Xmas approaching and the boy wants a proper rc car.

Having done some research its looking like a traxxas bandit xl5 is about the best value for money,but is there something else I should be considering for the same or less cash?

Requirements

-Must be rtr,dont want to be building it
-Must be able to drive on grass,gravel,carpet etc ie all surfaces.
-Would be good if it had some sort of beginner mode where the speed is limited.
-should be tough,it will get crashed hard.

Edited to add: must also be fast for me to play with.

Any suggestions?

Requirements

-Must be rtr,dont want to be building it
-Must be able to drive on grass,gravel,carpet etc ie all surfaces.
-Would be good if it had some sort of beginner mode where the speed is limited.
-should be tough,it will get crashed hard.

You’ve got no chance. This is STW. There’ll be a flood of people along in a minute to tell that you don’t really want what you think you want.
You really want something different and MOAR betterer. Like what they’ve got..

Which is of course… a Tamiya Lunch Box.

<Cue lengthy nostalgic Tamiya thread……>

Big thread here: http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/which-cheap-tamiya

Why RTR? Personally I think building is half the fun, plus knowing how it’s put together will help you when it inevitably breaks.

Anyway, I’ve ordered a Neo Fighter bundle, it’s one of the latest models so should be fairly future proof. And fast 🙂

Don’t think it’s got a “beginner mode”, certainly I’ve never heard of any rc cars having them. But they’re not that hard to drive, as long as you have a big enough space.

You’ve got no chance. This is STW. There’ll be a flood of people along in a minute to tell that you don’t really want what you think you want.

😀

I agree with most of the list, just not the RTR bit. But RTR models are available, including a Lunch Box.

Don’t think it’s got a “beginner mode”, certainly I’ve never heard of any rc cars having them. But they’re not that hard to drive, as long as you have a big enough space.

The traxxas bandit does, the speed control can be set to limit speed to 50%. Its not a big deal, but hopefully would make life easier , and less likely to break something when he just nails the throttle first time out and smashes it into a wall.

Why RTR? Personally I think building is half the fun, plus knowing how it’s put together will help you when it inevitably breaks.

not for us , hence the RTR requirement. Kits are a definite no.

What if you don’t have a big enough space? I’ve modded the controller on the one we have, with a switch and some resistors which effectively decreases the sensitivity of the throttle, but that wouldn’t be a job for most people. Makes it a lot less likely for it to go out of control and end up ramming somebody or something when kids play with it on the space outside the front of our house, which isn’t tiny, but not huge for a high speed RC car. Gets turned off if we go to the field where there’s more space. Seems a good idea to me.

We have one of these:
http://www.sussex-model-centre.co.uk/shopexd.asp?id=40807 – a lot cheaper, but not as capable as what you’re looking at, and I’m sure people will say it’s just a toy with brushed motor etc., but it does give you the full control and decent speed of a proper car (as mentioned above, it can still be too fast). No beginner mode out of the box either, but I can give instructions for anybody interested (similar mods will work with other cars)!

We have one of these:
http://www.sussex-model-centre.co.uk/shopexd.asp?id=40807 – a lot cheaper, but not as capable as what you’re looking at, and I’m sure people will say it’s just a toy with brushed motor etc., but it does give you the full control and decent speed of a proper car (as mentioned above, it can still be too fast). No beginner mode out of the box either, but I can give instructions for anybody interested (similar mods will work with other cars)!

Now I’ve looked at a few of those 1/18 scale cars (not that model specifically, but just 1/18 scale in general), but the various reviews I’ve read tend to mention that they dont go well on grass or other rough’ish surfaces, so if you want to drive it on any surface you need to go 1/10 scale.

How well does yours work on grass/in the garden?

id be looking at a Maverick scout or aVaterra Slickrock rock crawler. They go slow so can’t hit stuff too hard. They’re ideal inside because they go slow and so can’t hit stuff too hard. They’re designed to crawl over all sorts of stuff ( like rocks) so are loads of fun. They can also be upgraded and repaired easily.

not for us , hence the RTR requirement. Kits are a definite no.

Fair enough, it’s your money 🙂

aracer: What if you don’t have a big enough space?

Surely if you’re going to spend upwards of 100gbp on an RC car it would be worth taking it to a bigger space for the first few runs? Still, I do like the sound of the modding you’ve done, although I’m guessing that would seriously mess with the guarantee, right?

Fine on typical garden grass, also works fine down the park on the grass there. Clearly not as good as something bigger in really long grass and it does get a bit bogged down sometimes, but it can be driven there.

