formula for use with plastics. It is literally CA glue.

But yes, using the metal formula on plastics will damage them.

They only spec it for metal to metal parts, but without guidance I wouldn't have thought twice of a dot fell on the plastics.

juicedcoupe wrote: ↑Fri Jan 05, 2024 5:14 am

JosephS wrote: ↑Thu Jan 04, 2024 7:55 pm The instructions call for the liberal use of lock-tite and there are reports from Facebook that it makes the plastics brittle.

Lock-tite makes a formula for use with plastics. It is literally CA glue.

But yes, using the metal formula on plastics will damage them.

Yeah have first hand experience with that at an old job. They wanted us to loctite everything including a part that was plastic. This caused the plastic bosses of the part to crack. Once we stopped applying loctite to that part we never had a broken part again

Cyanoacrylate glue is actually bad for polycarbonate. It's fine for nylon though. For a static model no thread lock is even needed, and I only really thread lock like three threads ever on an rc10. The steering servo screw with metal gears. The outdrive screws on a 6 gear, and the pinion set screw. All metal on metal.

jwscab wrote: ↑Fri Jan 05, 2024 3:10 pm Cyanoacrylate glue is actually bad for polycarbonate. It's fine for nylon though. For a static model no thread lock is even needed, and I only really thread lock like three threads ever on an rc10. The steering servo screw with metal gears. The outdrive screws on a 6 gear, and the pinion set screw. All metal on metal.

I think that there wasn't the full amount of thought placed in this kit being made of a different material.

JosephS wrote: ↑Fri Jan 05, 2024 3:22 pm I think that there wasn't the full amount of thought placed in this kit being made of a different material.

The whole conversation from start to finish: "this engineering sample looks pretty cool, I bet people would buy it"

Also, the first person to polish the whole thing clear is pretty much guaranteed to win BOTM, deservedly so.

Here is a photo of it where it’s going to stay.

I have located a body for this. I’ll leave it like this for a bit and get the body on it when it’s time for a decor change.