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Have you also considered a G-made R1? I got one last year and I couldn't recommend it highly enough. Its a great all rounder. Its either a very capable crawler or an incredibly fast rock racer, you can have either set up very easily. Its definitely the most fun and versatile kit I've ever owned. For £350 you get get one plus a lot of hop-up options. Its very customisable. Here's a few of pics of mine in crawler, rock racer and sand buggy guises. As you can see its also quite a scale looking thing too once you have fun adding a few touches of your own.
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Bruiser 2012 (spy photo from Nuremberg Toy Fair 2012
mobias replied to RA1028's topic in Re-Release Discussions
So why do they bother selling at all? Surely they'd be better off just saying 'find your nearest hobbystore. Plenty of other companies do that. I'd be a pretty disgruntled customer if I bought from them only to realise every single other shop in the world is way cheaper. -
Bruiser 2012 (spy photo from Nuremberg Toy Fair 2012
mobias replied to RA1028's topic in Re-Release Discussions
Yeah that's definitely true or at least it is in my experience and judging from what I've heard from others its seems to be a commonly held view. I haven't bought from them in a while mind you so they might have improved their game. Someone who's built one of their more recent kits might be able to have a view here. I suppose people might argue that RC4WD are a much smaller much more specialised company so have to charge more for what they produce where as a company like Tamiya can swallow up costs more and therefore should in theory be able to bring down prices. My view on it has always been isn't it better to charge less for something and sell more of them rather than charge a premium and sell to relatively select few. Why can't the Bruiser be a 100 quid less than it is and perhaps Tamiya would sell many more of them? I guess maybe they don't want to. They want to produce a relatively small number of them and sell them at a premium. Whilst all that is true I think people have a right to voice their view on something especially if they disagree with it. Despite what some people here think Tamiya aren't beyond criticism and if you feel you're being ripped off by them then you should be able to say so. You're totally right in saying it'll make diddly squat of difference but its still something worth discussing and venting your steam over where needed. I didn't think the Bruiser would be cheap at all but I do still think £750 (which seems to be about the average street price) is quite depressingly expensive. If you can indeed get one for nearer £500 then you've got yourself a bargain. Still a lot of dosh though and more than I would pay for something that's better suited to sitting on the shelf than is to running in my opinion. Another thing I've often wondered is how Tamiya can charge $1,239 on their own US store when they know fine well places like Tower are charging $799? Is that not in the realms of them ripping people off? -
Bruiser 2012 (spy photo from Nuremberg Toy Fair 2012
mobias replied to RA1028's topic in Re-Release Discussions
Got logged out and lost all my long post. Grr! Anyway... try again tomorrow -
Bruiser 2012 (spy photo from Nuremberg Toy Fair 2012
mobias replied to RA1028's topic in Re-Release Discussions
You're right Wandy that's exactly what I'm doing. And how dare anyone have a go at Tamiya eh? -
Bruiser 2012 (spy photo from Nuremberg Toy Fair 2012
mobias replied to RA1028's topic in Re-Release Discussions
I said 'probably' the worst offender Wandy, there are obviously other contenders, that's why I acknowledged it can be an expensive hobby generally. And I was talking about their entire range of high end RC vehicles, not just the Bruiser. -
Bruiser 2012 (spy photo from Nuremberg Toy Fair 2012
mobias replied to RA1028's topic in Re-Release Discussions
Worked for me. I saved up enough for an Avante, decided it was a total rip off, bought a G-made R1 instead, discovered the joys of crawling and have never looked back. So thank you Tamiya your ridiculous over pricing and my own futile protest in not buying from you has made me enjoy the hobby even more! Anyway why is it pathetic for people to want value for money in this day and age of austerity? Tamiya sure don't provide it, though I do confess this can be an expensive hobby right across the board. Tamiya are probably the worst offender. -
Bruiser 2012 (spy photo from Nuremberg Toy Fair 2012
mobias replied to RA1028's topic in Re-Release Discussions
I agree with most of that but they clearly care up to a point about the crawler market otherwise they wouldn't have released the CR-01 and kept on supporting it. Personally I do think we'll see more from them in that area too, its just a matter of when. -
Bruiser 2012 (spy photo from Nuremberg Toy Fair 2012
mobias replied to RA1028's topic in Re-Release Discussions
I think there's some people here who are getting a little confused over the whole crawler scene and the difference between a crawler and a scale truck and a scale crawler. They're all part of the same world but they're not always the same thing. The Bruiser is a scale truck which you could also use for scale crawling if you wanted to. Its not a full out crawler and I don't think anyone is claiming its trying to be. The CR-01 is Tamiya's only stock foray into full blown crawling at this point. The scale scene is definitely taking off so yes I would say more and more trucks are looking scale but its still only a part of that world. The crawler scene was in a large part kicked off by Tamiya but its long since gone its own way and as a lot of us have pointed out on numerous occasions here its odd that Tamiya seem to want little to do with it. The scale truck market is a different story, obviously there they are much more involved but are in no way in dominance but they are undoubtedly a major player, particularly in the EU. My take on the crawler scene is that its quite North American centric and in the US in particular they like they're own home grown stuff, hence in part the success of Axial and RC4WD. Both those companies are making far more interesting kits than Tamiya too which obviously plays a large part in their success. They're both catering for and leading the market. -
