Superluminal

Step 1 as usual on all these previous builds has been the rear ball diff.....but nooooooo not this time. Ive said every time that i dont like building ball diffs as i never know when they are adjusted properly so im going gear diffs throughout. The spares box contains Evo diff parts, TA03 lightweight ones etc but nope, theres something quite nice and simple about the gear diffs. Nothing more than a quick blob of antiwear grease. I know people say the ball diff can act as a slipper to reduce drivetrain shock but its not going to be running a powerful motor and plenty of other chassis types inc' the TL01 have gear diffs throughout. Fingers crossed.

Thank you! Im going to risk going with the white and castrol livery. Because the previous owner painted it blue i have the left over stickers plus an MCI set (which arent particularly great) so hopefully there is enough going on with the green and red swirls to cover the worst of it.

It looks ok from about a foot away. The problem will be is that I will be painting it white so any of the original residual paint will be very visible, on a darker new pqint would probably be fine. Its very difgicult to get it out from any recessed details as you have to apply quite a bit of pressure. All around the bottom and on the mould line seams are these very tiny splits. Im hoping the shoe goo and mesh will stop these widening. It worked, but I would never do it again. Too remove the paint would take around an hour of applying the paint remover to a piece of kitchen roll then rubbing, just to remove an area about the size of a two pound coin. It was ok on the larger flat body surfaces but anything with any moulded details was a nightmare as you had to dab it in with a paint brush, rub off, repeat and repeat. I did this over several months and even now still spot tinges of blue that I will try and get off.

Build thread for mine started in my TA02s general one; Will add any milestone stages or pics here too if ok as an update.

The body shell I will be using will be my favourite rally car - the 1997 Toyota Celica GT4 which has been looking for a home for a while. I originally bought this used at the beginning of lockdown 1 on the TL01 chassis as a restoration project. It had been painted in mettalic blue and following many hours of time, many gallons of Revell and Tamiya paint remover and many pats of elbow grease ive removed as much as I can. Theres still blue flecks ingrained in the plastic that I cannot shift and the continual rubbing and solvent abuse has clouded / crazed it in places and made it slightly brittle. It was also quite badly cracked along some of the body mould lines, wheel arches and bumpers. Realising I was not going to make this perfect I found another nib kit in the end which is residing in the future build pile and means that this one can be put to use without worrying about it anymore.

The last of my TA02 builds (until the next ones from the pile) - the TA02 budget rally build, inspired by @Cuiken £200 rally challenge. This really appealed to me and actually lifted me out of a bit of a "too much hobby" black hole I feel I was in. At the end of 2021 I was struggling to motivate myself to get on and build the kits that I had previously excitedly collected all the parts for and there was nothing in any new releases that was in any way remotely inspiring for this year. I started 2022 with the TF3 build and also the huge pile that was the collected TA02 Racing Special bits which over a couple of years of hunting down parts from all over the world that had probably cost the same as the GDP of a relatively industrialised first world country I was left with a huge amounts of left over plastics and a much lighter bank account so really felt obliged to get on with something new. The parts from this would then go towards the recent TA02SW and TA02W builds built from the left over spares and the Calibra donor but these were then mainly built for the purposes of displaying a couple of my favourite bodyshells on the shelf that I had always wanted. Whereas the new rally build will be a runner! To start this off is the donor TA02 chassis, well used / abused but bought because it had the Tamiya carbon plates. The gearbox plastics are a bit worse for wear and need some parts replacing and it didnt have any arms or dampers, just some random springs. It had a few other period correct hop ups though and some non Tamiya universals I dont recognise and now dont look like they will actually fit when comparing lenghths with the dogbones and proper universals needed. Everything has been stripped, plastics cleaned of old dirty grey grease they were caked in with fairy and metal parts soaked in WD40. The gearboxes have the usual cracks where the tapping screws go in. Ive tried super gluing them for now but they really need drilling out and a machine screw and nut using. The chassis plates are a bit scratched so i have tried to polish out what I can but they will be fine for a runner and will only get more scratches in time. The new parts specifically for this build are; New wheels and rally tyres - 12.39 New servo - 21.50 New reciever - 30.99 New Hi Torqe servo saver - 11.70 New aluminium servo mounts - 11 New TA02 A Parts tree - 14.99 New bearings - 13.99 New alloy prop shaft - 12.99 New Fastrax alloy motor mount - 7.99 New steel pinion - 4.99 Total for the base chassis and the new parts comes to £192.53 The rest will be left overs from the parts box - to date I have previously built a TA02SW Porsche GT2 street tub chassis, TA02SW Vaillant 934 carbon chassis, TA02SW Porsche Taisan FRP chassis, TA02 Racing Special, TA02W, Top Force 2017 and a ratty old dead end Manta Ray. Fortunately these all share the same base TA01/02 drivetrain and hopping up various bits plus the Calibra re-re donor for the RS means ive been left with a shed load of spares to use. The main bits i will need from this lot are; Uprights - narrow blue ones, left over from prior TA02W build Front and rear arms - left over from TA02SW builds CVA dampers + touring car spring set - left over after upgrading TA02SW build to low friction dampers. Diff parts and diff gears - salvaged from old Top Force build when changing to Manta Ray internals and using the lightweight EVO diffs on the Racing Special. The silver can motors - small selection here, got probably twice this amount in othef boxes knocking around; These range from grotty looking zinc plating, two vent slots or four vent slots, grotty looking zinc plating with a square label, textured nickel plating, smooth satin nickel plating, shiny nickel plating, round label, long wires, short wires, a couple of Torque Tuneds (left over from TT01 drift kits) and a silver can Sport Tuned which i bought when first released as an experiment - reason being it now actually claims 23T on the box (Whats that all about then? !!!!!! Can this be true!!!! when we know Black Hole Sun disproved the myth on the black can by opening one up) so was going to incorporate them both into a running build to compare performance. Never happened in the end as I put my last black can in my recent SW build which wont run. Otherwise, no idea why there are so many different types of 540 Silver Can out there - I assume its just cosmetic and internally they are all identical. ESC will likely be a TBLE02S as again got these left over although the one in the pink wrap is the new TBLE04S that came in the Calibra kit - any suggestions on whats likely to perform better out of the two? Screws and fixings - over the August bank holiday I attempted to organise my fixings that were previously all in a single big tub and searching for anything specific involved ages scraping through it like a cat in a litter tray until i got bored and ordered new bits from Tony. Now stuff is roughly bagged up into screws (all), round things, hexagonal things, rubber things and "other" things which helps a bit.