Well we spent less than that ;), but wanted something which would be fun for kids to play with in the space we have without having to make a trip out. There seems to be a bit of a gap between rubbish toys and things that are a bit fast for kids in typical spaces.

I suspect if I needed to I could probably remove most or all of the evidence – it’s just a question of how neat the soldering would be afterwards. The controller unscrews without any damage – switch located in battery compartment.

not for us , hence the RTR requirement. Kits are a definite no.

So how are you going to know which bits to change when you want to make it go faster?

And you will. Or you have no soul.

We’ve a helion anumus 1/18th scale (from SMC too!) (as well as MY 1/8th nitro Revo 3.3….vrooooom).
Great little care for £60!
Son (5) loves it!

DrP

So how are you going to know which bits to change when you want to make it go faster?

Because i built cars as a teenager ,so know pretty well how they go together ,plus its not exactly rocket science is it.

Looks like the traxxas is the one to go for at the budget rtr end of things.

sorry that previous reply of mine came across a bit shirty, didnt mean it to.

will keep digging but the traxxas is winning so far

-Must be able to drive on grass,gravel,carpet etc ie all surfaces.

+

Edited to add: must also be fast for me to play with.

Bit tricky IMO to find something slow enough to drive easily inside the home and then cut loose at speed on a bit of open land.

As somebody says above, a rock crawler would be fine for the slower and more articulated stuff, eg going over rocks/logs/obstacles. But speed isn’t their thing. Axials have a couple you might like but you’re talking £400+.

Maverick Scout is slow, end of. But very capable, especially when modded, to crawl. Vaterra Slickrock, not sure about. Vaterra Twin Hammers has 2 speeds IIRC, but it has its fair share of technical issues.

I started my 4yr old with a £50 Maisto Extreme for crawling, then upgraded to a modded second-hand Traxxas Summit VXL with training mode (50% throttle mode). Former is excellent for mucking about with and surprisingly capable. Latter is awesome, but needs space to make use of its speed.

traxxas are pretty tough. check out their 2wd monster truck range; they look great fun. Helion, MAverick et al are all good, and probably a little cheaper than traxxas.

Not rocket science lol, so you’d think. Things have come a long way in the last ten years with brushless motors and esc’s. Just because you put a bigger or better motor un doesn’t mean for 1 minute your transmission will take it. Most of the traxxas stuff is brushless ready. I’ve had 6. As for nitro, does anyone buy that rubbish anymore ?

how about one of these? la trax is Traxxas’ ‘budget’ brand. (as maverick is to HPi)
la trax teton

^^^^ seriously. Don’t ! For starters it’s too small to run on anything other than a man acute golf course.

changed my mind. Didn’t realise is was 1/18, I’d stick with 1/10, ideally.

this, instead.
HPi at better prices. Good and bashable, not too quick or pricey.

Any transmitter which supports will EPA (End Point Adjustment) will allow you to limit the maximum speed. I went through a lot of broken cars before I bought Maverick cars, which allow the speed to limited to any value you like.

Without the speed limiter, we would take a car out..it would get smashed up…order the parts to fix it…wait for them to arrive, fix it…repeat.

We now have two Maverick’s (Strada XT and a XB I think, non brushless, but running on lipo’s) and by limiting the speed, we have finally been able to repeatedly take them out to race without smashing them up.

Two cars racing is a million times more fun than one car on it’s own. Buy a few plastic cones to race round and you can have hours of fun. Honestly, me and my 9 year old have probably never laughed so much as racing cars together.

I’d highly recommend the Mavericks….they are pretty cheap, spares are easy to get. Even the brushed ones go fast as you like off road…the brushless ones must be mental 🙂

What are they like on the beach ? Depending on tides we get a good amount of space on the beach, but am aware that a)’sand is abrasive b ) the sea is wet …

I’d always recommend the Traxxas Slash. The extra coverage of the body means less protruding wheels etc and that really limits damage. I’ve hit curbs at full tilt with mine and it’ll just bounce. Traxxas are made of a slightly more rubbery plastic than most so they can just take more stick before snapping bits, and if you do there are a million spares. The slower setting is also handy as you say. My son drives mine and it’s prefect then.

As the other thread was mine and I never updated it I thought I’d chime in. Also bought a neo fighter. Got the car with carson wheel controller fingy from Germany for £90. With a decent charger, 2x 3300mAh batteries,bearing upgrade set and paint it all came in at £150. Then my boy announced what he really wants for Christmas is a playmobil train set….humpf. Still, might build the car for myself. Got a blinging paint job planned!