Bruiser 2012 (spy photo from Nuremberg Toy Fair 2012
mobias replied to RA1028's topic in Re-Release Discussions
Thats not the case at all though. As we discussed earlier in the thread there are a stack of very similar trucks on offer out there at near identical spec and price ( actually some of them are even more expensive) hence the fact that outside of Tamiya enthusiasts this re- release isn't really mustering much excitement. -
Bruiser 2012 (spy photo from Nuremberg Toy Fair 2012
mobias replied to RA1028's topic in Re-Release Discussions
I'm pretty certain that chassis has been made by RC4WD for a while, if Tamiya had a copy right over the name Bruiser they would have done something about it by now. -
Bruiser 2012 (spy photo from Nuremberg Toy Fair 2012
mobias replied to RA1028's topic in Re-Release Discussions
But it hasn't been brought out at exactly the right time at all in their target market. Why is bringing out the most expensive re-re yet at a time of total economic downturn 'the right time? Surely the right time would have been in about 2007 when we all had more money, especially us Brits when it came to buying from the US, and when the kit would have had utterly free reign over the growing scale truck market. I can see that the Bruiser re-re is the culmination of the success of all the other re-re's but good timing it ain't. Also when it comes to wealth their main target market might as well be in the scale crawler market as it is in Tamiya collectors. The scale crawler guys spend serious money on their kits, you only have to look at the RC4WD website to see how much all these kits cost. -
Bruiser 2012 (spy photo from Nuremberg Toy Fair 2012
mobias replied to RA1028's topic in Re-Release Discussions
The comments are by and large positive it's just that there's not many of them especially, as Twinset alludes to, the amount of clamour there has been over the years for this kit. The fact is it's too late coming out to have the impact it might have had, especially at the price it is. Wandy I don't think anyone is kidding themselves about anything. Tamiya have brought out this kit to appeal to anyone wealthy enough to want to fork out for it, whether they be a hard core Tamiya enthusiast, a scale truck enthusiast or a mix of both. No the Bruiser isn't a crawler it's a scale truck. The scale truck area of the hobby and the crawler side of it are pretty much totally intertwined. If you're into one side of it you don't have to be into the other but a lot of people are. -
Bruiser 2012 (spy photo from Nuremberg Toy Fair 2012
mobias replied to RA1028's topic in Re-Release Discussions
You could buy a lot of other RC car(s) for 729 quid. Much as I'm a huge devotee of the scale truck area of the hobby and much as i think the Bruiser is a beautiful looking kit its appeal in 2012 is ever so slightly lost on me, and that's perhaps in part to do with the price. Its quite telling that over on the RC crawler forums not that many people seem to be paying it much attention. A few people share my view that Tamiya are too late to the game with this re-re. Its just not going to have the impact on the scale market, outside of hardcore Tamiya enthusiasts, that it would have done a few years ago, certainly at the price it is. Anyway out of the scale enthusiasts that do end up forking out for it I'm really keen to see what mods people do on it. There's clearly a lot of potential with the newly tweaked chassis to do something interesting now that it works better. -
Bruiser 2012 (spy photo from Nuremberg Toy Fair 2012
mobias replied to RA1028's topic in Re-Release Discussions
RC4WD sure ain't Tamiya but then again my opinion of Tamiya's quality isn't what it used to be either. Lots of scale enthusiasts run RC4WD trucks and generally seem to get on fine with them. My opinion of their universal shafts isn't good thats for sure. How would they be more fun to run? The four link Tundra for me would almost certainly be more fun to run. Its looks vs performance would be a really good balance, which for me personally is important. For slow speed crawling the four link set up would be articulate and compliant, you would see it easily do its job going over rough terrain, nice to see working in a scale truck. In third gear and at speed it would easily handle jumps and again would take what was thrown at it. I've never run a Bruiser but I have run a F-350 with 2.2's and jacked up suspension, so a pretty much similar set up. For slow speed crawling the suspension was almost entirely non existent, it might as well not be there. In third gear at speed my F-350 used to go through leaf springs all the time, they would just bend utterly out of shape even with the hardest set up, and I don't seriously misuse my vehicles. Maybe the 2012 Bruiser will be better engineered for it but I suspect it'll be the same story. Tamiya seem to have a habit with their trucks of over engineering certain parts and under engineering others. With the huge amount of motor combos available to people these days it not always a good mix. At the end of the day my pimped out F-350 looked a lot more fun to drive than it actually was, reading around others reports of driving the Bruiser it sounds like a similar story. A pimped out Tundra with four links plus shocks sure isn't cheap either, definitely agree there. Like I said though, probably much better performance