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Found 263 results

  1. All these will be going on ebay tomorrow evening So it's a brief chance to grab them now.....I PayPal gift please, prices inc. Free UK shipping SOLD NIB Dancing Rider T3-01 £130 NIB Heavy Metal Dump Truck Ltd.Ed GF-01 (no esc) SOLD NIB Unimog 425 CC-01 (no esc)
  2. Help needed just got these any ideas what they are thanks for ure help
  3. Hello, i am new to more expensive rcs, and i made my first a flea market hotshot. Not sure if its a mk1 or mk2, but it came with pamphlets printed in 1985 for the nicad battery. I tried to fix the msc, but it still wont work, as soon as i plug in the battery, it just runs backwards even with the controller off. There is a considerable lip on one of the contact plates. Gear boxes and suspension seem good. I am looking to simply replace the old one with a modern esc. Also, i have a new motor that came with, is there any way to make sure that its a compatible power? I will post pictures this afternoon. Thank you all.
  4. Completion of this project has been almost a decade in the making... Commercial-level high-rez resin 3D printers had been sitting beyond $200,000 for all of the nineties and even when smaller desktop units dropped below $20k by 2011, their build envelope was only large enough to cram 5 or 6 custom ring designs into... IOW, not terribly applicable for 1:10th scale modeling. Jewelry casting resin was $175 a liter. Disruptors came on the scene with their $2500 resin printers. In 2012, this was a downright bargain compared to my first printer at $15k. Resin was "less" costly at $100/liter. Reasonable expense for paying clients, but remains extravagant for hobby tinkering -- and the build envelope stayed minuscule at 5.7 x 3.2 cm. The only way to fit a standard on-road 26mm wheel into this space is to orient it upright. I attempted this very exercise around 2014 but the end-result wasn't worth posting here. Problem? Vertical print position pooled and caused a resin imbalance. The build-envelope constraint permitted no other alternative attempts. The wildly off-balance wheel was only good for shelf display. 2019 is the next watershed year where resin 3D printers have started tickling the $200 milestone. How'd they achieve this? By utilizing super-inexpensive components from the cellphone industry -- deploying a relatively cheap 2k-resolution smartphone screen rather than building a 3D printer around a $1000 theatre projector makes all the difference in final cost. All the buzz became loud enough to take notice. At $200, there are indeed some cheap resin printers cost-wise but also cheap in quality; questionable design features abound. Experience proved invaluable in identifying features to avoid. The standout winner worthy of a spot in the stable is the Elegoo Mars at $250. Jaw-dropping price point no matter how you cut it. Tons to like: Stretched-film release design similar to my $15k printer suggesting low-maintenance workhorse reliability/repeatability. Superb Z-axis rigidity using a linear-rail like design. A wobbly Z-axis arm can cause disastrous banding in the print. User-replaceable critical components as demonstrated by their own instructional YouTube videos. Crack the masking screen? $40-ish replacement makes things right. Considerable leap in the build envelope. The Elegoo is able to print what fits within 11.9cm x 6.8cm (x 15.5cm height) and still maintains a 50-micron resolution. Color touch-screen control. Files read off a thumb drive. Prior resin printers mandated tethering to a dedicated computer to drive the projector. (itself limited to a bulb lifespan) After running a few calibration tests (largely unnecessary and for my own satisfaction), it was time to address my long awaited project. 26mm width BMW Style 35 wheel fitted to a Tamiya hex hub. Elegoo Mars 3D printer. Quickly Glowforged a pedestal storage box for it and made sure there was resin on-hand. One liter of their resin is just $45. Third-party resins can be used as long as they're formulated for these kinds of masked-SLA printers. Laser SLA like Formlabs and Moai require different resin formulations. Still, not many are gonna beat $45/liter! The free support & slicing ChiTuBox software has quite a bit of nice features coming from this veteran resin jockey. The ways to identify & edit supports for undercuts or floating islands is praiseworthy. One nit is that there's no apparent publicly centralized data pot for exposure times for Elegoo resins. Possibly walled off in their Facebook page. The product box only provides a range -- thus my initial tests. Small-object test prints suggested that my settings for Elegoo Black Resin be 60 seconds for the first 5-6 layers and all subsequent layers can be at 6-seconds exposure. As shown here, the represented build platform has plenty of space to accommodate an on-road wheel. For reasons outside the scope of this hobby forum, a flat lay-down positioning of the wheel isn't necessarily the most recommended, but I've printed using two alternate ways and got away with successful prints. ChiTuBox goes as far as asking how much I paid for this batch of resin and can calculate the projected volume of resin used and total cost of parts put on the build platform. Let me do the math for you.. a liter of resin ought to yield around 66 Tamiya wheels. Toss the sliced file onto a USB thumb drive and feed it to the printer. Here's the angled & supported version... What kind of detail does 50-micron yield? Hex heads on the lug bolts resolved with a faithfully reproduced dimple at the center of every one! Here 'tis mounted to the M-04L chassis... spins just as nicely as the Tamiya-made wheels. No off-balance issues. Giving the back part of the rim a squeeze shows that it takes nearly DOUBLE the effort over Tamiya's ABS plastic to start deforming. At roughly 1mm resin wall thickness, the toughness observed so far suggests it would fare no worse than manufactured wheels. Once I get my hands on more resin vats, I'll dedicate each one to their own resin making for super-quick printing material changes... black, grey, white, translucent, etc Now all the things that normally get scuffed up (side mirrors, body posts) can be easily and affordably re-grown on the high-res 3D printer. Onto the possibilities of fabricating all the details I only dreamt of decades ago... windshield wipers, light buckets, suspension arms, action cam mount...
