Changing opinions on cars with age

[Saito2]

Did you ever have a Tamiya vehicle you've loved (or lusted after, if you didn't own it) as a kid that you loved a little less as an adult? Whether looks or performance, did something make you fall out of love with it or did your taste just evolve? I can think of several.

1. Bullhead. This was the decked out Clod Buster/USA-1-killer of my youth. Can't beat 'em with a monster truck? Crush 'em with a monster big rig! (or so I thought at the time). I still like Bullheads and I like the look of them, but I prefer the Clod nowadays. All those crazy colors (red chassis, yellow bits, chrome parts etc.) are a little to flashy for adult-me so Clod buster it is.

2. Mitsubishi Pajero. I wanted one of these so badly as a kid. Is was the father of my cherished Lunch Box so-to-speak. When I finally pieced one together to run...it was horrible. It's wheelie-mate at the time, Wild Willy 1, was much better. The Pajero tried to topple over at any opportunity coupled with the horrible sound of that beautiful body being scratched up. Well, at least it looks great on my shelf now.

3. Fire Dragon. I had nothing against the Dragon cars back in the day. When the Fire Dragon was re-re'd years back I snatched one up to experience the Thundershot chassis in action. When I dropped the newly painted body on the chassis, I thought I made a mistake building it. The body sat way too far forward on the chassis, something I'd never caught in guidebook or magazine photos. I've since discovered why, the body itself being an option for Hornet-type vehicles first and then tossed on the Thundershot chassis later on. Like the body, love the chassis, just wish Tamiya married them better.

On the other hand, I was dismissive of the Blackfoot back in the day as a rather generic monster truck (I was/am a huge Monster Beetle fan). All the other trucks had a unique gimmick , Monster Beetle being a VW, Lunch Box being a van, Pumpkin being an old Ford, Clod being...well huge. Today, I love the Blackfoot, so go figure.

[Theibault]

Nope. 

[Rb4276]

I loved my monster beetle as a kid so i was excited to get one last year and hop it up with everything. As i drove it my views changed. It was quirky, it rolled over to easily and the dog bones popped out over any big bumps or roll overs. So i decided to sell it a few weeks ago, just wasnt fun and the way it handled just was t worth the headache

[Juggular]

1 hour ago, Saito2 said:

 2. Mitsubishi Pajero. I wanted one of these so badly as a kid. Is was the father of my cherished Lunch Box so-to-speak. When I finally pieced one together to run...it was horrible. It's wheelie-mate at the time, Wild Willy 1, was much better. The Pajero tried to topple over at any opportunity coupled with the horrible sound of that beautiful body being scratched up. Well, at least it looks great on my shelf now. 

 

okay...

I was going to leave the chassis the way it was... now, Saito2 made me want to upgrade the front suspension.  

But... no room for the upper arm... oh well, at least the rear will rock a bit side to side. (the wheelbase got longer because of that)   

 

When I had a Grasshopper, but I was dreaming of Hotshot, I imagined Hotshot to be awesome.  In reality, Hotshot is almost as clunky as the Grasshopper.  Suspensions were clever, but sloppy, etc.  I saw how FAV moved, so I wasn't surprised the ancient chassis performed reasonably well.  I love them with all their faults, but the reality can slap you hard when the expectation was high.   

I hated how awkward the Bigwig looked.  But it kinda grew on me.  It could be the IKEA effect (of loving something just because you worked on it).  I never cared for the Falcon, but I wouldn't mind owning one if re-re is inexpensive.  

A Canadian youtuber Cycra, who's teaching sketches, said that just by watching many drawings YOU change.  You'd go from "wow, I did good" to "how could I think that was good?"  We get influenced.  We see more car designs by just seeing new cars on the road.  And that shapes how we think of things.  

If we saw a lot more cab-forward designs like these, we might think Fire Dragon looks cool... (never quite did it for me... where are his feet? They would stick down below the bumper!) 

[Jonathon Gillham]

I think I'm the opposite and still stuck in the 80s/90s and wish my race cars still looked like the Boomerang, Fox, Top Force or Astute than the current crop of cars. I've also always had a thing for buggies (my favourite cars to run) and touring cars or F1 (I love how fast and precise they are but just can't get as enthusiatic about them I can buggies).

This goes for my real cars too - when I get my toy/classic car it will be a Porsche 993, or Lancer Evo 3, or Mini 1275GT or C3 Corvette. The same cars I wanted when I was a teenager...

[ThunderDragonCy]

Definitely had this. I desperately wanted a Lunchbox to add to my Thunder Dragon when I was a kid. I did (And still do) think they look achingly cool. After I got back into RC I picked up a wreck on eBay and sorted it. Oil shocks, new tyres, transmission brace, all the good things. I sold it. It just drove so badly! I got frustrated and I don't do shelfers. 

