Tamiya Rere B.A.R. Honda Hotshot Evo V

OK guys, this car has finally reached it's 5th evolution stage. Hence the name 'Evo V'. This car is a re-re Hotshot bought back in 2008, and it's been used for vintage racing ever since. I've had the idea of adding the BigWig air intake/scoop for quite a while, and I finally got around to actually doing it... and by coincidence here comes the BigWig re-re! Timing could not be better - and it's a nice salute to the BigWig I think. I always though the BigWig as to looks could have been a lot better with some tweaks. It just looks too tall, bulky and there's way too much yellow plastic on it. IMHO it works better 'dressed up' with some silver and carbon look vinyl :-)

I'll be honest and admit that it's far from an ideal base for a proper race car. But since the Supershot was my first 'good' RC car back in the 80s it has a special place in my heart. And I've always believed that this car had a lot of untapped potential. So my goal has been to make is as fast as a more modern car. And being very close now to a Tamiya Top Force or Schumacher CAT 2000 I definitely think I can conclude that I've fulfilled my goal. Although it took a lot of time, money and testing to get there :-)

The most fun part has been to go my own ways - it's very rewarding when you get a new idea and it works out like you've planned. I still have my original Supershot, which I already back in the day did heavily modify. You can find that one in my showroom as well.

If you click the link below 'If you liked those pictures, you should see these...' below the last picture it will send you to Evo IV, which again is linked to Evo III and so on. I've also put links to all the previous evolution stages in the 1st comment, including a link to my build tread (in norwegian, but you can run it through Google Translate).

Now, this is what I've done in the Evo V stage (since Evo IV):
-Installed a Thorp ball diff in the front
-Modified the front universal driveshafts to make them fit the Thorp outdrives (larger dimension)
-Mounted and customized a BigWig air intake (cut, sanded, painted, added carbon look vinyl, added mesh net in the intake)
-Made an extra support for the rear damper mount using an alu tube
-Stiffened up the rear wing supports more using ball links
-Added a 7-fin Integy colling rib to the motor
-Fitted an ESC colling fan and a fan guard to the end of the motor endbell (motor still ran too hot)
-Geared it down to 11T using a Schumacher 0.6 modulus pinion (motor still ran too hot on 12T)

Thanks for looking and comments or questions are always welcome! And of course feel free to copy any of my mods, I'd be honored! :-)