  5. 1. I am based in Japan. 2. I ship with real tracking number. Delivery is quick, sometimes very fast, and shipping cost is quite low compared to most of countries. Shipping cost is not included in the price. 3. Please add 4,5% to the total to cover paypal fees. (you can send money as a gift if you trust me) 4. Since my prices are in ¥ you can check exchange rates here: xe.com 5. I can send by email, extra pics, or large size pics upon request. 6. I have good feedback on ebay, oople, rc10talk.. Ask if doubt. 7. My prices are 100% firm, I will not lower them. Dynarun SOLD, used but in very nice condition. Acto power, new, come with manual too. 14.000 yen Super stock type RR, lightly super, I doubt this has touched the floor. No scractches. SOLDyen Futaba MC510C New 3200 yen Sanwa Comras ESC+ servo new 3200 yen LRP IPC Digital New sealed To ebay HPI pro control unopened 11.000 yen sport tuned new 700 yen Novak mercury sealed To ebay FS sop new 8.000 yen LRP sx 12 masami edit. sealed To ebay Novak Tempest sealed To ebay
  6. Hi guys im struggling here! I’ve not built an RC for 25 years and now there are ESC’s instead of 2 servos. I have a Viper eco 27 which I’m running on a Tamiya DF-03 with a brushed motor and standard kit. i took it back to the shop that I bought all of he electronics as it would only go in reverse! (Steering is and always has been fine), the chap in the shop said it was a dud and swapped for a new Viper eco 27. so now I’m home. Everything works in reverse (if not a bit slow on the uptake) but when I go full throttle - NOTHING...... if I startin the middle and go slow to build up pace it works fine but I want to race! It seems if I go past 3/4 acceleration it cuts off. I’m stumped, annoyed and embarrassed as my 10 year old son thinks I’m thick 😂 any ideas or help please? CAEC61FA-AB56-4658-8E92-7C369BB17CC2.MOV
  7. Hi can anyone tell me what chassis this is please
  8. Can anyone tell me which chassis this is and would like to say thanks to any1 that has helped already brought a loft find and thanks to peep on here am finding out what I brought thank again
  9. Embarking on a 3 way with some falcons Falcon #3 - rolling chassis in need of a clean up Falcon #1 - filthy wrecked chassis in need of cleaning and repair Falcon #2 - brand new chassis, gearbox, wheels and loads of other bits (about 75% there) I’ll post some pics shortly JJ
  10. Looking for a used Super Sabre in decent shape. Thanks!
  11. Brand new in box with Tamiya ESC (company cancelled my order due to no stock then fulfilled it anyway - grrrr - so have 2 kits now) The DT-03 Racing Fighter special black Edition is as per a new Tamiya Racing Fighter with some extras and hop ups:- Hi-Torque Servo Saver (Black) (51000) - £10 DT-03 Lightweight Gear Shaft (5x45mm/2pcs.) (54560) - £2.50 DT-03 Full Turnbuckle Set (54572) - £15 4mm Flange Lock Nut (Black, 8pcs.) (54642) - £3 RS-540 Torque-Tuned Motor (54358) - £13 DT-03 CVA Damper Set (54567) - £20 Im in the U.K. Happy for local delivery or collection (free) or postage to EU (£12) £150 JJ
  12. SOLD tg10 mk1 tamiya nsx raybrig nitro. comes with box and radio controller. it ran twice, and you can see the condition under the chassis. i will ship worldwide at buyers expense. i could trade with a vintage tamiya hornet (58045) but NIB, and i will throw the extra cash if someone has one and is interested 155 euro excluding shipping (from Cyprus - Europe)
  13. Another day, another skillset to tackle... Where wheels and suspension arms and gears are best created with CAD software, the other end of the 3D spectrum is represented by digital sculpting programs for those who want to create organic, non-mechanical subjects using an artistic approach. The choice for those committed to sculpting is ZBrush. Are there ways of using scanning tech to acquire 3D data? Yes, but specifically for capturing living subjects, the choices become very narrow and harder to come by as explained here. Capturing/scanning 3D data without ANY sculpting knowledge means being locked into that one pose until more $$$$ gets ponied up for additional scans. Using some reference photos and coaching from "likeness sculpting" YouTube videos, a self-portrait sculpt gets finished in ZBrush... Sculpt is exported as an STL mesh and brought into the ChiTuBox slicing software (Free download & bundled with the $250 Elegoo Mars 3D printer). For this particular model, there weren't any egregious overhangs that warranted generating supports. YMMV. The model is double-checked