Similar with the Grasshopper2. I love love love the body, but having driven the Lunchie and the kids Rising Fighter I just don't do solid axle vehicles. They just suck to drive. I built Ultra G instead so now I have a vintage tech Grasshopper2 that drives properly!

[acprc]

Yep,

 

Sand Scorcher. I ran a used one to death when I was younger, repeated battery charges for 8-10 hours straight. Nowadays I have a restored one and a Ford Ranger that have been waiting to be painted and finished for around 15 years. Just can't get the enthusiasm for them anymore. I did get a NIB Re-RE SS and Buggy Champ and forgot I had them as well!

[Mad Ax]

Yes.

When I was younger, I had a Midnight Pumpkin Jr - a miniature version of the famous Pumpkin powered by 2 AA batteries.  I bought it with some birthday money, put it together and drove it to death.  I made little hills for it to climb out of pillows and books, I tried to make barriers that would make it turn.  But I always dreamed of the full-size version, a big, fully-functional, high-performance monster truck with a cool vintage Ford body.

I spotted the re-re in my LHS over a decade ago, and it drew me inside.  After a long chat, I walked out with a Dark Impact.  GOOD move.  If I'd bought the Pumpkin, I might never have got back into RC.  The DI was great: everything I expected of a hobby-grade buggy.  It even came with oil shocks and bearings.

But I couldn't get that Pumpkin out of my mind, so a month later I went back and bought it.  As a kid I'd had a Mud Blaster, and I expected the Pumpkin to be much the same.  I couldn't have been more wrong.

The marketing blurb sold me a functional monster truck, what I got was a stupid kid's toy.  I couldn't have been more disappointed to discover, after 15 years or so of dreaming about it, that the Pumpkin wasn't so much a monster truck as a gimmick.

OK, I get the whole wheelie truck thing now - I have a WR02 and I absolutely love it.  The wheelie races at Iconic events are the highlight of the weekend.  But back then, with no RC mates to play with, the pumpkin and its siblings just didn't make any sense to me at all.  I've always hated gimmicky toys; I used to feign gratitude when I got daft gimmicky toys for Christmas and birthday.  Just get me toy cars or lego, darn it!

I sold the Pumpkin on pretty soon, and vowed to always pay more attention to what I was buying rather than being sold on marketing blurb alone...

[markbt73]

I've had a certain amount of "meeting your heroes and being unimpressed" moments, particularly with the Hotshot and the SRB. Reality just didn't measure up to expectations in either case. And that's the main reason why I can't bring myself to buy any of the 3-speeds; what if I spend all that money and then hate them?

On the other hand, I never "got" the Willy-based rally cars before, but now I find myself wanting one badly, and hoping they get the WR02 treatment like the Wheeler did.

What's funny is I absolutely had the "aha" moment with 1:1 cars not long ago, with Austin-Healeys. Never paid them much attention, but at the big British car show a few weeks ago, I couldn't take my eyes off them...

[Saito2]

I've liked Austin-Healeys from a distance but aren't into them like Triumphs or MGs. As a side note. my resto shop is supposed to be getting a Morgan in to work on in the coming months which is good because I'm tired of big 50's Cads, lol.

12 hours ago, Mad Ax said:

The marketing blurb sold me a functional monster truck, what I got was a stupid kid's toy.  I couldn't have been more disappointed to discover, after 15 years or so of dreaming about it, that the Pumpkin wasn't so much a monster truck as a gimmick.

Yeah, Tamiya's marketing is good for that. Ever notice just about everything they make is touted as "high performance"?  In my case it was reversed. The Lunch Box, being my first Tamiya, was big and "high performance" compared to the small Nikko, Tyco and Radio Shack cars around my neighborhood. It wan't till years later when I ran an ORV monster truck that I realized "oh, wow! this is so much better."

[Pablo68]

When I was younger I was quite impressed by the look of the Fox. I had Hornets up until that time. I was always on the line as to whether to get the Hornet, Grasshopper of the Frog, not knowing much about them.
I really wanted to get a Fox though but the chance sort of never came, other things got in the way. I have a NovaFox now, and I need to drive it a few more times I think, cause I'm wavering a little. Seems quite under-steery and the build experience was a tad dodgy, not to mention the oddness of the chassis design.

