My Curtis Edinger Restoration-The one that ALMOST got away

[Ruffy]

What better day to acquire a gem like this than the 4th of July! After having missed out on this gem 4 weeks ago due to a BIN and my hesitation and posting a quick question to the seller, I was distraught for a few days over this car as "THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY" because it had everything I had been hunting for.
After seeing me beat myself up for a few days mentally afterwards, my wife was on the hunt for another early Edinger (if she could find one) to buy for my birthday and to help me forget about "THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY".

This is how I first saw this car, this image one from the original seller's ad that probably lasted 5 min on ebay, then she was gone due to a BuyItNow.

and a close-up of the car in the 1st posted ebay ad

After 4 weeks passed, I was still reluctant to believe I had let that Early 1984 Edinger RC10 Buggy with the fiberglass battery straps, goodyear tires, dual servo savers, early rear shock spring cups, Edinger motor, light gold "NO STAMP" anodized chassis with the nose, shocks and motor plate that matched the anodized color perfectly, early differential cover, Associated Electrics blue/white custom painted body and to top it all off it also came with the earliest Novak ESC (not shown on their website) that had 3 wires, 3 adjustment pots and the unique machined heatsinks along with the Futaba Magnum FP-T3PG Radio (same one used by Jay Halsey early in those years), Futaba FP-R104H receiver (4 channel), and to top it all off the Futaba S132H High speed servo for steering.
Imagine the mental anguish I experienced for allowing that to get away! Well after a week or two, I let my wife know that if i was ever able to get another chance to acquire one like that, that I would jump at it without hesitation.
Four weeks passed and we hadn't seen any more, so I started to stop searching so that it wouldn't "hurt" so much mentally.
Suddenly I got wind through my friends of the very same car that got away from me, being relisted by the buyer and that my wife had tried to get him to list a BIN because she hates auctions. He refused and that is when after some prodding she told me she was trying to buy it as a surprise for me but that guy wouldn't budge so she would bid on it and buy it for me.
July 4th came and went like a blur and today we went to pick up this gem and she is even more beautiful in person than the pictures can show. The transmission was silky smooth too which is rare!? Well after all this here are pictures of her as I started to take her apart, and more pictures will follow as I bring her back to life, and full running conditions again (even ordering the NiCads to replace the transmitter pack) and I intend to cut this body properly and mount a wing to her with the same paint scheme (kinda like slotcarrod's). She must have been an ASC#6016 full bearing kit as "Amy" has bearings everywhere.
I present "Amy_Lee" (Evanescence) that sings "Bring me to Life" :

[youtube]UKer9hry-Gg[/youtube]

[Seabass]

I was wondering when we would get to see the pics of this car. Very nice and the car looks great.

Thanks for sharing.

Jake

[Ruffy]

Here are some good pictures of the body for treehugger and anyone else that might want to do a reproduction of this Associated Pre-Painted Protech Body by Curtis Husting for the RC10.

[scr8p]

that paint layout flows much better on this one.

on that protech...... not so much.

[Ruffy]

Sweet Pic there scr8p, thanks for posting that!
Hopefully once she is cut properly she will look nice. I may add the roll cage area and open the windows up to stick a painted Associated driver in there. She might look something like this, but with those back side windows cut out as well, I'd have to paint this on the outside too, then add a window net and some fog lamps and she might look pretty nice.

She could look like this with the fog lights:

[Y'ernat Al]

Congrats Ruffy. Good to see it go to a good home.

[Ruffy]

Thank-you Y'ernat AL!
I forgot to mention earlier this one has NO STAMP on the chassis, my first.

Body looks a lot like slotcarod's early no stamp edinger!

[THUNDERSTRIKE1]

Like to see that body on a blue annodized chassis lol.I didnt know they prepainted bodies too.Don

[rc10johnny]

Very Nice Ruffy thay body would sure look good on my TQ I bet Amy is goin to be squeaky clean like your OTHERS

[DerbyDan]

Superb! as you said in your post in the 'ebay' section - it does look even better in your pictures than in the pictures from the ebay advert.

Real bonus getting those rare (& mint) electrics

Gonna look great with your others in the display case

[m_vice]

This is awesome, I LOVE AMY…
Congrats Ruffy.

[Ruffy]

Amy's completely taken apart now and undergoing the whitening treatment to try and whiten all the parts as best as they can get. The majority of the items were white to start with, just dirty, but one of the tranny case halves was very yellow (motorside facing one) and the front and rear arms are a dark yellow too. We'll see if these turn out better, if not they will keep their "patina" color showing their age.

The only other thing that got hard hit was the acid stain from the batteries stored in her, where they leaked electrolyte under the battery cups onto the chassis. Thankfully none of this should be visible once the battery cups are in (both) and the receiver is on the chassis behind the battery with the Novak on the rear shock tower.
The underside of the chassis & noseplate is in near perfect condition with barely a scratch on them (just a very light few hints that she was once run for a short period). The tires are in fair used condition and cleaned up nicely. I currently have them undergoing the softening treatment with an ample dose of the food-grade silicone spray covering them, and allowing this to soak into the rubber pores for tire longevity. Thankfully they were not dry rotted or cracked, even though both front tires are missing very small portions of the outer rib that appears they were close to drying out completely, probably in a garage or storage bin.
It has come to my knowledge that the original owner of this car stated that the car was built for him by his father (he did a great job, so he had to have some good mechanical assembly skills...the tranny was so smooth!) back in 1984 to be exact, they ran a few battery packs through it in and in front of the house for less than a week, and she was put away and forgot about, and never used again. Then he found her once again years ago back when the 1700SCE's were out, bought a pack and ran her again to make sure everything worked... once more she was put away and not run until just recently when she was sold with all of the other RC stuff the owner had in a bulk sale.
Amy came with all of her original paperwork from 1984 with paperwork and receipt tucked inside the pages that was dated 1984 as well.
The buyer then sold her off as he does not have an interest in RC10's but prefers Tamiya cars more, relisting her exactly as he bought her. The original owner was from Boca Raton, Florida, and now she holds a permanent residence in Orlando, Florida from now on.
We kept her in Florida since 1984!

[slotcarrod]

That's great Ruffy, I wonder who did the painted bodies for AE? Sort of looks like a Andy's type of paint schemes!

Funny, my Edinger came from Florida as well! Lakeland if I remember?

[drillNink]

very nice car and very nice story...im starting to get hooked on these rc10's...
i wonder what my next resto should be lol...

[drillNink]

my edinger was born n raised in socal and thanks to u guys itll stay in socal