to print at a target 1:10th scale. If it wasn't already done in ZBrush, ChiTuBox v1.5.0 offers another opportunity to hollow out the model by specifying the wall thickness. The CBDDLP file generated by ChiTuBox contains all the sliced image data along with resin exposure time info. All that's left is to feed this into the Elegoo Mars via USB thumb drive and tap the touchscreen Print button. This printer's touchscreen makes a Pause button available where it'll even raise the platform out of the resin to visually confirm and double-check the progress. Tap the screen and the printer continues back on the same spot it left off. Nice touch not found on my previous resin printers. All of 24 cents worth of resin used, the high resolution print finishes in three and a half hours. Remove it from the platform, quick rinse in an isopropyl tub, and it's off to the UV tanning bed for 10 minutes. As stated in another thread, I've devoted this resin vat to holding black resin. Once additional vats are available, I'll use those extras to hold Elegoo's grey, clear, and skin-colored formulations. For figurines, painting on black resin should make the colors pop more. The Elegoo Mars shares the exact same resin vat dimensions with the Anycubic Photon. This will allow users from both sides to jump brands or even find this market large enough where third-parties start offering replacements (eBay has vats listed for ~$35) Note how the eyeglasses printed perfectly. 'Nuff detail for ya? The main downside to a fresh black resin print is the difficulty in capturing the sculpted details despite using a macro lens and a light tent. Earlier red resin prints from years back posed in the driver's seat of the M-04L. Future iterations might involve tweaking the sculpt to evoke the sense of being reclined in a seat with arms reaching toward a steering wheel. This was not possible on the red resin printer as it was configured for a super-tight build envelope. On the Elegoo Mars? Plenty of build platform space to include the driver's seat headrest, steering wheel and even the instrument cluster - all in a single printed object. Still plenty more additional tasks to finish in this vein... sculpt a helmeted version for the F1 F201 chassis... review a bunch of YouTube videos on painting/airbrushing techniques with acrylic... Exercise that sculpting muscle and the world opens up to sooo many possibilities -- take your own creation and alter it at your whim... road-raging Xenomorph Wild-Willy substitute behind the wheel flipping the bird? Do it. Do it NOW!
  14. Vintage, near mint condition Tamiya QD cars; - Mitsubishi Lancer EVO VI WRC 46306 - Peugeot 206 WRC 46305 Was clearing out my attic and found these beauty's, originally bought them in 2000 on release for my then 2 year old son, opened once as i had to try these babys out and then put into storage, it is now 2019 as they were forgotten, life gets busy sometimes. £350 for both & offers
  15. Well after starting this build nearly 3 months ago Grasshopper #2 is finally finished. Waiting for parts to arrive is a killer! After perusing the interweb looking at other Hoppers I got a few ideas, along with seeing what not to do. My design brief to myself was to make it look different to anything else and try and make it look good while using the original stripes, oh and add a few hop-up parts in the process. I think I have almost nailed it, I'm pretty happy with the way it has turned out anyway. It now features a bunch of aftermarket parts (over night from Japan. Sheesh I wish!) which include coil over oil shocks all round, aluminium front suspension arms & bash plate, carbon reinforced uprights, full ball bearing set and aluminium wheel outers which look really nice. Also fitted are some very nice aluminium side nudge bars, gearbox oil filler cap & pinion cover/heatsink all from T4works. It still retains the little 380 motor so shes not fast but is totally controllable. Took it out for it's first run last night at the Manawatu Indoor RC Car Club meeting and she ran good. Had a couple of small teething issues to sort, the battery cover on the bottom fell off and dragged the battery on the floor and the front suspension had a couple of screws come loose. Not sure if that is because I failed to check them before assembly or if it means they are not up to the punishment, time will tell I guess. Picked up a few scuffs already but that's ok, just proof that it's been used and not a shelf queen. A nice addition to the collection which is growing.
