Hello, new old guy from NoVA by way of upstate NY here

[Bottom Feeder]

Hello, all. After lurking for a few months I've decided to sign up and join in!

Like many guys here it seems, I got into R/C when I was a kid in the early 80's. My first experience was seeing someone doing stunts with a Wild Willy in front of the hobby shop in the Bazaar Mall in Mt. Kisco NY, and I was hooked. Being into static models at the time, seeing a detailed model (well, the body at least) of a Wild Willy in action was the coolest thing ever. Then a kid our family went camping with brought his Frog and blazed around a dirt field way faster than I thought these things actually went. But what really did me in was visiting Herb's Hobby House, an awesome hobby store in Doylestown PA. Herb's was loaded with static models and it was a treat to go there when I was dragged to see my grandparents a few times a year. But the really cool thing about Herb's were the detailed radio controlled cars from Tamiya they had on display in the front window and the original boxes hung up like artwork on the walls. It was awesome! Problem was that I came from a family of somewhat limited means so an expensive 'toy' like a Grasshopper just wasn't in the cards. There were only so many lawns I could mow and driveways I could shovel to make enough money to buy a full R/C setup before I would lose interest between visits to my grandparents. But I still loved going to Herb's whenever I could because hey, a kid can dream, right? There was no local hobby store nearby home which was a tragedy for a kid into models and R/C cars. I felt like Ralphie forever chasing his beloved Red Rider BB gun.

Fast-forward a few years and my friends all started getting R/C cars. Grasshoppers (and some Rock Buster clones), a Hornet, a Subaru BRAT, a Big Bear, a Blackfoot, an FX10, a Fox... Some kids had all the luck, or at least parents that didn't mind throwing down a big chunk of cash for that one mother-of-all Christmas/birthday/whatever present for their kid. The only good thing about it is that I was the only one with any mechanical aptitude so I was the one either helping to build these fantastic machines or at least helping to fix them when they broke. Opening up those Tamiya kits was like opening up the briefcase in Pulp Fiction. It was magical. Everyone seemed to buy the same crappy Aristocraft twin-stick radio, so the rare Futaba setup was like seeing an exotic Japanese sports car. 15 minute timed chargers were the norm, and everyone sprung for the cool-looking grey plastic Tamiya hump pack batteries. It just seemed like those batteries were the epitome of quality and performance for some reason, and those cheap-looking shrink-wrapped batteries I saw in some places were just low-cost wannabe replacements. What little I knew.

Eventually I got my driver's license, and miracle of miracles, a small hobby store opened up nearby called A&D Fastracks in Carmel NY. It was a small store run by nice folks that had a mix of airplane and model kits and building materials, a few Tamiya kits (naturally), and other hobbyist odds and ends. But way up on the top shelf behind the counter was a small-ish box that said TEAM ASSOCIATED overlaying a cool-looking action shot of a buggy in the dirt. What the heck was an RC10...?

Back then, to a kid who thought the R/C world revolved around Tamiya products, the RC10 was a strange animal. First off, sure the box looked cool, but not in the somewhat artsy otherworldly way that Tamiya boxes looked. And it was a relatively small box to boot (a bad sign for some reason). White plastic? Tamiyas were generally all black and therefore cool. Lots of aluminum? The Super Champ had a lot of metal in it and it was a heavy pig. What's with that funky transmission, and how does a ball diff even work? A speed controller needs to be soldered together? Who the heck wants to deal with that? Non-metric Allen-head hardware? Flanged bearings? It didn't even have a front bumper! The RC10 looked more like it was hand made rather than a polished kit. The typewritten and xeroxed instruction manual was just more proof of that. It had none of the charm or personality or 'mystique' that Tamiya cars had. I wasn't sure what to make of it at first but I can't say I was too crazy about it. It really had nothing that attracted me to the hobby in the first place.

