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Turbotom

Trf touring car

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Does anyone race any tamiya trf's these days?

Im the only one at my two local clubs that run tamiya cars. I do have 3 schumacher buggies but prefer the tamiya cars.

Im a solid front midfield runner, I race against schumacher mi5,6,7 and xray touring cars with great results. 

My current cars are trf419x, running on polished wood floor using mini pins and a trf419xr full carpet set up. They are great cars and in my opinion still worthy opponents. 

So does anyone else race tamiya trf touring cars?????

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I want to, so I’ll probably pick up a 420X in time.

For me the Reinhard vs Hara era was pretty iconic, and I loved the HPI/HB look, but I’ll always be a Tamiya fan.

Luke

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Personally, I'm not, no. At least not in open chassis classes. I have an M-07R for M-chassis class and a TT-02 SR for a TT-01/TT-02 only class, otherwise I haven't raced (or even driven) a Tamiya car for 20 years (after having  been severely disappointed with the TRF TA-03R's performance, I went with HPI instead (right before Tamiya came up with their first real good pure race car), then Yokomo, came back from a long hiatus again with a Yokomo and then ending up with Xray as my manufacturer of choice for now). But of course even older cars can still be competitive, and Tamiya have been right up there for well over a decade. Driver (and setup) skill is more important than the chassis itself (although of course some chassis are easier to drive fast and easier to set up well than others). In racing, at least Tamiya's popularity (by numbers) has declined in the past few years, but not because their actual cars were bad, but because of when they cancelled their racing program, they kind of gave racers the impression that they didn't care for racing and development as much anymore, plus not having the big names, like Marc Rheinard successfully drive their cars at the big events anymore made customers go away, too (remember the saying "what wins on Sunday, sells on Monday" - well, they stopped winning on Sunday without drivers like Marc). To me it's more a psychology thing than any real issue with their cars. The result is almost the same, though: very few people seem to still race a Tamiya.

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I race on low grip painted concrete (netball courts with temporary tracks setup) and my TRF102 holds its own. There are up to 10 in F1 on a usual race day and there are 2 Tamiya's, mine and an F104, and the balance are XRay, Schumacher and Exotek. I was generally near the front of the pack during club days last year. 

I also run a TA07 Pro in 21.5T. This has just about every blue bit and the Exotek RS7 chassis so its a bit of a frankenstein, but once again, that is competitive. We have 25 - 30 21.5T cars and use a spec motor so its pretty even racing. While I'm usually at the back of the A main or front of the B, thats my consistency not the car holding me back as the fast laps are comparable. 

The common TC are Xpress, schumacher, xray, yokomo, infinity and awesomatix.

I'm considering the TRF420X when its available, partly because finding setup help with a modified car can be tricky, and partly because my car is old (although, like triggers broom...the rear universals are still from the Pro!). A guy at the club with a TA07MSX just uses kit settings and does well. I don't have kit settings...my other option is to get infinity, the same as one of the fast guys who is happy to share knowledge. He is great, rather than just telling you what to change, he asks what you want the car to do then suggests changes. Learnt that lesson, don't just copy setup from fast people as they usually set their cars up to be agressive which just means twitchy and hard to control for your average racer.

Outside the TT02 class, there are always a handful of Tamiyas. There were 3 or 4 TRF102s but now I'm the only one, otherwise there are a few 419s and 420s. Even a TC01 but that was too heavy for stock TC racing so he runs that in allcomers with a le mans body now. I was one of 4 TA07Pro's when they were newer, now its just mine and the MSX. Haven't seen a TA08 yet though.

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I also race a ta08pro. Its good but had to fit a carbon top deck as the flex was toooo much in the lower chassis. I will find a picture.......

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After seeing the release price of the 420X yesterday, I am wondering if I would be better picking up a 420 when I graduate from TT-02 classes.

Whatever my racing future holds, it’ll be with a Tamiya.

Luke

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10 hours ago, lukej said:

After seeing the release price of the 420X yesterday, I am wondering if I would be better picking up a 420 when I graduate from TT-02 classes.

Whatever my racing future holds, it’ll be with a Tamiya.

Luke

I saw that TTP said 699pounds. It will be a lot cheaper than that, I would guess that ths Hong Kong stores will have it around USD500 - USD600. I almost bought a TRF420 in December and it was going to be about NZD850 from Asiatees including shipping. That brings it in at the cheaper end of TC kits as they all seem to be over NZD1,000 now, with the exception of Xpress.

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22 minutes ago, Jonathon Gillham said:

I saw that TTP said 699pounds. It will be a lot cheaper than that, I would guess that ths Hong Kong stores will have it around USD500 - USD600. I almost bought a TRF420 in December and it was going to be about NZD850 from Asiatees including shipping. That brings it in at the cheaper end of TC kits as they all seem to be over NZD1,000 now, with the exception of Xpress.

Yes, I saw the TTP price and was a bit shocked as that’s round about T4 money, especially as TTP had the TRF420 at £450 just before Christmas.

Luke

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6 hours ago, lukej said:

Yes, I saw the TTP price and was a bit shocked as that’s round about T4 money, especially as TTP had the TRF420 at £450 just before Christmas.

Luke

I contacted a local shop who gets some TRF cars in (not sure why, but they are the only one I know of in NZ) and they said NZD900 - 950, which is around 450 pounds. Hopefully we see it soon

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I believe it comes with both chassis so that's £90-100 worth there. Still not cheap but Tamiya stuff never is...

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I run my 419xr stock racing on carpet and use my ff04 evo occasionally. I was using my TA07 in 21.5 but have since replaced it with a Destiny rx 10sr for that class.

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Started in 5th and finished 3rd not bad against xray and schumacher cars! I was pleased with my laps!

20220320_143747.jpg

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