  16. Hi all, New to builds, having had my Dad make me a Super Blackfoot as a kid. My cousin had a LB, and I always loved how mental it was to drive😂 My missus bought me one as a gift back in February and having put it all together, and immediately crashing it, I decided I wanted to look at making it fun but better to drive. To date I’ve installed a Tamiya Sports Tuned motor, metal bearings, and this evening I’ve installed oil filled shocks. Having just taken it out, it seems to sit better under load. I will say it pulls a touch to the left, and I’m almost certain that the wheels are spinning inside the tyres. So my questions are the following: How can I make the car better than stock beyond those adjustments? Should I have replaced the pinion with the motor upgrade? Foam in the tyres or not bother? What’s the best battery setup to choose? Where can I get a transmission strut brace in the UK, as I don’t want to do the 5th shock mod? Sanding down the damage on the body for re-spraying, what’s the best process? Sorry, lots of questions but I’m very new to this. Kind Regards, Carl
  17. I have just picked up an old Fighter Buggy RX (Correct me if I am wrong!) from a boot sale. Not bad for £3 including an Ansmann quick charger and 2 batteries! I'm going to restore this one as a runner for my 8 year old - should be a good buggy to start with. It has electrics and it all appears to work ok. The main issues it has are a broken rear shock mount and the rear tyres are completely shot.
  18. Built entirely from Tamiya T3-01 Dancing Rider parts, my alternate build uses two sets. Even his head and eye pieces are directly out of the Tamiya T3 kit. Cog the Dog has 5 servos and a 6 channel receiver in his nose. An Adafruit micro gimbal moves the head, with left/right tied to the hip servo. 3 mixes coordinate arms and hip for four-wheeled leaning. A Traxxas 370, full bearings and an aluminum Hot Racing ball differential puts Cog at 25 mph. Please enjoy a little movie about Cog, an ongoing project that has taken many forms. The most successful one so far, unsurprisingly, is entirely Tamiya. https://drive.google.com/file/d/15Cv7sK0OL81QszjAD4fz_f8XaIIVgBop/view?usp=drivesdk
  19. So I have bought myself a well used (I admit this may be a bit of an understatement) Gravel Hound from everyone's favourite on-line bidding site. As is often the way I was looking for a new Tamiya project (snappily codenamed the Christmas/Birthday money project) and I happened to stumble upon this little fella. I wasn't looking for anything in particular just something new and as I haven't owned anything on the DF-02 chasis before I decided to take a punt as the price didn't seem to bad. To be fair to the seller he was upfront and honest with his photos and description - "very used RC car in semi working order with plenty of wear due to age and use" And it's hard to argue with that....................... Freshly out of the box and bubble-wrap.... It has certainly been enjoyed!
  20. Hello all I'm trying to locate some original Tamiya 6V 4000MaH batteries as used in the Blazer, preferably boxed. Please let me know if you have any and are willing to sell (let me know how much you want for them) - thanks Rich
  21. Dear racers, builders and collectors To BEC or not to BEC... THAT is the question... :/ I have recently joined your wonderful club, mainly because I fell in love with Tamiya and all the wonders and joys of RC's again. So, like many I had the Grasshopper as a kid and nostalgia made me reinvest in the reissued version which was a great joy to build as well as owning it once more. Since that time, I've bought the HotShot, Neo Fighter and a few others. The latest is Monster Beetle, however, since it's been a while since I built one again, I noticed my Carson's Reflex Wheel Ultimate Touch 2.4G's (this is the one Carson Reflex-Wheel-Ultimate) has a BEC that is a bit hard to find these days and anywhere I find it costs a bundle not to mention the shipping costs is astronomical. I need one so I may bind the Monster Beetle to my Remote Controller, I have the HotShot, Neo Fighter to bind perfectly, but I am now looking for another BEC to put into the Monster Beetle and maybe even upgrade my Grasshopper for the same reason. I have found these, which I don't know will bind with my Reflex Wheel Ultimate Touch Remote Controller: Carson 500501533 - Reflex Wheel Receiver PRO 3, 2.4 GHz Press for Info and this one Carson 500501536 - empfangerrefle xwheel Pro3, 2.4 GHz V.2 Press for Info My question and hope here is to have someone explain to me if this is a possibility that my controller will bind with these two or do I explicitly need the one that came with the controller like this one (Sorry no image only description), or can I simply buy any of the above mentioned alternatives and they will bind with the remote controller without problems? I sure hope you guys might have an answer to this, it's a little frustrating as I'm still not entirely sure how these things work, I had tons of problems with brushless non-brushless Tamiya ESC, I couldn't figure out the differences and it didn't work... I'm sure I did something wrong, heck it took me three hours to put the Grasshopper's rubber wheels together... when I was a kid, I did it in 20min... I don't know what that means, but let's just leave it at that... I hope you guys can help me cause I'm at a loss here, I wish to buy it via Amazon, if possible, but since they don't have the one I use exactly I was hoping I might be able to use one of these. Here is the manual for the Controller from Carson I use for the RC's I have. User Manual for the Carson Reflex Wheel Ultimate Touch The one place I found that might be okay but I don't know them, never ordered from them is this one: The Alternative however, the shipping is kind of a stab in the feelers, but, if this is the only place I can get it, or Tamico, then I guess I have to buy it... but please let me know if I can use those from amazon. Thanks a lot guys PS. Sorry guys for some reason, it posted my topic twice...