Of course, one of my friends eventually bought one, an original gold pan six gear. I helped him a little but generally the unfamiliar design was more frustrating rather than interesting to build. I could certainly see the performance potential, though. For example, the amount of suspension travel in the rear was amazing, and when fully assembled it was built like a tank. Not necessarily heavy, just sturdy and apparently designed to take abuse. It made the Tamiyas I coveted look like toys, and that bothered me a little.

In the meantime, I finally bought my first real R/C car, a very used and abused Fox from one of my friends for cheap. With a complete teardown and rebuild and a few new parts, it was up and running. Like the Millennium Falcon, it didn't look like much but had it where it counted since it was reassembled correctly and adjusted like it was supposed to be. Daring to be different, I bought a good Airtronics radio and some no-name NiCd batteries. I did not have much invested in it which made me worry less about it and enjoy it more, something that stuck with me later on.

A&D's sold Radio Control Car Action magazine and I bought every issue. The pages were filled with new cars and project car buildups, stuff I loved, but a lot of it was for the RC10. It was only then that I started getting interested in them and appreciated its design. I decided I would pull the pin and buy one. A&D Fastrack's had moved into a new place in Brewster NY by then and were in the process of building an indoor dirt oval track. They also expanded the stock they kept on hand so I had lots of choices! Not even seriously considering any Tamiya or Kyosho kits that were on the shelf, I could get a classic gold pan, an 'exotic' TQ10, or what seemed to be Associated's next-generation car and a better buy, an RC10 Graphite. I went with the RC10 Graphite and the rest, as they say, is history.

Being my main hobby (and being a financially irresponsible teenager to boot), R/C is where I dumped all of my money. I loved tinkering with these things. I loved all the aftermarket parts available for them. I loved modifying them, upgrading them, just changing them to make them different and 'better' than how they came out of the box. Different wheels and tires, different bodies, different suspension parts, different transmissions, etc. I LOVED it. But what I really didn't love was actually driving them. All that hard work and expensive parts just to get them dirty? I could barely bring myself to do it but most cars still had a few packs run through them. Cars multiplied like rabbits due to all the spare parts I ended up with. I was able to build RC10-based cars out of spares and a few bits and pieces from A&D's, and I LOVED doing that too. I also branched out to Team Losi cars during the JRX Pro through XX era, and still bought an odd Tamiya and Kyosho car when one struck my fancy.

Eventually, the hobby started to change and so did my priorities. Computers started taking over my life and that's where a lot of my money started going. The last new cars I built were probably a Losi XX and a car that I really should have enjoyed more but didn't: the then-new RC10B2. Those cars seemed to mark the end of an era, when aftermarket support was huge and you weren't afraid to drill holes in a chassis, modify suspension parts with a dremel, etc. to make them 'better'. The XX and B2 both seemed to be finely tuned race cars out of the box and not much needed to be done with them, and the lack of (or really, the need for) aftermarket parts was a sign that it was time for me to move on.

A&D Fastracks had previously moved again to Mahopac NY, downsizing by getting rid of the indoor dirt oval and moving back into a storefront-type shop. During this time I had bought and sold quite a few cars through A&D's, and it was very cool of Adam to sell customer's cars on consignment for a percentage. Eventually he closed up shop, but thankfully I was able to sell all of my cars and equipment before he closed his doors for good. It was nice to be able to offload all this stuff I had spend THOUSANDS of dollars on to new homes and get a few hundred back in the process. At the time it was certainly the best thing to do but how I wish I now had all of my cars and equipment back!

So if you bought a nice, clean 'used' RC10 or JRX-something from A&D Fastracks in the early 90's, it might have been one of mine!

[Bottom Feeder]

On a side note, I mentioned above that I didn't drive these things often for fear of getting them dirty and beating them up. Well, among a collection that included cars like an RPM '91 Worlds-converted Fusion Speed graphite tub with all the trimmings, and a double-deck Composite Craft chassis made for the '91 Worlds suspension also loaded with goodies... the 'best' car I ever drove was a lowly used and abused RC10 Team Car that I bought in a pile of pieces, with a few batteries and motors, a working radio, peak charger and a whole collection of half-worn tires dumped in a carboard box for $40. It was literally a 'basket case'. I brought that car back from the dead using the bare minimum amount of spare parts from my stash, bought new parts only if it was absolutely necessary (shock seals and oil), and a whole lotta cleaning and fixing. The end result still looked like hell, but it was straight, the bearings and transmission were smooth and quiet, the suspension worked like it was supposed to, the electronics were still good... and I drove the hell out of it.

