masterbsax's CommentsMy comments to other members

Great fun in a small package
masterbsax

Hi El Thoro. Normal 7,2 V racing packs will not fit inside of the battery bay, you will need packs out of 2/3 A cells, 6 cells side-by-side. Afaik they are the same as for the MiniZilla. But I prefer the one sold by Tamiya, because it uses Intellect cells, cheaper than GP but nearly the same power, if you upgrade the wires to at least 1.5 mm² silicone. Then you will get as much fun as possible out of this small buggies.

1-Aug-2007

Taiyo jet hopper turbo - project speed hopper
masterbsax

Oh yes, it is cute. If you want one, they are being sold on ebay germany sometimes. But only the red ones, the black one is somewhat rare, I think because it was the 40 MHz type, red was 27 MHz, which was and is more common in Germany.
4-Aug-2007

Great fun in a small package
masterbsax

I'm sorry, but this car will never ever get correct rear tires again. The original rears wore very fast and they do not provide enough grip on sand and tarmac, and this is where I mainly drive. For tarmac I now use Mini Cooper 60D tires and the toy tires are only on it while I have to wait for ProLine Bow Ties to be delivered. The Bow Ties are the replacement for Wild Boar rears, which are not available from Tamiya Germany. In fact, Tamiya Germany brought out its new catalogue, and there is none of the GB-Chassis based Buggies in it, only the GT-01 Cars and spare parts for them. For the buggies there are only spare bodies and wheels, no other spare or tuning part that is only suitable for the GB-Chassis.

5-Aug-2007

Mirahamm hobby laser - rare or just uncommon?
masterbsax

I knew, no I assumed this before, because I had a front shock tower of a Ultima clone before I bought the carbon-fibre one from you. And at the first run with the 'new' shock tower I broke the rear one, luckily I bought both from you. But since then no more mechanical failure. The biggest problem now is the esc, because I am using a big 3500 mAh battery pack now, which is twice the power the battery packs had at the times the Laser and its esc were bought.
6-Aug-2007

Spare part racer - scratch built buggy
masterbsax

'Uncommon handling' means it does handle different than the cars I knew until then. I thought it would feel like my daughter's Sand Viper, because it used the same tires for the first test run and the weight distribution is similar. But it handled different, the dampers were way too soft and it was very slow. Now the damper characteristics are better and the car is faster. But it still handles different than my other cars, more like a street racer than a buggy.

Yes, it was fun to built this, so much fun, that I decided to repeat this with a Monster Beetle chassis and body and a Kangaroo gearbox.
8-Aug-2007

Mirahamm hobby laser - lightning does strike twice
masterbsax

The only different shock towers I have at the moment are those of the later Ultima based Onroad Chassis distributed by Robbe. But my Ultima chassis should arrive soon, if the shock towers fit, I well tell you.

Yes, I have seen the other one on ebay and I don't know if I should buy it, because the only things that I could use of it are the shock towers and the rims, the wheels look very used, no shocks, no dogbones, even the steering brace is missing. I think I have enough spares for the next years, I even have a set of aluminium shock towers (selfmade) and I may build a FRP version of them also, so who needs expensive spare parts?

18-Oct-2007

Kyosho ultima - the black beauty
masterbsax

Thank you for your help. I think I will leave the shocks on the car as long as I restore the original ones.

I do have off road tires, I just forgot to make a photo of them. Maybe tomorrow, the light is too bad now.

3-Nov-2007

Mirahamm hobby laser
Road Burner

Hi, I am sorry to disappoint you, but this is not a Kyosho, it's a Mirahamm Hobby Laser (have two of them in my showroom). It is based on the original Ultima, that's true. As far as I can see it is in good condition for a runner, although the wheels and tires are not original and the wing is missing.

I think it is missing the belt in the transmission, because it has a belt driven transmission. But maybe it only slid off the ball diff, I had this problem on my second Laser.

These are good runners, fast and reliable. This is the first one I see outside of Germany, lucky find, they are pretty rare (but nearly worthless). If you need a manual, mail me, I can scan mine.

13-Jan-2008

The worlds most ugly monster truck - aristocraft hitec wildebeest
masterbsax

@trismagic: I know its a Wildebeest (note the double 'e', its written this way on the decals). And I know its similar to the Kangaroo and the Koala and the Dolphin, because they share the same chassis, a rude copy of the Marui Samurai. Wildebeest and Dolphin have 4WD, the others only 2WD.