Grasshopper?

So in the end I ordered the traxxas bandit xl5 , it came to £139 for the entire ready to run kit including a 4 amp fast charger, and 3000 mah battery.

Just read the manual for it online, looks good fun, lots of tinkering opportunity for me, so looking forward to having a play with it once julian jnr has got bored of it.

The slipper clutch is a new one on me, but the rest of the adjustments I’m familiar with.

re. the beach query above, I have a beach at the end of my street and thought it would be ideal. Great fun, but the sand gets everywhere and every iron-containing part corrodes instantly. If you want to do serious beach running you need an air compressor or something and thoroughly clean after every session. and put all the electronics in sealed bags.

Also, every dog in 200 miles will chase the car.

Reading this thread has now made me start looking at RC cars again.
I’ve never had one and always thought i had missed out.
So…i have discovered these mardave v12 models.
They look great .. things like mk1 escorts, morris minors and granada estates..really really want!

Are they any good?

Only any good on carpet. They also take a bit of setting up or can be all over the place. If you want one, find a local club that races them and go along. In my experience they are rubbish for anything other then racing.

Bandit us a great little car. Slipper clutch ? If the wheels don’t turn when you throttle on and it sounds like it’s whinning tighten up in quarter increments. It there as a safety feature in case you get something bound up. Biggest advice on battery rc KEEP AWAY FROM SALT WATER ! Bandit will be fine in fresh water though .

Anything from Helion, however, I’ve just bought this…

http://www.modelsport.co.uk/carisma-gt16mt-monster-truck-4wd-rtr/rc-car-products/379829

And it is astounding! Jumped it out of a half pipe skate ramp and it cleared the back fence railings of the ramp and landed on concrete… I was expecting a broken mess of plastic but it was even on its wheels ready to go, not even a scratch

So the traxxas arrived yesterday, and to get it ready for xmas morning I had to charge the batteries and just give it a quick test run indoors. Blimey these new cars are fast, it will pull a wheely from a standing start. I also like the brake function that the ESC’s enable.

The beginner mode is still pretty quick ,probably the same sort of speed as the car I used to have when younger.

It seems well built and everything was set up straight from the box, so no need to go messing with toe angles etc. Its now all wrapped up ready for xmas.

Overall I’m pretty pleased with it, hopefully julian jnr will also be pleased with it on xmas morning.

I think you made a good decision.

My youngest has an older bandit and it is an awesome little buggy. Covers a lot of different ground and is 100x better than the lunchbox we also built around the same time.

The lunchbox is hilarious to use with its archaic design wobbling all over the place but as a car to use and jump, generally wizz about its frustrating.

I’ve got a Revo 3.3 that I converted to brushless and it is so fast and capable it’s scarey. Trouble is it has only been used once as I don’t have the desire anymore 🙁

The slipper clutch is basically a mechanical traction control and we used it when racing to stop wheelies. You would do a few practice starts in morning practice or one before the race if you have just changed the motor/gearing and nip up or back off the nut a bit.

You also had more complicated fluid filled slippers which were good for use on clay tracks (rare in the UK) but not really needed and a lot of excess weight (drivetrain inertia) for the tight corner grass tracks we have here.

My youngest has an older bandit and it is an awesome little buggy. Covers a lot of different ground and is 100x better than the lunchbox we also built around the same time.

even back in the day I thought the lunchbox and its ilk were generally crap compared to the buggys, even as a 12 year old I didnt/couldnt understand why they were so popular, they appeared practically undrivable if you actually wanted to go fast round corners,over jumps etc.

The slipper clutch is basically a mechanical traction control and we used it when racing to stop wheelies.

yep , last nights wheelies on the carpet may indicate that the ‘factory’ setting is maybe a bit tight, but will just leave it as is for now until we try it on the more typical surfaces it will be used on (ie grass/dirt/tarmac/concrete)

100x better than the lunchbox we also built around the same time.

I had a couple of Schumacher buggies (Club 10 then Cougar 2000) and absolutely agree that they knock spots off a lunchbox type chassis.

I loved the engineering of something like the Cougar 2000 when it came out – what’s the equivalent type thing these days?

Buy a kit. Send it to me, I’ll build it. Everyone’s a winner.

Thread bookmarked.

No, just spotted that Costco are now doing the full kits
Lunchbox