Turbo Optima Mid - Restoration
Posted: Sat Jul 06, 2019 2:11 pm
Hi, new member here. I thought I'd share some photos and thoughts on restoring my old Turbo Optima Mid. It's taken a couple of months, and I've loved every minute of it 
So, my old Turbo Optima Mid was in a box gathering dust since the early 90's.
It had some old mounts for a saloon car body shell.. the original body shell was nowhere to be found.
It was a in pretty grubby shape, but everything seemed to move/turn OK..
So, stripped it all down..
And started giving things a good clean. The steel parts cleaned up OK with some Autosol.
The rear gears were pretty badly worn, probably from stones/grit getting into the gearbox. But the belt seemed OK.
Got it all back together, and bought some electrics from a local RC shop. Stuck with the original brushed motor, and bought a cheap ESC, transmitter/receiver and batteries.
Initial runs were OK, but the transmission sounded pretty rough, mainly due to the worn gears.
Fitted some cheap wheels/tyres while I source some replacements.
A new Penguin body shell and it was looking half decent.
A couple of weeks later and the OT-85 Spur and Centre Gear I'd ordered from Pargu's arrived. Fantastic parts, really well made.
Comparison of the old vs new:
At the same time, the new SG-25 rear diff gears arrived from vintage_gears. Again, really impressed with the quality given they are re-makes.
Also took the opportunity to fit a new drive belt while I had it opened up.
Spur gear in place:
Eventually the decals arrived from Marwan, along with the excellent tyres and another body shell. Didn't really pay enough attention when I order the decals.. and bought the Turbo Optima Mid SE and standard Optima Mid set rather than the Turbo Optima... never mind...
Realising my mistake, I left the "SE" off, but was really happy with the results. Buying the standard decals was intentional, really like the white body with these decals. But the yellow one came first:
So, my old Turbo Optima Mid was in a box gathering dust since the early 90's.
It had some old mounts for a saloon car body shell.. the original body shell was nowhere to be found.
It was a in pretty grubby shape, but everything seemed to move/turn OK..
So, stripped it all down..
And started giving things a good clean. The steel parts cleaned up OK with some Autosol.
The rear gears were pretty badly worn, probably from stones/grit getting into the gearbox. But the belt seemed OK.
Got it all back together, and bought some electrics from a local RC shop. Stuck with the original brushed motor, and bought a cheap ESC, transmitter/receiver and batteries.
Initial runs were OK, but the transmission sounded pretty rough, mainly due to the worn gears.
Fitted some cheap wheels/tyres while I source some replacements.
A new Penguin body shell and it was looking half decent.
A couple of weeks later and the OT-85 Spur and Centre Gear I'd ordered from Pargu's arrived. Fantastic parts, really well made.
Comparison of the old vs new:
At the same time, the new SG-25 rear diff gears arrived from vintage_gears. Again, really impressed with the quality given they are re-makes.
Also took the opportunity to fit a new drive belt while I had it opened up.
Spur gear in place:
Eventually the decals arrived from Marwan, along with the excellent tyres and another body shell. Didn't really pay enough attention when I order the decals.. and bought the Turbo Optima Mid SE and standard Optima Mid set rather than the Turbo Optima... never mind...
Realising my mistake, I left the "SE" off, but was really happy with the results. Buying the standard decals was intentional, really like the white body with these decals. But the yellow one came first:
