A good day at the fair HPI RS4-2

[RedScampi]

I haven't had much time to do anything RC related lately. We have a new puppy which I'm sure some of you know about. Also, I've been preparing to sell stuff at a swap meet with a buddy of mine. Well the big day finally arrived yesterday and we went to the swap meet and froze our asses off! We didn't sell much stuff even though we were there all day. There were a few vendors around us that had some RC related stuff. A guy across from us had a rock crawler of some kind. I didn't ask because he had a $650 price tag on it and from what I could see it was beat to heck. I found another rock crawler in another part of the fairgrounds, i think a Traxxas something or other but he wanted 500 dollars and i kept moving. It wasn't until I got to looking at the stuff in the stall behind us that I noticed a box that said Nitro RS4 2 on it. Now I'm not a nitro guy mostly because I've never looked into it or had the opportunity to be around them. Add to that the fact that i had just seen two obscenely over priced trucks so I figured that would be the case here too. Eventually though I got bored and wandered over to see how badly beat up the car was. The first thing I noticed was the $50 sticker on the box. Now my interest was peaked and I asked the guy if I could look at it. He says sure, it's all there but the body. Now I'm thinking how bad could this be for this price. As I opened the box it took me a minute to adjust to what i was looking at. I saw a bunch of plastic bags and random parts floating around in a full box. It took me a second to realize that I was looking at a basically new kit. The guy say, "It's a 200 dollar kit" so I say, "will you take forty bucks"? He says, "You're killing me!" so I say, "how about forty five?" and he says "SOLD!" My wallet left scorch marks on my pants as it left my pocket! The guy even threw in a charger he had laying there. I waited until I got home to open the box. Here is what i found inside. Not sure it's complete since many of the bags are open but for the price, I don't care! Oh, I need a manual if someone has one laying around.

[purpletimbo]

Seriously fast those are, I had one on foams made a great tarmac 4WD drifter
And this should be manual
http://www.hpieurope.com/manuals/411/411-1.jpg
just alter page number for each pic up to
http://www.hpieurope.com/manuals/411/411-32.jpg

[bearrickster]

Thats to cool, I just bought that body for my XXXS it looks great.

[clinehobbies]

Great find!
If you are mnissing any parts I might have some parts for it. just ask and I will check for you.
Bill C.

[RedScampi]

Thanks for the manual link 'timbo...and for the parts offer Bill. I started putting this together the other night and I discovered that of the few assemblies that were begun (3) there were at least 3 mistakes. Wow, this guy was at least smart enough to stop before he trashed the kit! He did empty the contents of a lot of the bags into the bottom of the box though and I'm sure a few pieces have slipped away. Right now I find I'm missing parts A850d and A850c from the differential assembly. I found that RC Boyz has the entire bevel gear assembly for under four bucks though, so don't waste too much time looking. I'm going to try to look ahead in the manual and see if I can find any more missing parts.

[BTracer]

Great find! Parts are still plentiful and cheap on ebay. Here's my rs4 that I've been trying to finish since 2001

[RedScampi]

Wow! It looks like you have every upgrade known to man on that! Looks very sharp though! What years were these cars built? I haven't been able to find much reference material. Most is for the RS4 3.

[Brandon G]

If I had to guess, I'd say around 1999 or so.

[BTracer]

Yeah, '99 was when the rs4 2 came out. There's not much info out there anymore. The whole rs4 series cars are super reliable and I think we're at the point in its life cycle where a lot of people are willing to let them go for cheap on ebay. A lot of the links on the HPI website lead to dead ends. You can still get info on the HPI racer 2, which is almost the same car. Here's a link for HPI's history http://www.hpiracing.com/history/

The HPI 15FE is a very reliable engine; not very powerful but easy to tune. New ones usually bring about $50 on ebay, if you were interested in starting with a better engine right off the bat. The one problem with the belt cars is that rocks will get stuck and tear up the rear belt. Given the lack of supply on these, I would be very cautious about where to run the car and never try to "throttle out" of a jammed drivetrain.

A lot of the parts that fit the rs4 3 can work on the rs4 2 even though the main drivetrain is completely different: suspension arms, hubs, uprights, shocks, hardware, etc...

[RedScampi]

Thanks for info guys.

[RichieRich]

I have one of these. I tore up the rear belt a few times. I'll have to post a pic. Mine has a few common mods.

[RedScampi]

Yeah I'd like to see your car Richie. Can you post some pictures of the rear differential? I need to see an assembled shot.

[RichieRich]

I'll take a few pics and post them here or my showroom. It's one of about 3 models I don't have on Tamiyaclub.

This an old pic. I think from 2001. It doesn't look like this anymore.