Restored To Mint but will never see a shelf. Ever! :)

I'am getting sick of just looking at my models festering in my display cabinet. I am starting to feel again like the 9 year old kid 'window licking' Beaties model shop somewhere in the 1980's in blackpool houndshill shopping centre, drooling over the latest release Tamiya's, you know that look but dont touch feeling ? Well I am back there again with that same feeling - too nice to run etc. Well I am going to revolt! From now on they are all fair game and if any local kids say 'hey mister can I have a go' instead of the reply I used to get as a kid ' clear off sonny no chance' its going to be OK I'll throw a new pack in for ya kid! This might make some of you cringe as a lot of my models although not the most valuble by any stretch of the imagination as luckily for me I like the more simple 80's ones they are in brand new condition. But how can I fully enjoy them just by eyeballing them in a cabinet ? So this truck is now brand new condition. Its come out really well and Its so far only been test run breifly on tarmac, But will get fully christened on the next north west meet It'll get 'de-minted' and used mostly 'hard' off road :) I feel liberated allready :) . When the drive fails I will update it with the re-re frog transmission. OK rant over!! ;) About the truck. I bought this off ebay for a very good price on a buy it now, I deliberatley went looking for a less than perfect runner so I would be not tempted to 'over restore' it. This is one of my weak points,once I start I cannot stop untill its spot on. I guess its because I enjoy the restoring as much as the running. I emailed the seller to ask permission to use his fleabay pics and explained my vice and about tamiyaclub and that his pics would be used for my showroom 'before' pics. He kindly mailed back saying no problems by the way I am a T.C member too ! So Thanks to Razer. Initial inspection revealed that it had been used as it should! A lot! :) but required only a couple of new parts that were beyond redemption being the diff gear & spur which looked as if a screw or small stone had been drawn in and had destroyed the teeth, but the die cast alloy gears where fine The second part was the front bumper mount had a large portion worn away and would not offer enough support to the bumper, I can only restore whats still there so it had to go. The radio cover/front shock tower stiffener is a bit crabby and wil be replaced at a later date for cosmetic value only. The rims had the usual dinks and where also painted, so into the sheep dip for them ! When stripped the outer rims were re- shaped and polished. The paint was acrlyic and came off with about 3 days soaking and finished with a little tickle from a toothbrush (makes my mouth taste funny when I use it now) The chassy frame was pretty good and again had the usual gravel rash on the underside and on the battery door. This was removed with my by now well practiced 3 grades of wet & dry and optic rubbing compounds. This gives it that fresh from the mould look and condition. Then I soaked it in a PTFE silicon liquid, I'am no expert on the chemistry here but it definatley rejuvinates and refreshes the plastics, brittleness caused by the age is reduced and it puts that new look shine back on as I think a constituant of the plastic that makes is mallable (flexable) sorry for poor spelling! is leached out with age or uv exposure or something, I am sure someone in TC will know the exact science or be in the plastcs job and be able to explain it better. I can only think that something in the chemical I use replemishes or helps with this. On the other hand I find that certain groups of lubes eg WD40 has the opposite effect attacking the plastics and accelerating the effect. Once removed from the silicon fluid I thouroughly rub the oil in then re-wash the parts in a weak detergent solution to remove any residue. I find this makes the parts last longer if you are running them, as older parts just become too brittle to take the beating. I repeated this task on all the plastics so effectivly you end up with brand new condition plastics, mmm loverly. All the alloy press parts have been polished to a mirror with autosol and similar rubbing compounds to give them the blingy factor, an effect that does not last but looks good when it first goes back together. All the steel metal work is rubbed with a brass wire brush to remove corrosion, I used a brass one so as not to remove any further the anti corrosion treatment from the screws ( the gold effect on the screws and the black coating on the swingpins etc). I then apply a thin coat of dry lube to all the screws so they look really new. The tyres had started to harden so they were boiled to soften them and scrubbed clean. All in all it was coming together nicley. I like to replaced any screws with badly chewed heads
as I think they look bad and become difficult to remove at a later stage but on this they were only a few to change. I was lucky also with the springs as once rust breaks through the chrome they never clean up the same but these had not succumb to the dreaded red rot and looked like new when cleaned. I reassemble the chassy when all the bits were done and you can see the results in the pics. I opted for a tamiya ESC as I like to keep it all tamiya if possible so a tb101bk boggo job was fitted, as due to the weak gearsets I only fitted a blackcan sport tuned motor. Also they have quite neat wiring making my life a little easier. It came with a kimbourgh heavy duty servo saver so of course that went straight back in. It ran great around the front room on the initial test and just as well on the 'just a quick blast on the back lawn test' I also completly ballraced it as I find it hard to put those yacky nylon things back in. The shell restoration was a seperate job in itself so I will link this entry to it as I think I spent more hours on the shell than the chassy. I hope you enjoy my longer waffles as I will try to say more about my future entries into my showroom and I have a better camera now so no more misty out of focus phone camera shots from me :) Thanks to neil for the fleabay pics, Tris and artie for parts to finish. Please see the link at the bottom for the shell resto. (when I list it of course) ;)
Want to see it run! see related Item at the bottom :)