The Monster Beetle is kind of this thread's situation, but in reverse.
I got one back in the day, my first impressions was that it looked awesome, very cool. I built mine tut suite and to be honest did a rough job on it.
Anyway, got it running and though I was sure I put enough lube in the hex join drive shafts/cups, they wore out in short order. I bought a new set, same thing happened again.
I also stuffed up a steering upright but that is neither here nor there I guess. Anyhow, after not being able to find a way to keep the drive system reliable I got sick of the car and sold it on. In my opinion the MB was a cool looking car but a design mistake.
Fast Forward to the re-re. I got my hand on one of these, and with quite a few more years of experience and a bit of foresite, and Mr-T's design changes, I built my MB, made a few mods here and there and have loved the thing since. It's a great fun Truck/buggy.
I still think that making a Monster Truck out of a buggy chassis like they did was not the best move, and it does have its drawbacks, but at least it's reliable.

[Wooders28]

Watching endless loops of tamiya promo vids in model shops as a kid, led me to believe every single tamiya handled well, had great suspension and jumped sand dunes effortlessly.

After being disappointed with the frog, it put a dark cloud over any ORV chassised car, Subaru Brat (which is what I wanted until I saw the hornet, loved the weldstar look wheels)  MB etc. 

As I've got older, I've realised most of the tamiya range dont handle, haven't got great suspension and struggle in soft sand without paddle tyres 😂

[Baddon]

The vintage stuff is great to build and look at but handles like a tub of lard half filled with Jelly!

I got a Neo Scorcher about 2 years ago that got me back into Tamiya (just a impulse buy of Gumtree, it was so easy to drive, so predicatble, did exactly what I wanted...but was soooooo low, no fun and grass....lol. same for jumps. no fun for me as I lke to bash and blast and jump)

 

Now I have a whole fleet of the buggies from back in the day, all the 4WD range from my youth. The two I REALLY wanted were the BigWig and the Vanquish- the top of the line in real world buggies back in the day( I only had eyes for Tamiya as you all know the on loop videos in the Big Smokes model shop just designed to make a kid want to spend every hard to save ££ on a Tamiya) - NOTE I always ignore the Avante as it was JUST soooooo out of reach money wise. I have a NIB re-re BigWIg that I will build over the Christmas holidays and a new to me Vanquish which I will do a full nut and bolt restore on. Will I run them.......probably once --you have to don't you?

But in reality after running my old Thundershot after fully restoring it I know they will likely be disappointed, as expectations have moved on.

I bash a stock Traxxas Stampede. Runs no problem on grass, jumps without breaking and will only flip if I am really stupid. Oh and if it rolls I just flip it back over and drive on. No so the old Tamiya - heart in mouth at every bump or scraping sound.....always doing repairs on the family fleet of WT-01's

Old for show and new for go. BUT the pleasure of the build and smile from looking at the old stuff - hope that never goes away. Keep the re-re's coming Mr Tamiya.

 

[Pablo68]

Another couple.

The Striker. Never liked it, was one of the cars that actually made me think that Tamiya had gone in a direction I wasn't into.
This was only confirmed after reading into peoples experiences with them.
Recently though I'm looking at them and thinking.......maybe I could use one in the collection.....I've even looked on Ebay a few times.
God it's like coming out of the closet or something.

And on that tangent, I am thinking that the Watanabe Hornet has actually aged well.

Maybe I'm just getting old and bent.

[Yalson]

Seriously, don't buy a Striker.

For me it's been like that, though. BITD I was a racer and anything that wasn't race-spec was superfluous. Didn't care about monster trucks, wheelie cars or anything which was supposed to be "fun". I think I may have been a bit of a jerk.

Now, the idea of racing modern buggies with massive-capacity batteries and brushless motors rather scares me. Instead, I bought a Marui Hunter and a Kyosho Raider and I am really looking forward to running them. Equally, I realised I had a scrap Super Sabre chassis in the garage (a car which I would never have considered when I was a teenager, as it and the Boomerang were the normal mounts for 'Christmas present kiddies' who'd turn up for one week, get upset when they didn't win and go home, never to be seen again) and I now really, really want to get it going again. It will be expensive and it will need a lot of work as there isn't much there to work with. But were they really all that bad back then? Could I have driven one and made it work? I am dying to know now.

[Yalson]

I also really, really want an old-school 80s/90s Ultima. I briefly had one, but sold it and I wish I hadn't.

[Pablo68]

8 hours ago, Yalson said:

Seriously, don't buy a Striker.

 

 

Ha ha ha, don't worry, not much chance, they are thin on the ground for some reason.

[Pablo68]

8 hours ago, Yalson said:

I also really, really want an old-school 80s/90s Ultima. I briefly had one, but sold it and I wish I hadn't.

 

I have a Turbo and an old original.
One of the best designs of a 2wd racer ever imo. Or at least a design I find very appealing.

Hopefully the original Ultima will be Kyosho's next re-re.