Of all my cars, that POS Team Car is the one I used most, the one I probably had the best time working on, and is the only one I really miss!

[klavy69]

Welcome back to the mayhem. Wether you build them for the shelf or put them back together from nothing this is the place for it. Its all good and welcome to the board.

Todd


p.s. Are you a writer by trade ?

[integra22t]

im glad i bought my old rc10 race car from my brother after he put it into a yard sale

[Coelacanth]

Welcome, and thanks for sharing that great back-story. I know what you meant about the RC10 being a bit confusing back in the day; the same kit was available in several different ways and varying levels of completeness; with/without bearings, with/without motor, with/without this, that & the other thing. To the hobby n00b RC buyer, I just wanted something complete, I didn't want to buy something and have to buy a bunch of other stuff to make it work! I'd also read in magazines that they could be a pain to build properly, also not something the n00b RC'er wants to hear.

So, I got The Frog.

Well, that was complete, alright...a complete piece of crap.

My second car was where our stories diverged, but timing played a role. I'd been reading about this 4WD car that was wiping up at the track, including RC10's, but this was back in the day when they would race together, they weren't segregated into 2WD & 4WD classes yet...and anyway, because of timing and because in my mind, I wanted a car that I could drive anywhere, not just on a track, I figured 4WD was the way to go.

So for me, I went down the Kyosho Optima track and other than brand names, our stories were quite similar.

Looking forward to some of your builds, projects, completed cars, etc.! I can appreciate the RC10 now in ways I was just too ignorant to understand better, back in my early days of RC.

[Bottom Feeder]

Thanks! You guys all seem like a straightforward knowledgeable group here. I've done too much reading and not enough posting/contributing. I gotta work on that.

Are you a writer by trade ?

Haha, no. I actually to hate write but I sure can churn out a long-winded post when inspired to do so, apparently.

[klavy69]

no need for a serious answer to an idiotic question but thanx. These little addictions can bring out the longwinded in alot of us. Don't worry about posting/contributing so much until you're comfortable...we don't test you on it

Todd

[Bottom Feeder]

Because you were all dying for a sequel...

Fast-forward 15+ years and, feeling a little nostalgic, I picked up an issue of Radio Control Car Action on a whim. Thumbing through the pages of that issue (and the following month's), it was strange and somewhat sad to see how much the hobby/sport had changed since I had cashed out years prior and I was initially thankful that I had. To my horror, kits were fairly rare while RTRs were the norm (which I still think is tragic). Why the heck would anyone NOT want to assemble their own R/C car? Traxxas was now the big player (seriously?) while Associated and Losi were a lot smaller, lumped in with a lot of companies I had never heard of, and some favorites just didn't exist anymore. 1/10th 2WD buggy appeared to be dead. So were stadium trucks. This new short course thing was in and monster trucks were big again. The nitro craze that was picking up lots of steam back then was now over being replaced by brushless systems that delivered all the runtime and speed of nitro without the mess and fuss. Ball diffs were a specialty tuning part rather than the de facto standard with gear diffs now being the norm. Nicads were old tech, NiMh packs were the standard and LiPos were the next big thing. Bashing was big (certainly a good thing) so cars and trucks were built sturdier. Racing seemed less cutthroat but faster. Off the shelf electronics were so good now that there seemed to be more of a focus on car setup rather than how much you could spend on batteries that would last exactly four minutes and two seconds with your chosen motor and gearing. Tracks were much smoother. Antennas were shorter. Even Tamiya kits had electronic speed controllers included as standard equipment. Crazy! I recycled those magazines and mourned my favorite hobby for another year or so...