  22. Hi everyone! I've seen that some people were struggling with mixing body color paint for Tamiya's Hyundai i20 bodyshell. I've just ordered one from Gmarket and while waiting for it to arrive I am considering some painting options. I'd like to stick with Hyundai's livery. I've been searching for appropriate body color because I don't have any option to mix colors as Tamiya recommending in body's manual. I stumbled upon a Tamiya PS-32 (corsa grey) and I'm curious about how does it look like in real life. I found some photos on the Internet but every one is different. Sometimes this corsa grey color is kinda blueish, sometimes it's greenish. Does anyone used PS-32 before and could help me to decide? This is the easiest option (for now) to paint body color but I'd like to hear some input from more experienced Tamiya PS paints users Thank you!
  23. I am not sure how much excitement there may be for this new car, but I see a whole lot of possibilities for the shell: Any takers for this one? The 1:1 Citroen 2CV was the basis for a lot of, uh, inspired works: While the Tamiya release is quite likely to be a polycarbonate-bodied version, I am wondering if anybody else might be inspired by its appearance in the new releases list. Edit: Now paging @JennyMo and @IBIFTKH:
  24. Evening Some of you may remember my FF01 speed run car I've been slowly building. It's not quite finished although the finish line is certainly in sight now, so I thought it was about time I started my next project which I've had in mind for a while. For the last couple of years I've had an old TA01 Chassis kicking around. I've never used it but it's always sat on my desk in the hope I might build it into something one day. Well, that Chassis still isn't being used but it provided the inspiration for this build. It all started off with me spotting a brand new TA01/02 FRP Chassis kit on eBay a few weeks ago. I stuck it in my watch list expecting it to get snapped up before I had the money to buy it myself. Surprisingly as pay day came around three weeks later it was still sitting there. So I bought it, and plenty of other bits to go with it. Anyway, today those bits arrived Not one to stand on ceremony I got straight on with building the chassis. Now I've dismantled plenty of TA01 and TA02 chassis' to be able to do it with my eyes shut, however despite my FF01 being FRP the chassis came pre-assembled so I've never actually built one. After staring at the parts tree and pile of screws for a while I decided to get the FF01 down to use as a reference for where it all went. That worked and before I knew it I was underway You'll notice the FF01 doing a bit of life modelling in the background. A very useful reference. I figured as I'd got this far (reasonably quickly) I might as well attach the gearbox casings as well. Im still waiting for a rear diff to arrive so I could only attach the main rear housing, however because I'm running this as RWD I carried out getting the empty front casing screwed together and onto the chassis along with the FRP top deck I then had to figure out how the carbon front body mount bracket went together and onto the chassis. It took a bit of googling to find a decent picture but I think I got it right haha! I'm still waiting for plenty of other bits to arrive but I'm happy with the start I made this evening For the body I decided on the Mercedes 190E from the TT01E kit. After lots of searching I managed to find someone selling the body, sticker set and wheels but after adding it all up with shipping it was coming to nearly £70!! I did a bit of googling and found Tower Hobbies were selling the whole kit for £93 delivered! So I bought the whole kit! Ive taken out the body, stickers, wheels and tyre's and I'll advertise the chassis kit on eBay as I've got no interest in the TT01. Thats about it so far. Not bad for the first night
  25. Recently, a TamiyaClub member had an idea for a project which interested me: I offered to write some fiction for it, using ideas from that thread, the sources that inspired it, and influences from my own work. Reading the initial post there will give the required context for this thread. The result is a story that chronicles a potential development route for the famous Avante. The actual Avante's history is documented, so this is purely fiction. It uses details from the RC car's development, but otherwise attempts to treat it as a real racing car - and the driver figures as people. Certain elements of the story may not be entirely accurate - I never owned a Vanquish, Egress, or Avante 2001, after all - but are adequate for the narrative. My knowledge of Tamiya's actual racing programs is likely not entirely accurate, either, including the bits about the TRF 211X and 411X. Again, fiction. I am putting the story here in case it is not accepted as the vision of the project's creator, in which case it is my stand-alone writing. Personally, I find it interesting to think about an RC project including elements that go beyond just the car and its parts. The writing is amateur at best, but so are my other hobbies! This first part in particular is heavy on exposition, but will set up a story later. And now, presenting: Tamiya Azente: TXR, the Avante, and the Driver who Never Raced "First, be aware that I was the one chosen for this project among almost one hundred drivers. Among them, the promising Albert Attaboy who remained stuck in Baja Buggy races, Evert Edwards who had relatives working at Tamiya and who couldn't get more than the Vanquish. Even Greg Martin, who was popular thanks to the Hornet, was in the list. The most pathetic of all was undoubtedly Ricky Roop." These were the words attributed to Marcus "Paranoid" Perry, the lead driver for the Tamiya Racing Factory (TRF), and the one entrusted with the famous Avante. Chapter 1: The Avante Today, the Tamiya Racing Factory is a