[Jonathon Gillham]

20 minutes ago, Pablo68 said:

 

Ha ha ha, don't worry, not much chance, they are thin on the ground for some reason.

Is that because @Jason1145 owns them all?

[Slyda]

As a kid I always wanted a Rough Rider, Sand Scorcher, Super Champ and a F150 Ranger, I still don't have any of them and I still would love to get them. When the Wild One and Boomerang came out I had no time for either of them, I now have one of each and LOVE driving my Boomer and I'm planing on getting another two WO's at some point. Never liked the Hotshot but now I have a Super Hotshot, so I guess I have changed my mind/mellowed somewhat over the last 35+ years, there are still some I don't like now that I never liked back then however.

[Wooders28]

10 hours ago, Yalson said:

BITD I was a racer and anything that wasn't race-spec was superfluous

Guessing you didn't have a ,fun class? Which was ,basically all the Christmas presents, MB's and lunchbox's etc, bundled into one class so as to give people a fighting chance at winning.

At that point I had the Ultima for 2wd, Optima mid for 4wd , but nothing for that class! So bought a lunchbox, fitted rough rider wheels and a hornet pinion and won that class too 😜

10 hours ago, Yalson said:

Now, the idea of racing modern buggies with massive-capacity batteries and brushless motors rather scares me.

It's not the power and the speed of the buggies that scares me, it's the 7yr old next to me, that has to stand on a box to see over the bar on the rostrum, thats just about to lap me...again 😳 

10 hours ago, Yalson said:

Could I have driven one and made it work?

If you're driving standard was that of Masami Hirosaka, then maybe! 

The shaft drive cars of that era where nowhere near as efficient as the belt drives and no camber adjustment etc.

[Jason1145]

On 10/12/2018 at 1:59 AM, Juggular said:

If we saw a lot more cab-forward designs like these, we might think Fire Dragon looks cool... (never quite did it for me... where are his feet? They would stick down below the bumper!) 

 

 

“Where are his feet?” 🤣🤣😂😂😇😇

Funniest thing I’ve contemplated for RC stuff in a long while to imagine Mr Fire Dragon looking at his own oddly shaped proportioned body wondering where his own feet are?!

(but to be honest I could go quoting Juggulars musings day and night for hilarious insights on RC stuff and not run out for a week they are so numerous ( in a complementary way ofcourse)

12 hours ago, Yalson said:

Seriously, don't buy a Striker.

I think I may have been a bit of a jerk.

 

I think I quoted the above out of context but meh, it’s only a giggle, hope you take it on the chin @Yalson

But that’s good advice, don’t buy a Striker as there will be more for me

3 hours ago, Jonathon Gillham said:

Is that because @Jason1145 owns them all?

This is my first target, to own all Strikers... then on to world domination.. I got my priorities straight

 

As for the thread title, I’ve not got much to add.. loved most RC cars back in the day despite owning hardly any of them. Then when I got back into RC 6 years ago I still love them all from back in the day plus seeing all the new modern offerings with lipo power!

But as with most things even non RC related our tastes are probably bound to change over time (will I be an OAP in the future who still loves Drum b Bass and Breakbeat hardcore music... I think I’ll break a hip bugging out!) 

[matman]

5 hours ago, Pablo68 said:

 

Ha ha ha, don't worry, not much chance, they are thin on the ground for some reason.

chickenman242tk has one for sale with the other one that came out of the same chassis . I hate them .

They were way too toy ish And in the same league as nicko etc or tyco type of things .

 

[Yalson]

13 minutes ago, matman said:

chickenman242tk has one for sale with the other one that came out of the same chassis . I hate them .

They were way too toy ish And in the same league as nicko etc or tyco type of things .

 

That'll be the Sonic Fighter, then.

[Yalson]

6 hours ago, Pablo68 said:

 

I have a Turbo and an old original.
One of the best designs of a 2wd racer ever imo. Or at least a design I find very appealing.

Hopefully the original Ultima will be Kyosho's next re-re.

I think I had a Turbo II, or whatever the uprated version of the evolution was called. It came as part of a job lot of Kyosho cars and gear which a friend was selling as he was raising money to race real cars. It had a single-deck, flat pan chassis made out of Dural, or possibly FRP (it was a long time ago and I only owned it for about three months). It had been raced for a while, so it had lots of extra after-market bits on it and I remember I was surprised when I first drove it how easy it was to set up and how well it handled. I'd exclusively raced Mids in 4WD for about two years by that point and had formed the opinion that 2WD cars were twitchy and handled badly. The Ultima was a revelation in that regard and I really wish I hadn't sold it in order to buy a new speed controller and a motor.

If Kyosho re-re one of the Ultima II range then I will be waiting with my face pressed against the glass for the shop to open on the day.