Great stuff - have just ordered the roll tape you linked to. Do you use a paint brush to spread the glue around?

Im quite glad to here that - i bought a tube of it and some mesh to have a go at it. Have you had any issues with the glue reacting with the paint? It smells nice and solventy

Thats interesting you mention that there may be some cross compatibility between Flysky and Absima - if theres a 6 channel Flysky RX out there it may use the same coded signal and be a more economical option. Will investigate further!!

Yeah in hindsight I screwed up a bit. I only bought the CR6P transmitter set as I wanted the extra channels / toggle switches to use on a Bruiser for the gear box selector. I ran it twice then was too scrared Id break it but should have bought another transmitter set for the rest of my runners that only need the normal two channels. The CR6P uses some unique signal that doesnt seem to work with any of the other (cheaper) Absima receievera so every time I want a new one its £30 to £40 a pop.

All being well I should be able to start my build this weekend - the parts below are where Im at - Actual direct expenditure for build to date is; Base is a very well used TA02 donor chassis - recall was about £50 (carbon chassis plates, no dampers or lower arms, broken gearbox covers and cracked uprights, some internal ironmongery and did have turnbuckles, also about eight tons of some black automotive cv joint grease or similar caked into everything) No electronics. New wheels and rally tyres - 12.39 New servo - 21.50 New reciever - 30.99 New Hi Torqe servo saver - 11.70 New aluminium servo mounts - 11 New TA02 A Parts tree - 14.99 New bearings - 13.99 New alloy prop shaft - 12.99 New Fastrax (I think, its blue) alloy motor mount - 7.99 New steel pinion - 4.99 Total - £192.53 Other bits left over in spares box I will be using which I think I get free based on Bernies rules (?) Uprights - narrow blue ones, left over from prior TA02W build Front and rear arms - left over from TA02SW build CVA dampers + touring car spring set - left over after upgrading TA02SW build to low friction dampers. Diff parts and gears - salvaged from old Top Force build when changing to Manta Ray internals and using EVO diffs on the Racing Special. Silver can - ive got probably about 20+ of these left over ESC - TBLE02s, again got about five or six of these unused from previous kits Screws and fixings - millions in spares box Body + decals - reclaimed from a TL01 build (previously painted, now stripped but very cracked and needs some repairs - ideal basher though) Misc; Paint, grease, lots of fairy liquid, shoe goo and some mesh, double sided tape etc. I think the new electronics cost is denting mine a bit! The Absima transmitter I have only seems to work with a specifc type of receiver signal so each runner I have I end up getting a new one (which was a reasonable chunk of the new costs)

Ive got quite a few of them floating about too but had no idea what they were for!!!! (Edumacated by thread)

That's a superb idea! Ive got several shells that ive thought about switching between chassis types but the thought of drilling extra holes in a painted body has always put me off.

Yep - you just get more options