RC10Talk - The Net's Largest Vintage R/C Community

is the front diff a normal diff or a "one way", and does the belt have markings that say "310MXL"?

Front Diff is a normal diff.
Can't find any markings at all on the belt.

are the belt sprocket parts of the diffs plastic or metal?

I called them pulleys in an earlier post.
The Sprockets are made of metal.

Then I believe what you have is a TBS "Competition kit". That is if the belt is a 310MXL. You better start counting the teeth of that belt

HatTrick wrote:I called them pulleys in an earlier post.
The Sprockets are made of metal.

You're probably right about "pulleys"

Judging by this comment "i had a fine tooth belt conversion for the original optima that had machined pulleys, they werent nylon though, had a bright orange belt, sure that was a wasp item. pretty sure i still have the pulleys somewhere! " here http://www.oople.com/forums/showthread.php?t=58407

It would seem to be a pretty good match to what I found. A WASP Belt Conversion.
The person I got the Salute from said he got it from the UK and as WASP was a UK based company (from the linked thread) it makes sense.

The question for me now is, since I want a vintage belt driven Optima: Is this belt drive better than the Option House one as it doesn't use the idler pulley?

And second question, is it possible to get a new belt for this drive?
The current belt seems to be a bit worn, tiny tears in the rubber.

I always believed the WASP "pulleys" were natural aluminum, and not black anodized. But I can of course be wrong, or even have them mixed up with something else.... It just pops up in my mind when I hear WASP

I've heard people say the idler-less belt drives are better, and makes maintenance easier, but I don't have enough experience to comment on that. The wear on the belt is probably a result of the idler-less system, making the belt touch the gearbox under acceleration, I've read. My belt from such a setup is also very worn. Much more worn than from the Kyosho version, where the belts looks brand new on all the conversion kits I have.
The belts can be bought new. The pitch looks like MXL, and the number (like 310MXL) tells how many teeth.

Here is a MXL belt. It looks quite similar.

Yep, that looks very similar!

Found MXL belts here: http://www.ebay.com/itm/B280-B285-B290-B295-B300-B310-B320-B330-MXL-Synchronous-MXL-Belt-in-closed-Loop-/322255036355?var=&hash=item4b07e59fc3:m:mT406IAI9nGmBfHlftb9g1Q

Would the pitch be correct simply because it's an MXL belt?

I just noticed one place right where the belt comes out of the gearbox that I'd have to dremel down a bit to avoid the teeth dragging over it.

Yes MXL is an industry standard for pitch and profile of the teeth. The standard Kyosho belts are of the XL type. I do, however believe there are both metric and imperial versions of the pitch within the MXL standard.....

http://www.sdp-si.com/products/belts/imxl.htm

.