Optima is back!!

[Coelacanth]

All of the "paint", aside from the white, are stickers. Just mask the windows, and paint it white, the rest is stickers.

Wow thats interesting, the rear yellow section looks like it might be tricky to apply to the concave rear window area

Agreed...that looks like it would be hell to apply all those stickers with the Optima's detailed body lines. Not to mention how it'll look after a few years with some of the corners & edges lifting.

[ron]

I am loving the red ano shocks! I like the bottom aluminum retainers, I am big fan of kyosho CB shocks, these are the first 'modern' shocks to resemble that, 12mm siam, just the same size, I am sure rr scorp, toms and beetle owners will use them as up grades, they look the part vintage shocks, so well made too.

[GoMachV]

They are nice and smooth too! I see two sets on eBay already, broken from kits. $80 ain't terrible but I bet they come down

[ron]

ha ha ha, i'd pay that price for some decent CBs, for these i will wait for price to get lower, better yet, I will have them ordered from banzai hobby, might order 2 sets if price is reasonable in the near future and order some scorp universals to make the $15 (around that figure) EMS shipping worth it. In no hurry but am getting 2 sets at least

[yellowdatsun]

The rear yellow section is about 8 different stickers alone. The blue sides are like 5 per side. Lots-O-Stickers. But, it looks great when finished. And you can always re-position them if you make a mistake......can't do that with paint.

When I jump mine is is *extremely* tail heavy, and likes to land tail-down vertical. I've tried adding weight to the front (a lot), adjusting the shocks, everything, and it still goes extremely tail down on a jump. Not sure what to do at this point. The only thing I can do is nail reverse in the air, but even that is sketchy and it's about a 50/50 shot at a satisfactory landing. It really sucks to jump. If it stays this way I won't be driving it at the track anymore.

[bunnyboy]

I was very close to buying those red shocks for my Raider. Still in my watch list but couldn't quite justify the price vs FD37+38. Maybe I can find someone to trade for my vintage gold (leaky) ones...

[mugenbulldog]

I wonder if an Optima Pro radio plate would help; the battery is farther forward. Lipo is lighter than the old batteries and that's probably hurting too.

The rear yellow section is about 8 different stickers alone. The blue sides are like 5 per side. Lots-O-Stickers. But, it looks great when finished. And you can always re-position them if you make a mistake......can't do that with paint.

When I jump mine is is *extremely* tail heavy, and likes to land tail-down vertical. I've tried adding weight to the front (a lot), adjusting the shocks, everything, and it still goes extremely tail down on a jump. Not sure what to do at this point. The only thing I can do is nail reverse in the air, but even that is sketchy and it's about a 50/50 shot at a satisfactory landing. It really sucks to jump. If it stays this way I won't be driving it at the track anymore.

[rccars4sal]

I think Optima was never very good for jumping. I would try more gradual ramps, and practicing the throttle at point of release,, but it probably aint gonna get too much better. Back in the day my optima jumped pretty flat, but that was only on smaller hills. On any big jump it tumbled either end first. Seems like in the eighties, the designers were more concerned with finding traction and steering. Jumping was a 2wd thing and a 4wd nitemare.

Very glad to see your guys's pics. Im eager to build a new one,, but will have to wait a while. As usual,,a bit late to the party. My workbench is clogged with old optimas and beagles right now.

[Coelacanth]

When I jump mine is is *extremely* tail heavy, and likes to land tail-down vertical. I've tried adding weight to the front (a lot), adjusting the shocks, everything, and it still goes extremely tail down on a jump.

Strange. Back in the day, I raced my Optima with a bunch of other guys, several of whom also ran Optimas, and everyone put a wing on because they tended to land front-first. The new Optimas must have a very different front-to-rear weight distribution than the original.

[yellowdatsun]

I'm also running a shorty lipo. I wonder if running a full size pack would help?

[yellowdatsun]

I just threw in a full size Lipo, and it feels a lot more balanced. It was extremely rear heavy before. We'll see what happens next track session.

[j0pp3]

They are nice and smooth too! I see two sets on eBay already, broken from kits. $80 ain't terrible but I bet they come down

That's a rip off

Check out the Optima parts at BanzaiHobby. For example $23.34 per pair of shocks.

[TomEG]

The Optima is a tricky one to jump good. You need to work with the throttle the whole time. From what I remember: On "straight forward" jumps it had a tendency to nosedive, but if the run-in to the jump was steep it was really hard to get the nose down. Just try to balance the car in your hand, and you'll see how far backwards the balance point is. Then compare it to a Optima Mid....

[Coelacanth]

I just threw in a full size Lipo, and it feels a lot more balanced. It was extremely rear heavy before. We'll see what happens next track session.

That makes sense...back in the day, guys were running 7-cell 8.4V NiCad battery packs.

Re: What Tom said: The Mid was superb at handling jumps, it's even very controllable in mid-air. I've seen a YouTube vid of one guy bashing a speedy Mid at a skate-park and was amazed at how controllable it was for insane jumps.

[yellowdatsun]

I will also note, that the front end parts, steering rods, ball cups, screws, and the parallel bar thingy, will all need to be upgraded for modern use. I broke that parallel bar (can't think of the name), the one that goes between the two steering links. Having a second car I was able to use that. The camber links also adjusted themselves inward so I had a huge amount of camber that needed to be adjusted back out. Also, the screws that hold the camber ball cups to the caster block are weak wood-type screws, that come loose easily. The cone washers that hold the steering links to the bottom of the chassis broke off, and as a result the steering got really sloppy. Those should be replaced with button head screws of a longer length and held with loctite.

I didn't have any rear suspension issues, only that from the rear-biased jumping bashing my motor cover into the motor itself.

Learn from my issues...........


Yeh, I had both a regular Optima, and a Mid, and my old Optima never had these issues. Even on large jumps back then, and small jumps now.