.iGav

With it being a Bank Holiday, I've spent the weekend rummaging around my mums attic sorting through stuff, and literally stumbled over a Nikko Hurricane buggy that I'd completely forgotten I'd ever owned.

I cannot for the life of me remember what year I was given this (though it must have been pre-1989 because I was running an Avante in 1989) and nor by whom. And apart from the vaguest of memories I can't actually really ever remember running it, though I obviously did because the bottom of the chassis is scratched from running, though the tyres look almost perfect. Which is all rather surprising considering it's a good looking and well proportioned buggy.

Looking at it with the benefit of age and experience, It's quite an intriguing car actually, it's 1/12 scale, though it's close in size to a Boomerang/Hot Shot, and from what I can make out... it's powered by a 380 sized motor, (quite possibly a Mabuchi though I've not disassembled the gearbox to find out). It's powered by a 7.2v pack and a 9v PP3, which I'm assuming would've been quite rare for a Toy RC Car back in the '80's when the humble HP7 was the power cell of choice.

The drivetrain is interesting though, it features dual-hexagonal driveshafts that run on either side of the chassis, indeed from what I can make out... it doesn't actually have a front gearbox or front differentials of any sort, it looks like the driveshafts directly power the front drive shafts in small individual gearboxes (and I use that term loosely) situated in each of the front wishbones, an interesting layout... though it'd be interesting to know if any other cars every employed this layout?

The front suspension is fully independent, with a monoshock, though the rear suspension isn't, in fact the rear gearbox is somewhat reminiscent of the Grasshopper/Hornet but for an addition of a gearbox selector between High/Low gears.

And more surprisingly... it actually still works. I charged up a racing pack and picked up a couple of 9v's (one for the car, and one for the transmitter, which is a trigger type) and gave it a run... by todays standards it's not what one would term speedy, but in Low it's surprisingly torquey, and there's a reasonable turn of speed when it's set to High though the steering lock is appallingly and lacks torque... it's fine on tarmac, but on a short pile carpet, the car needs to be moving for the wheels to steer.

I'm not entirely sure what to do with it... I don't have a use for it, so I might take it to the Car Boot next weekend, or I may put it on eBay... I need to have a think (though if there's any Nikko collectors out there that are interested, feel free to drop me a line).

G