formidable force on the racing scene, fielding competitive racers across all categories and winning prestigious events around the world. Privateers using the team’s equipment have managed to score many successes at the club and national levels. The genesis was the Tamiya Avante program. *** Tamiya was responsible for the democratization of off-road racing; their Rough Rider and Sand Scorcher kits allowed even the casual enthusiast to take part in competitions. Both were setups high on value, with rugged components that could withstand the abuse of hard driving under harder conditions. The pair had a certain aesthetic flair, as well: purposeful lines that emulated the Volkswagens upon which they were based went well with the simple appeal that their oversized tires and sturdy mechanicals had. The ones with the most time and money of these amateurs became the professionals that established dominance over drivers with lesser vehicles. It took some time before the Rough Rider and Sand Scorcher could be challenged, but once rivals began improving on the basic layout, the racing scene began transforming rapidly. Lighter, faster racers emerged from other shops, and yesterday’s heroes became today’s second-class citizens. Tamiya sought to retain its stature within the racing community, and achieved it with the Frog. This lightweight rear-wheel-drive buggy was built on the principles that made the pioneering Rough Rider and Sand Scorcher so successful: durability, value, and aesthetic appeal. The emergence of composite engineering allowed Tamiya to drastically reduce the Frog’s weight compared to their earlier models, blessing the new one with the sprightly acceleration of its animal namesake. Thus, a cycle ensued between Tamiya and the other racing companies that were beginning to establish themselves to challenge the incumbent. As these rivals advanced, so did their designs, producing a gap that Tamiya would close with a new design of its own. It was an arms race that saw Tamiya launch weapons like the Hotshot, waging its wars on the track, fighting ferocious battles in every heat. As time passed, the cycle intensified… At last, Tamiya did not have an answer. The company had cars winning at club and national races, but was dangerously far behind its rivals on the international scene. The Hotshot, once the car to beat, had spent precious little time atop the time sheets, and new developments on this design proved ineffective in bringing the fight to the rivals once outpaced by the racers bearing the twin stars. It was in this tumultuous time that a new racer – something completely different – was unleashed. *** The new car was Tamiya’s superweapon. It was supposed to change the balance of power in the off-road racing scene, and restore Tamiya’s name as not the producer of cutting-edge racers, but of winners. Yet the design of the Avante would have guaranteed both. It would win Tamiya the war. Extensive research and testing programs resulted in a highly-sophisticated chassis in an innovative configuration. Four-wheel-drive was not new at this level, not even shaft-driven four-wheel-drive – indeed, Tamiya introduced it with their Hotshot – but a longitudinally mid-mounted motor certainly was. A double-deck composite chassis was specified in place of the then-standard ‘bathtub’ type, and metal was used extensively in the suspension links, in place of plastics, for more precision and adjustability. Metal was also used for the coil-spring damper bodies, and the dampers themselves were of much-higher specifications than those found on other Tamiyas. Special attention was paid to aerodynamics; while this aspect of design is a vital component in on-road competition, the incoming design placed new importance on it in the off-road category. The swoopy Thundershot predated the new car; however, the former did not go to the lengths of the latter, which even had a special undercowl to streamline the bottom surface. A large rear wing generated downforce, which at its most aggressive settings brought its aerodynamic performance closer to its contemporaries, but with much more useful grip. Set low, the car cut the air quite well. Even the wheels featured aerodynamic hub caps, with cam-lock mechanisms that allowed for tool-free wheel changes. This new racer was designed exclusively for electronic components. Eliminating the bulky mechanical speed control setup found in contemporary cars allowed the designers to wrap the body shell tighter around the chassis, reducing frontal area and chassis size. The cockpit featured fully-electronic controls and displays, and the steering wheel was shaped accordingly, to accommodate the requisite buttons and switches. It would only look slightly dated in a current Formula One racer. The result was a racing package that was (in principle) fully optimized for its intended use. Many bold decisions went into its configuration, creating a car unlike anything ever seen before in the racing world. Could a design rife with such fresh thinking really be as fast as it was believed to be? *** The Tamiya Experimental Racing (TXR) team was formed as a testing group for this groundbreaking car. The lead driver was Hinomoto Rikimaru, who was selected for his ability to adapt to ‘progressive’ designs, like the unusual Saint Dragon that he campaigned with the Coro Coro Racing Team. The finished prototype would be christened “Azente.” Some sources claim that it translates into “gift from God,” which is certainly how highly Tamiya regarded it, while others suggest it was the name of a powerful deity. Whatever the case, the Azente would be tested thoroughly by Rikimaru, and it was in this car that he was rumoured to have set unofficial course records faster than the leading racers of the day. Stifling secrecy characterized the Azente testing program. At the time, TXR was not even officially acknowledged by