25-Mar-2008

Euro fighter sonneberg
masterbsax

It was indeed great fun, although we both finished last. I kept on fighting with the setup till the second timed run and then was slowed down by a gear problem, so I only made it into the B-Final. There I started third and went up to second place, but then I had to go into the pits because of transponder problems and came out right behind my son. But the fun matters, not the result. And my result was not bad, considering I drove the fifth best lap of the day with a heavy nicad-battery, nearly all others had the lighter and more powerful nimhs, it was impossible for me to follow them on the long straights.
11-May-2008

Wildebeest in the wild
masterbsax

Parts are no problem as I have two more buggies of the same brand running and one nearly complete in parts. I also drove very slow and careful. Imo RC-Cars are built to be driven, so that is what I do.
26-May-2008

Dickie-tamiya herbie fully loaded - a handful of fun
masterbsax

@Beetle One: The little scorcher is a cheap toy car manufactured by Maisto. Not radio controlled or something like that. I found it by luck in a big bag of toy cars my wife bought for my son.
9-Jun-2008

Kyosho 1985 vs. 2008
supergreg

You just can't beat the old stuff!! Keep on running.
22-Jun-2008

Hype chadory - cheap spare part
masterbsax

Hi Matt, I think this car has a different name in every other country it is sold. Yesterday I broke the front upright on the left side, and, surprise, surprise, it can be replaced with the much tougher one (nylon reinforced) from my Cool Racer spare parts lot, perfect fit. I think this car is some kind of successor of the Cool Racer or Valiant II (the not so rare, later version with upper deck and transversal mounted battery but without nylon parts), because many parts of the Cool Racer or Valiant II will fit the Chadory or Booster or whatever.

After the crash I disassembled and rebuild the shocks and now the car handles better. Just some soft oil and a different position is all that is needed to make it work better. And some tougher parts in some places.
23-Jun-2008

Radio control racing - rc-micro-slotcars with track
masterbsax

Video is no problem, but I have to repair the body of the yellow car, it broke after it spun ot of a corner and the silver car hit it. First layer of epoxy resin has hardened, now I have to glue the second part of the nose back onto the body.

By the way, a friend of mine has something that could be the Pace Car for this racing set, I am trying to convince him to sell it to me.
29-Jun-2008

Aristocraft hitec kangaroo - my first rc-car
masterbsax

@Danbox: I think they came RTR in many countries, but in Germany you could buy them as semi-kit also (gearbox already assembled, tires glued, not much left to do except tightening some screws), don't know if there were any RTR sets of them in Germany.
8-Jul-2008

Fixing/reinforcing blackfoot rear 'trailing arms'
KingPin

Why do we have to come up with this solutions? I always thought that the car designers are paid for this, but the more cars I have I doubt this more and more. I am thinking now, that they design it this way on purpose, so their company can make more money with spare parts. But not with this part anymore. Thanks for sharing this great tip, I hope I will never need it, till now my epoxy glue solution is holding up fine.
22-Sep-2008

Quickest build i ever did
masterbsax

@tuff bug: I think that the front end is very close to the Blitzer Beetle / Falcon chassis. But the rest is not. But you're right it handles fine, if you could only use hotter motors, only two possible gearing ratios (9,28 and 8,30) are limiting the performance of this great car significantly.
24-Sep-2008

Black grasshopper hopping around my house
masterbsax

I just came back from a quick run over some gravel and sand and must say that the front springs are way too stiff, but otherwise the car is fun (maybe video and pictures later this day). Hopefully I can find the springs from my brothers Grasshopper II, which we threw away after the chassis was broken (I kept some parts, but can't remember where), some years before I found out that ebay is a perfect source for spare parts. I also thought of a brushless sytem, but here in Germany the MambaMax is too expensive, Team Orion is cheaper and should be at the same level. But first I need some spare parts, as a brushless motor will probably feed on gears, front wishbones and maybe even chassis, as the shock towers are not very tough.
5-Oct-2008

Black grasshopper hopping around my house
masterbsax

That's good to hear, so I can put some real hot machine into this baby. I do not use alloy pinion gears on offroaders, only steel or brass, as I know that alloy pinions can destroy your counter gears with ease. I already found some replacement tubs on ebay, and the good thing is, the seller is a lhs that is only 30 minutes away, so I think I will visit him this week or so, as I might need some other parts too.

You are right, brushless systems are cheap compared to lifetime (I am an electric engineer and work with brushless motors nearly all the time), but at the moment I can not afford one (my 1:1 Rover 114 needs some care). Carson sells a BL Set around 100 Euro (designed for onroad use, don't know if you should use this offroad, as it has active cooling via a fan) and Team Orion wants 130 Euro (good quality brushed ESC and motor are slightly cheaper, but you have running costs for brushes and comm cleaning and they don't last forever) for a passive cooled offroad suitable BL set dressed in black carbon, but both have only about 3000 kV, so I think the 18T pinion would be better in this case. We will see, I will ask the guys of the Tamiya Raceway Team next time I go there for practising (some of them work for Tamiya) about this, as some of them use BL Systems for quite a while now.

Brushless is not the future, it is the present. Brushless Systems will get cheaper by the end of the year hopefully as more and more manufactures equip their cars with brushless systems out of the box. Otherwise I have to sell some of my cars.
5-Oct-2008
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