Forest friendly rally car builds

[WRC4 me 13]

Well here we are nearly a week in to my RC experience and thanks to the very kind members on this forum I've got a reasonable idea of where I'm heading. Now's the time to put theory into practice - and look! My very first Tamiya parts arrived today - £6 inc. post well spent, I'd have said:

So what it the plan of attack, I hear nobody ask. Well basically, I'm hoping to run a rally car or two in the woods around where I live. There are two commons with mainly sandy earth where we walk the dog and a couple of fairly deep, dark woods with richer soil and narrow pathways closer to home that are also dog walking favourites.

All of these routes are going to put a premium on off-road ability but from watching a lot of Youtube videos it looks like a touring car chassis with a decent rally setup would be able to deal with all but the most churned-up earth and exposed tree roots.

This thread is starting with a restoration - a secondhand TL-01 that looked used but not overly abused on the Bay. It's clean but lacking radio and batteries while the body (1997 Impreza 22B, Colin McRae) looks like it is in need of some TLC. Exposure to sunlight means that the yellow has almost completely faded to white on the 555 logos, there are a few scuffs and rubs on it and there are a whole bunch of extra stickers that have been slapped on it over the years.

Hopefully it can be made presentable again but, if not, it's not the end of the world. Among the other parcels headed this way are a brand new body set for the 1990 Toyota Celica GT-Four that was a bargain from China and a 1993 Toyota Celica GT-Four body from GooneyBird that's a manageable restoration job. The new wheels above are to go with the 1990 car, and there's a used set of five-spoke wheels heading in this direction to go with the 1993 car. I've also got some brand new rally block tyres coming from Dirt-540.

First job will be to get the TL-01 running and to see how it fares in standard trim on rally blocks. After that it will be clear which upgrades are needed - I'm expecting it to be CVA oil dampers and ball bearings. If the TL-01 isn't up to the job then I'll put it on some smoother rubber or possibly drift tyres and use it as a car park cruiser before trying out the mods I've seen for the TT-01/02 or venturing into DF-03ra or XV-01 territory.

I'm very much looking forward to having at least one rally car to report on building and testing this winter, and if all goes well perhaps might look at a retro buggy for our camping weekends on the coast next summer.

To be continued when the rest of the parts arrive...

[Darat76 265]

sounds like a good plan, only thing I would change is the bearings and cva's before running, or at the very least, bearings. Either way, I'm interested in seeing how it all pans out for you

 

[WRC4 me 13]

One thing that we do with slot rally cars is stick a shorter gear or smaller diameter wheels on the front axle of a 4wd car and it does work to pull you through a corner, particularly if it's covered in 'gravel*'. Might be an interesting experiment one of these days to scale it up!

*chocolate powder!

[WRC4 me 13]

A very busy postman today... no oily bits have arrived yet, but I've now got two Celica bodies with their respective wheels. The secondhand 1993 car from GooneyBird should come up a treat, I'm pretty sure from memory that the standard green and red Tamiya paints are a match, I can print waterslide decals to replace the most torn-up Castrol logos and the off-white paint on the plastic parts is an easy fix. Thank you very much GooneyBird - a pleasure doing business!

The tyres on the 5-spoke rims aren't split or damaged but they are quite hard - I'm not really sure how soft they are supposed to be. I've got some magic oils for slot car tyres that will no doubt have an effect if needed, but plenty more fish to fry first...

Looking forward to seeing the chassis now.

[WRC4 me 13]

The 'base' car for my first runner has now arrived. Bodywork is passable, with a few cracks in it here and there. A bit of tape will shore things up.

I've removed all the extra stickers that were put on by the previous owner and will get the residual gum off with some white spirit. All that's left then is to refresh the yellow sections to make them the correct colour again rather than the sun bleached off white that they currently are. Here's the way it currently looks:

Under the shell it's all pretty much as I expected. The car has obviously been out of use for quite a while Screws are all rusted, the shocks move but stay stuck in the position you put them in but it's pretty clean and there aren't all that many scratches underneath. Here's what I mean about the suspension:

The motor case is a bit rusty but it turns freely. Next job is to strip it down, clean and lubricate, fit some proper bearings and shocks and see where we're at with it.

 

[WRC4 me 13]

Still just generally tidying at the moment. This old girl's looking a little less peaky now that the yellow is on the 555 logos and the Subaru logos. There's nothing for the body to rest on the posts at the moment - assuming these are adjustable pads and that they're MIA.

[Darat76 265]

If I'm understanding what your saying:

The common way I have found all shells to be held up is a set of body clips fitted to the posts at the height you wish the body to sit to clear the wheels and suspension travel, sometimes with an o-ring or piece of foam above it, then the body fitted, and then another set of body clips to hold the body onto the car.

 

If I've misunderstood what your saying:

Please ignore everything I just typed out

[Prescient 671]

Yep, ^^ this is what it needs for the body. 

[GooneyBird 938]

Oh look! It's my old body!

Glad to be of service.  Good to see that old body finally getting a proper resto-job. It was just laying around here doing nothing at all.