Tamiya itself! A special design with such prodigious potential could never risk being spotted by anybody, let alone a rival. Reportedly, the Azente was troubled by poor handling during early test sessions, but swiftly developed into a devastatingly-quick machine. Rikimaru spoke quite fondly of the car, and his lap times – some on the same circuits that appeared in the international racing scene – seemed to vindicate Tamiya for going ahead with such a bold design. Much of the prototype testing was done in America; hence, TXR would be based there. The location did allow for relative seclusion from Tamiya’s primary home in Japan. As the Azente progressed, the prototype gained new decals as different liveries were subject to tests, too! Tremendous excitement was building within Tamiya around the program. The astounding success of the race test sessions prompted Tamiya to push for an early start to the racer’s campaign. This decision was assisted by the acceleration of the program, owing to test driver Rikimaru’s devotion to the project and his long hours spent honing the car. *** The Azente was now deemed ready for competition. Somewhere before its first public unveiling, the name was changed to Avante. Refinements that went into the Azente was now changing the car’s design to the point that a new name was merited. Tamiya believed that “Avante” was more dynamic and indicative of the forward thinking that went into the new car’s design. The flamboyant lettering and colourful stars and stripes were replaced by a brilliant dark-blue finish, with sponsor texts in bright yellow. The intent was to give the car a more “professional [and] purposeful” appearance, befitting the high hopes that Tamiya placed on their latest weapon. Similarly, the TXR officially evolved into the Tamiya Racing Factory, to be the first team to race the Avante. The laid-back atmosphere that followed the crack squad of engineers working on a secret project was made more formal, in time with the group’s new role in the public eye. Suspension geometries and minor finishing details were revised for the Avante’s launch. A new testing program was launched, a quick one to further optimize the design for racing. Since it was felt that an engineer/driver was better at developing the Avante at this stage, Marcus “Paranoid” Perry, an emerging engineering and driving talent with the program, replaced Hinomoto Rikimaru. While Rikimaru did the driving for the Azente, Perry did the work refining the overall design package that resulted in the Avante. He would continue this role for the duration of the Avante’s career. Complementing the electronics package was an additional computer system that would allow the team to record and access live telemetry from the car. Data gathered here would be used by TRF and Tamiya for the further development of the chassis, as well as succeeding models. The Avante was unlike anything seen before in the off-road racing world at any level, and the engineers believed that its unique combination of adjustability, precision, and creativity could be leveraged into spectacular success on the international circuit, the kind that had been eluding Tamiya for so long. It had been designed from the outset with the qualities that made a championship racer. Tamiya felt that the car simply had to win. Nothing had been left to chance… *** What happened next is well-documented. The Avante, Tamiya’s great hope, and the flagship of its off-road racing efforts, failed conspicuously. The operation went into disarray as the new model showed poor handling tendencies and even worse reliability. The precision metal ball-end joints that were selected for their tight tolerances developed alarming slop after a few races, while other metal parts were either too fragile or too heavy. Drivers complained of vague-feeling steering that could suddenly snap into a spin, owing to its wide front tires and short wheelbase. The innovative wheels were also to blame, being much heavier than standard types, and less reliable. Cooling problems were evident in some events due to the compact packaging of electronic elements within the chassis; the motor was placed largely out of the slipstream, which made for better aerodynamics but poor heat exchange. The varied use of metal, composites, and plastic did not allow for a particularly-cohesive design, and so the overall quality of the product suffered. The Tamiya Racing Factory and its lead driver, “Paranoid” Perry, could only therefore collect limited in-race data from the Avante, and spent frustrating amounts of time replacing broken parts and tuning the chassis during the only season it was raced with factory support. At the end of its only factory racing season – a national one, no less – it could only finish seventh overall. *** The Avante was too expensive to write off as a total failure, and so different solutions using the existing chassis as a base were tried. Much of it was based off the data collected by TRF and “Paranoid” Perry: The Vanquish attempted to simplify things to the point of creating a new, less-expensive (and thus more marketable) model. This was an Avante with a longer wheelbase, bathtub chassis, cheaper components, and a new body. It featured more plastic than the racer upon which it was based, which increased slop but reduced the complexity of maintenance. The subsequent reduction in weight benefitted its handling. Unlike the Avante, the Vanquish could be equipped with a mechanical speed control, which increased its appeal with privateers. However, it remained out of the price range for many others, and so it did not recoup as much of the losses that Tamiya had hoped it would. Of note was the lightweight wheels: initially an upgrade for the Avante developed during its short front-line career, it would be specified as mandatory equipment for the Vanquish, along with aggressive pin-spike