Kids Tamiya RC

[Orange Cola]

I was always very wary of that, lots of people broke their nylon parts and they’d always have a flood of people chiming in with it being time to ‘upgrade’ to aluminium or criticise for not running aluminium parts in the first place

[simon_g]

Just to update - still having fun with the Holiday Buggy, it's still on the 380 motor till I get a bit better (and my brain copes with reversed steering when coming towards me) but I have a 540 waiting to go - thanks drcarlos!

For the kids though, I started off with about the cheapest thing going - a 9115M like this. Would not recommend - it's tiny (although the little remote is good for little hands) but way too much power for the hard plastic tyres. Can't even go in a straight line on any surface, no throttle control so it pretty much just does donuts all the time.

A couple of days ago the latest try arrived - a WPL C24 (like this. I'm amazed at how good it is for the money, a smart looking Hilux-ish 4wd crawler, came with a bagful of little plastic details to stick on (wipers, mirrors and the like) plus the removable hardtop. It's slow enough and strong enough (metal ladder chassis underneath) they can drive it into anything and it's fine. Non-proportional steering (not a big issue on something so slow) but good speed control, even has cute LED headlights. Neat little USB charger but it runs for ages on the standard battery. Was just over £20 delivered on some flash sale but well worth the money even at normal £30-40. Kids love it, I really want another - I might get the kit version instead so I can use better electronics and doubtless spend as much again on upgrades.

Good review of it here: https://www.rcuniverse.com/articles/rev ... arr-truck/

[drcarlos]

Glad to hear the motor arrived safely, you never know when you send hermes LOL!

Spoke to a lad at the weekend who does 'scalers', he has some very detailed 4x4's that aren't fast and basically crawl along over rough terrain like a full size one. They just basically take long walks in the hills and woods as a family with him running the truck at a walking pace trying to drive the obstacles. He was saying it's lipo power and brushless that opened this area up as BITD a stick pack may do 20/30mins and he'd have a very heavy back pack full of them. With lipo he goes all day on 2 packs easily.

[Orange Cola]

Glad to hear the motor arrived safely, you never know when you send hermes LOL!

Spoke to a lad at the weekend who does 'scalers', he has some very detailed 4x4's that aren't fast and basically crawl along over rough terrain like a full size one. They just basically take long walks in the hills and woods as a family with him running the truck at a walking pace trying to drive the obstacles. He was saying it's lipo power and brushless that opened this area up as BITD a stick pack may do 20/30mins and he'd have a very heavy back pack full of them. With lipo he goes all day on 2 packs easily.

LiPo and high turn brushed motors give the range, not brushless. I have a small collection of scalers

[V8Granite]

I’ve got an F350 hi-lift, 2.2 tyres, a locked rear diff, some leafs removed and the body chipped to give clearance. It pulls a small trailer aswell.

Then a small HBX 2098 crawler, I’ve fitted Scrambler tyres and a larger body and that’s the main crawler. Nice and small so we make tracks indoors. Bark, books, kids toys etc all make a fun track.

I’d like an Axial scx24 but am spending far too much on toys lately!!!

I’ve a few more but don’t use them all.

Dave!

[Orange Cola]

[mention]V8Granite[/mention]

Dave, you can get SCX10 mk1 or mk II’s used for good money and they hold their value. Might be worth looking at one of those rather than splashing out for a new one.

[V8Granite]

I have a couple of WPL 6x6trucks. One ural that the kids play with along with a trailer and a Deuce and a Half which I’ve put metal gears, prop and gearbox in but yet to pop the electrics in, really must get to that.

I think we have about 10 now. Banggood has a lot to answer for as you no doubt well know yourself !!

Dave!

[JonMad]

A couple of days ago the latest try arrived - a WPL C24 (like this. I'm amazed at how good it is for the money, a smart looking Hilux-ish 4wd crawler, came with a bagful of little plastic details to stick on (wipers, mirrors and the like) plus the removable hardtop. It's slow enough and strong enough (metal ladder chassis underneath) they can drive it into anything and it's fine. Non-proportional steering (not a big issue on something so slow) but good speed control, even has cute LED headlights. Neat little USB charger but it runs for ages on the standard battery. Was just over £20 delivered on some flash sale but well worth the money even at normal £30-40. Kids love it, I really want another - I might get the kit version instead so I can use better electronics and doubtless spend as much again on upgrades.

Good review of it here: https://www.rcuniverse.com/articles/rev ... arr-truck/

Thanks. Ordered one of those for, ah, the kids to walk around with.

[JonMad]

Arrived quicker than expected. Looks good.


Thank you mute button on web conference calls so I can attach all the bits during the day.

[JonMad]

Exceeded my expectations

[Rich B]

What model?

Just seen post before it!

[simon_g]

Nice. Doing better with the stickers than mine - I let the kids do it and didn’t realise how sticky they are. Son has managed to get they tyres off the wheels and break a suspension mount so far.

[Carlos]

They were Super Fighters not Rising Fighters that I built with my daughter a few years ago.



As she hasn't been out with her mates lately we've been having a run in these and finally finished the decals as they were a bit fiddly when she was 10

They go quite well with the 540 motor but the dampers are poor so as an upgrade I bought my wife a pair of Neo Scorchers for Mother's Day

[John]

I'll add to this thread as it's got crawler content rather than start a new one.

A couple of friends have 1/10th scale crawlers and they are bending my ear about joining them, not that I need much convincing as they look fun in a slow way . I don't want to go silly with the budget and they are only running versions of the FTX which are less than £200. One is an Outback Fury and the other some sort of Defender. After doing a bit of research I've come up with the Carisma Coyote 2.1 which looks pretty good for the money at £209.


https://www.modelsport.co.uk/product/13 ... OhEALw_wcB

This reviewer seems to like it on the whole https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MV0IvWk ... gHobbiesRC

Any others I've missed? The Traxxas TRX-4 is too much!

[simon_g]

Revisiting this as I bought an FTX Tracer for the boy now he's 6. Can be had for sub-£70, 1/16 in truggy or pickup/monster truck style. Super impressed with it, has a speed dial on the transmitter so you can keep it sensible while they're getting used to it but pretty quick on full. Wheels are big enough to run on mown grass. Seems very robust, everything seems strong but it's really light - plenty of videos of these being abused on big jumps and skateparks without issue. Spares available if anything did break.

They do a brushless one for a little over £100 that's even quicker.

100% recommended for what I originally asked for!

[Carlos]

I built a pair of Rising Fighters with my kids about 5 years ago after a thread in the EVO forum and my daughter now 14 still talks about it and really sparked an interest in engineering

Useful advice if any of the kids are hoping for a STEM Apprenticeship. My daughter got offered 2 engineering apprenticeships at 16 in 2021 and used the above and then the 4wd Neo Fighter as a showcase and point of discussion during the interviews.

My son is finishing school next month and decided he'd like to do something similar so he applied for a couple and we built a Racing Fighter over the last 6 weeks for the same reason.

He's just been offered a place, paid to go to college for the first year. I'm as thrilled as he is

Feedback was complimentary on his ability to demonstrate practical knowledge of things like bearings, valves, lubrication etc which may seem simple but probably a reflection of younger peoples lack of practical skills like fixing bikes, spannering with dad and so on.

[Marv]

That's great Carlos