Thumbing through the magazine rack one day, the latest issue of RCCA had a small blurb on the cover regarding Tamiya re-releasing some of their classic kits, and the once-coveted Fast Attack Vehicle was now available. 'HOLY S**T!' my brain said to me. 'NO WAY!' my wallet said to me. I was like an addict- I knew that just one slip would mean this moneypit hobby would reel me back in and I would be screwed. I had other things I should be spending (or not spending) my money on and I couldn't justify $170 for a radio controlled car, especially a plastic Tamiya one... an OLD plastic Tamiya one. Of course, logic went completely out the door when I read that it came with full bearings and an ESC and Tower would ship it for free. 'SOLD!' my brain yelled at me while my wallet wept quietly in defeat knowing it never had a chance.

Opening that Tower box was like Christmas morning, and seeing that kick-ass Tamiya artwork on the big white box put a big dumb smile on my face which my wife thought was amusing as hell considering I was probably 41 at the time. Removing the shrink wrap and opening the box released golden rays and pixie dust into the air (well, that's what it seemed like!) as I inventoried the contents. Yep, everything was just as Tamiya-esque as I remembered with the nicely packaged parts, detailed wheels and tires, fantastic decal set and excellent instruction manual. I think I was up until about 3:30am that morning assembling the kit. I loved every minute of it but it was pretty humbling when I realized that 1) my eyes don't work like they used to and 2) neither do my fingers. I really struggled with some of the smaller bits but overall it was a fun experience, one I should not repeat, not even if/when Tamiya released more classic kits... so of course they did. A Subaru BRAT was next (an overly-complicated design that has not aged well), followed by a much more modern Sand Viper, then back to a dead-simple Grasshopper. All received full bearings and at least cheap steering servos for display purposes, and I did end up buying a cheap Futaba radio just so the option of taking one for a spin was there should the mood strike. I enjoyed building them all but eventually felt the need for something more of a challenge.

Axial was a big name now with their crawling rigs but they had an oddball in their stable, the EXO Terra 'buggy'. It price-dropped from $299 down to $199 and I decided I needed to have one since it was a kit and it looked to be a lot more involved to build. I had fun initially but it started getting on my nerves with annoying little issues and the process just got a little tedious. That was well over a year ago and it's still sitting in a box on the shelf unfinished. Someday...

I decided that what I really wanted was an RC10 again. The Tamiya kit feel-goods didn't last as long as I liked or remembered but I always enjoyed RC10s and Losi cars because they were never really finished, always in a state of being tweaked and modified. So of course, wouldn't you know it, that's when a casual Google search brought me to RC10Talk.com and the thread about the Classic re-release. 'HOLY S**T!!' my brain said to me. My wallet just shook its head in disgust.

Since we're pretty much caught up now to present day and lots of others have had similar experiences with their re-released kits, I'll spare you the details. But I will say that after building that brand-new RC10 (and the Durango DEX210 that preceded it... and the Atomik V2MR that followed it... ugh), I realized that no matter how much I enjoy this hobby and building new kits from untouched shrink-wrapped boxes, the best time I ever had was taking old, unloved, worn-out and battered RC10s and giving them a second life. New kits are nice, certainly, but taking basket cases down to the last screw and diff thrust ball, cleaning and checking everything, fixing problems while ignoring aesthetics, making runners out of rejects, resurrecting sleepers out of crap... that's what I really enjoyed. And I'll probably give up all the new cars I currently own, sell them cheap, and start buying some 'projects' in order to do it again.

See y'all on eBay.

[shodog]

Great write ups bottom feeder. I'll agree with you that it is satisfying to polish a trash heap into a gem. So what kinds of cars are in your sights for restoring?

[Bottom Feeder]

Thanks!

Just RC10s, mainly. Maybe branch out to newer models since there are some cheap B4s out there but who knows? I've got 10 new cars built here but for some reason I just want to tinker with old stuff. Nothing would make me happier right now than a big box of discarded random, dirty RC10 parts to play around with.

[SONYtec]

Welcome!!!