RC10T - Original Rebuild

[Lavigna]

(LATEST PHOTOS ON LAST PAGE)

Hi all. This is my original RC10T that I saved up for, and bought new when I was 12 years old. It was my first real RC vehicle. It is in relatively good shape, and has not been run since probably 1996. As a kid I couldn't afford an esc, and had to use the manual speed control that came with the Sport version of the RC10T. I remember having only one crappy battery pack, so my run times were only a couple of minutes. A buddy had the Team version, and his bearing and ESC equipped would run circled around my truck, and the battery ran sooo much longer. The up side to all this is the drive train never had any real stress through it.

Build: I plan to strip it down completely, and rebuild it into a light runner, or add some nice vintage electronics that I had wanted as a kid. I am not sure if I will keep it completely original, or make some upgrades.

Below are pictures of the truck as it has sat since 1996, including the body I 'custom' painted, following a How To in RCCA's Monster and Truck Racing Magazine in 1992. Needless to say, it did not turn out how the magazine looked. *(Spoiler - I now own that original magazine drip body, and it sits at home on top of my original RC10T)

[Lavigna]

Having a hard time getting the images small enough to load...

[501sRC10]

For the body you only have 2 choices. Team Blue Groove via E-bay, just search rc10t body and their choices will come up, or an Andy's pre-painted again available on E-Bay he would also be the one to contact through E-bay to do the painting he is well respected and has been painting bodies for a long time. For decals someone in Canada is reproducing them but the clarity isn't that great, someone in the UK is doing the "Team Truck" sheet and their work is better quality in my opinion but still not perfect. Best bet is watch E-bay complete original sheets do periodically pop up.

[SnoopMaxx]

I use Paint.net to resize my photos

[jwscab]

if you are using windows, it's really easy to use paint. open in paint, and use the stretch/skew function to reduce the picture by some ratio (50% works good), you can rescale repeatedly until the pic is small enough.

there is also fast image resizer which I use now before paint if I am doing a bunch of pics. drag and drop.

[Lavigna]

Thanks for the help guys. Is there any way to distinguish the slimmer TEAM body from the regular. I want to find the slimmer body style.

I have everything stripped down. I am currently purchasing parts from my local hobby store, and hunting down parts online. More pictures to come.

My parts are pretty white, but could be whiter. I was reading about the peroxide bath, and that looks to work well, but does it make them more brittle?

[DaveM]

Hi,

I am not sure of other differences but the Team body has small bulges on the sides of the front

bonnet scoop, if you look carefully at mine you can just see the line on the scoop for the bulge.

Clicking on the pic makes it bigger.

http://www.rc10talk.com/viewtopic.php?f=36&t=36057

Cheers, Dave.

[Lavigna]

^ I will look for that bump on the front of the body. Thanks.

Everything has been stripped and I have begun rebuilding the Stealth tranny. Since my truck was the SPORT kit, I am now replacing all the bushings with new bearings.

The transmission is built. I was originally thinking of keeping everything era correct. I was going to get an old Novak from eBay, motor, etc. However, the more I thought about it, I decided it would be better for me to just go modern on the electronics, and make a few current upgrades to the truck while I am at it. I bought a Element 3900kv brushless system. It is nothing special, but will be many times faster than anything this truck ever saw before.

[501sRC10]

With the body, go to the truck section in this forum and go through the thread on the history of the RC10T about half way through an unpainted team body is shown nicely and it states the other difference other than being narrower is it didn't have the AE logo molded in the tailgate.

[ktraver97ss]

Nice!

I'm doing the same thing to mine now...but it spit-balled and Im like $400+ into this damn thing. lol I couldn't believe how much play was in my original bushings, the new revolution bearings are going to be sweet. I am hoping to have mine up and running sometime next week.

Are you planning on using your old crystal receiver/transmitter? Mine would not work with my new digital sensored brushless esc from Atomik. Test it before installing everything, it sucks getting that 2 sided tape off a freshly cleaned chassis. lol

[Lavigna]

Thanks!

I do not have my original radio. It was lost a long time ago, which is ok because it was a total POS. I will be using my new Futaba 4PX, which is an amazing controller. btw.

I just pulled the trigger for some very nice vintage titanium tie rods from ebay. Very excited to get them.

[Lavigna]

Starting to get her back together. I am taking my time and making sure everything is meshed properly, and all the hinges are smooth and without play. All the details I never did when I originally built the truck when I was 12.

Still waiting on my titanium turnbuckles, ball studs, and some bearings.

None of the electronics are buttoned down yet.

Does anyone know the best way to remove the paint from the HPI wheels?

[Lavigna]

I finished with the shocks. I completely rebuilt them, and added TiN Gold shafts. The gold shafts are hard to see in the pictures, but they look nice in person.

I received the Tecnacraft tie rods. They are pretty nice.

Just waiting on rear hub bearings, ball studs before I can mount the electronics.

Still looking for someone to paint a Box Art body for me. Please let me know who would be best for that.

[Travertini]

Where did u find the tecnacraft turnbuckles ? Looks good !

[Lavigna]

The turnbuckles were an eBay find. I just got them mounted up tonight, and they look nice. Just waiting on a single rear hub bearing before I can finish.

Last 2 things to do are order some wheels and tires I can run on, and find someone to paint a box art body for me. Suggestions welcome.