tires, to help address the vague steering and heavy rotational mass that plagued the Avante. The Egress, on the other hand, sought to upgrade the Avante to its maximum potential. In the process, it lost the metal ball-ends, but gained new chassis plates that extended its wheelbase to that of the Vanquish. Many of the plastic parts that were introduced on the Vanquish were used on the Egress, this time in the interest of lower weight. Switching to plastic ball-ends for suspension links further reduced weight and complexity. The Egress also featured Tamiya’s finest dampers, nicknamed “Hi-Caps.” The result was an improved car, but despite an elusive international victory, it was not a dominant racer. Incidentally, that winning car was heavily-modified from the factory Egress… Lastly, the Avante 2001 was a refreshed, simplified Avante. Unlike the Vanquish and Egress, this model would retain the Avante name and an appearance much closer to that of the original model, but using many of the chassis components that made their debut on the former two. This meant more plastic, including in the damper bodies. The Avante 2001 also returned to the same wheel design that appeared on the Avante, in a different colour. This model therefore retained much of the aesthetic character of the Avante, but would be easier to service and race. Despite these intentions, not many of them were produced or campaigned before Tamiya finally left the platform – and competitive four-wheel-drive off-road racing – behind. *** With the demise of the Avante, and the lingering spectre of its dubious competition legacy, Tamiya sought to quit four-wheel-drive off-road racing, and instead focused on rear-wheel-drive platforms. Much like its four-wheel-drive campaign, the two-wheel-drive effort saw few returns for the effort (including the notoriously-complex Astute). It was the end of an era. Yet TRF persisted, and once again Tamiya developed competitive two-wheel-drive and four-wheel-drive racers for off-road competition. These models, dubbed the 211X and 411X, were tested extensively, under a much more thorough program that was influenced by the lessons learned from the Avante. The 211X went on to become the moderately-successful and well-received Dyna Storm, but the 411X was not developed further and was ultimately never released. Many years later, when TRF returned to off-road racing, they did so with a two-wheel-drive car: the TRF201. It was only after cautious research and development that a four-wheel-drive chassis was announced. To this day, the Avante remains a cautionary tale too close to Tamiya. In a twist of events, though, the Avante now enjoys premium collector-car status with off-road racing enthusiasts. Even in the face of poor results, time has allowed for the appreciation of the Avante as a seminal design that perhaps was just the victim of poor execution. Several features it introduced, such as the longitudinal mid-mounted motor, became standard on the next generation of top-line racers, and it has since been lauded for its forward-thinking packaging, use of high-quality materials, and pure aesthetic appeal. The vintage racing scene gives the Avante a new competitive setting, and with new modifications available, it has become an easier racer to live with. What it may still lack in speed, it makes up for in glamour, and it is partly due to its lack of success that the design has become quite unique among off-road buggies. There may well never be another quite like it. *** Stranger than the Avante’s elevation from factory flop to blue-chip collectible is another theory for the Avante’s ultimate failure: the appointment of Marcus Perry as Tamiya Racing Factory’s lead driver for the Avante’s campaign. It is unthinkable now, with “Paranoid” Perry being the most famous name linked to the model, and yet it has been suggested that the release of the very driver who paced the prototype Azente through its entire program – Hinomoto Rikimaru – was the primary factor for the poor competitive career of the Avante. Rikimaru certainly showed a pace in the car that Perry struggled to find; had the man most familiar with such a unique car been permitted to race it in anger, Tamiya could have found itself with the international trophies it so longed for. Counter to this theory is the notion that Rikimaru worked to the Avante’s detriment. A driver with more experience in conventional machinery could have developed the Avante to the style of a conventional driver, making it easier to access the design’s inherent speed. This theory posits that by entrusting Rikimaru with almost all the driving development, he built the car too much in his own image, and so the performances of other drivers in a car inherently set up for him would consequently suffer. Rikimaru was noted as having little experience in four-wheel-drive racers, which could have made a driver expecting the car to behave more like one drive it poorly. The Avante, by accounts, required more attention than most other racers to point it in the intended direction of travel. Confusing this further are the reputations of each driver: Hinomoto Rikimaru is simultaneously recognized as having exceptional car control and poor driving instincts, while Marcus Perry is at once a gifted off-road racer and a hard-luck loser. Whether Rikimaru spoiled the car through his incessant development, or Perry was too impatient to find an ideal race-day setup, controversy surrounds these two men’s involvement in Tamiya’s grandest plan. Rikimaru, for the record, has been bitter over his release from TXR and its allegedly-preferential treatment of Perry, while Perry continues to speculate that Rikimaru somehow set him up for failure… … They don’t call him “Paranoid” Perry for nothing, after all It is here where the story of Hinomoto Rikimaru begins…
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