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Terz1

Vintage Blackfoot restoration

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Hi all. I've picked up a vintage Blackfoot from ebay. It's in pretty good condition for a 30 year old model but far from perfect. I'm going to strip it down and give it a good clean and replace any damaged parts. It'll probably be on my shelf most of the time with the occasional drive.

I've already bought a few things which I knew were missing. Firstly I bought a chrome grill which is from the blackfoot III. This will do until/if an original comes along. Secondly the spot lights were missing so I ordered a set of these too. After a brief look at the truck I'll need the small front mount that goes into the bonnet of the shell which has snapped off and the strut brace that goes between the 2 mounts for the rear of the shell has split. Also I popped off the rear wheel to see if it was ballraced but when I did the plastic hub fell in half so I'll probably be after a pair of those too! (It's not ballraced :rolleyes: ). The parts list is starting to build up!! :lol: Oh and I'm after a driver too.

The electrics have been changed to an Msonic 4 RV 15 speed controller (doesn't mean anything to me, good/bad?) and a Vision modified 23x1 motor. On the speed controller is a SET button? Are these items worth keeping? It looks like they have put some plastic at the other side of the motor which has been cut to to size so I'd like to replace this with a proper motor mount (if that's what it's called). The power switch is on the chassis but all the wires have been cut. It's got an old 27mhz 2 channel receiver and lastly an acoms IC servo AS-12.

The shell is solid with no cracks or missing pieces and it has the original stickers which some have started to lift slightly at the edges. I'd ideally like to paint the shell a gloss black and put the new decal set on but is this a no no with a 30 year old vintage tamiya with an original decal set!? If I do paint the shell there are some little nicks which I'd like to fill with some kind of plastic modelling putty so it's all straight as it should be. Any recommendations? Wheels and tyres are near perfect.

I'm really new to all this so any recommedations about how to do things, where to get stuff and source items, upgrade etc is more than welcome. :) Oh feel free to post your pics too, I'd love to see some other original blackfoot and what you've done to it etc.


Current shopping list :

  • Driver ✔
  • Hubs for rear wheels x2
  • Motor mount
  • front mount for shell ✔
  • Strut for rear shell mount points
  • Chrome grill - original blackfoot
  • Tamiya paint - black
  • Ballrace kit
  • 2.4ghz radio gear (any suggestions?) May be a flysky FS-GT3C or b (I do like the old stick controllers though <_< )
  • Esc if I replace (suggestions?)
  • Motor Tamiya torque tuned
  • Some large capacity NiMH batteries
  • Rear axles (black plastic parts which connect the rear suspension to the wheels)
  • Servo cover for chassis


Already bought :

  • Blackfoot III chrome front and rear bumpers ✔
  • Spot lights ✔
  • Decal set ✔
  • Dual charger from modelsport ✔


Here's some pics :

20141201_113706_zps59793772.jpg

20141201_113758_zps122a6240.jpg

20141201_152108_zps966ecafc.jpg

Pics bigger now. Thanks matman. :)

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Get a photobucket or alike account & you can then link them to this .

This is what most of us do , to get the BIG pic ..

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Cheers matman. I'll look into it. The pics do get bigger when you select them but I'd rather they were displayed large in the post. I've took the pictures on my phone which can shoot up to 13 mega pixels but reduced that to 6 so they're not to big to upload.

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Looks in great condition. Nice find.

I'm far from a black foot expert, but has it been restored?

Being Frog based driveline, I reckon a 23t is borderline, especially if vintage.

I put a torque tuned in a frog recently, i reckon it is a good match.

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Thanks Cplus. I really pleased with it. I paid £56 including delivery so it wasn't too expensive either. The guy I bought it from said it was bought in the 80's then put in the attic and left there for years and years. He then had another play with it and changed the motor and speed controller then it went back into the attic for many more years. He hasn't restored it but I don't think it's seen much action.

I think you're right about the 23t being border line. There are other rc's I can use for bashing so I might even return it to a mechanical speed controller and a silver can motor for a real vintage feel. I'll look into the torque tuned though. I saw a torque tuned in a blackfoot on youtube and it went really well.

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That's really cheap! I like the sound of the torque tuned even more now. :D

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That looks real good for the price and you might find you like the look of the Super BF/BF3 grille over the original, but that is my opinion. I do have both grilles represented, but I dig the semi "custom" look of the SBF/BF3, hate the graphics on the SBF and not fully in love with the BF3 decals, but hopefully will come up with something when I finally finish and present my SBF here on TC.

I know I have a driver, would have to look for the other bits, but I am in the USA and shipping is at minimum $7 to the UK with a padded envelope, so it would pay off if I had more than one bit.

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The grill is a nice looking piece and I totally agree with you about the graphics on the other blackfoot models. The original are definately my favourites but I'm starting to like the BF3 graphics more. One of my plans if I couldn't get a vintage BF was to get a BF3 and put the original style replica graphics onto it.

Oh great you've got a driver. If it's not too much trouble for you and you had the other bits I'm sure we could do a deal. :)

I'll look forward to seeing your SBF. B)

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Well I received a few things I recently bought for the blackfoot. These were my BF 3 front grill, rear bumper and the spotlight set.

Here's a few pics...

Grill and bumper set

20141203_124258_zps2b1fb14d.jpg

Spotlights

20141203_124157_zps5c15e243.jpg

Eventually everything will be stripped down and the body sprayed a nice shiney black but I couldn't resist putting on the pieces which were missing when I bought it.

So here's a pic when I got it...

20141201_113706_zps59793772.jpg

And now with the bumper, spotlights and decals.

20141203_163344_zpse3eef755.jpg

Like I said this is just a bit of a mock up really. Everything will be stripped back to every nut and bolt were I'm sure I'll find other things which need replacing. Just checking it over today I noticed the plastic part which connects to the top of the rear suspension and too the wheels has a crack were the screw attches so I'll need 2 of these axles or a very neat glue repair. The list goes on. :lol:

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I have quite a few Blackfoot original parts new and used pm me with a list if you want any and i'll sort out what I have got, but looking at your list will have most .

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I have quite a few Blackfoot original parts new and used pm me with a list if you want any and i'll sort out what I have got, but looking at your list will have most .

Thanks for that offer Disco I'll contact you soon. The list is growing the more I dig into it. May be gear parts too now.

A little self indulgent but here's my resto project that I am halfway through;

http://www.tamiyaclub.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=72131&hl=

Thanks for the link steve. It's just the sort of thing I needed to look at. I've just had a good read and like I said on your thread I love the little details you've done especially the grill.

Just had mine running today and there may be some gear issues. On the stand (wheels off the ground, no load) it went forward, backward and the steering worked fine but when run on the ground it didn't want to move. I know the gear boxes are weak on these so when I open it up I'll see what's happening, or not in this case. :rolleyes: The esc makes quite a loud noise too so I'll definately be replacing it.

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Wow a lot of upgrades to do there, really useful links. Thanks. When it does get stripped down I might as well do these while it's in pieces. It's good that they keep the character of the truck too, they just make it more reliable.

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Received another piece of the jigsaw today. My black foot driver. Also got a new front shell mount on its way that I bought for 99p.

20141211_131628_zps4d488ee6.jpg

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