Found my dad's old Ultima

[jeepme79]

While scouring Craigslist looking for an RC for my boys, I stumbled upon my dads old Ultima from the mid 80's. After tracking it down and bringing it home last week, I decided it's time to bring it back to life. Back then my dad let my 10yo self stay up till 2am to help him build it.

The body is shot (original custom paint my dad did), roll cage is super glued in the very back where the pin goes, gold shocks are in rough shape but I may try to save them, tires are shot, front wheels missing, front bulkhead broke, antennae wire dry-rotted and bundled up inside the body, steering linkage is very loose. I plugged a battery in and the tx was unresponsive but the motor was turning on it's own and the steering servo was bouncing off full-lock in one direction.

I want to get this back on the road to drive but not bash. Question is do I got with a factory original or modern modified version? Do I try to revive the original Futaba electronics or go with modern equipment?

Any suggestions for parts or ideas would be greatly appreciated.

[LosiXXkid]

If that were me, I would be inclined to leave it as is. I'd probably just dust it off and maybe clean it up a bit and then put it on the shelf. After all, it has survived all this time and this is how it is now.

The alternative would be to download the manual or obtain a scanned copy and then tear it down, clean all the parts and then aim to restore it back to former glory with new or used parts with with either vintage or modern electrics.

[DennisM]

Clean it up, paint a repro body and shelf it.

Putting it back to "stock" is not going to be cheap.

[yellowdatsun]

Depends on what you plan to do with it.

If it was mine, and it used to be my dads old car, and I helped him build it when I was 10.........heck yeah I'd restore it to those specs, and recreate your dads paint scheme. Them keep it as a decoration on your shelf.

There's tons of RC cars our there that you can buy and drive cheap, but there's only one that your dad built.

[R Cane]

Depends on what you plan to do with it.

If it was mine, and it used to be my dads old car, and I helped him build it when I was 10.........heck yeah I'd restore it to those specs, and recreate your dads paint scheme. Them keep it as a decoration on your shelf.

There's tons of RC cars our there that you can buy and drive cheap, but there's only one that your dad built.

X2

[jeepme79]

I already have a VXL Slash 4x4, an E-Revo, and my boys each have a basic Slash on the way in the next week, so we have plenty to drive around. Still would be nice to get this one out and drive it once in a while without beating on it.

[jeepme79]

I decided to do a light restore on the car and drive it (not like I drive my slash or e-revo). Here's what I think I need so far:

Wheels and tires, possibly different axles if necessary
Body - the old one is in multiple pieces.
Any original decals or close replicas
Tx/rx - I think the originals are possessed.
Antennae mount/post
Shocks/springs - the ones on there are gold (I think the originals were red), but color aside, they are weak, adjusters are broke, and the springs don't have enough lift to hold the car off the ground.

I think that's it for now. I'm sure I'll find more along the way.

[DennisM]

I think Your gold shocks are duratrax - copies of the Kyosho golds - and they´re just as pretty but that´s it.
Instead of 2 o-ring seal at the bottom, they only have 1.

[Coelacanth]

If those are Kyosho Golds, the Gold shocks are far better than the original, pain-to-rebuild and usually leaky red shocks...but it looks like that car is running the short front Kyosho Golds on the rear. You'll want to get a set of long rear Kyosho Golds for the rear, but I think that requires the optional taller Turbo Ultima shock tower. By all means rebuild those Golds, unless they're damaged. Those were some of the best shocks ever made.

Take a close-up pic of the bottoms of the shock bodies, where the pistons exit, and we can confirm if they're Kyosho or Duraleaks.

There's a lot you could do to mod that car, but I'd suggest going with a tear-down and thorough cleaning and rebuild first. Make a topic about your resto and we'll follow along...everybody here loves a good resto project!

[jeepme79]

I'll post some pics shortly. I would agree that it has "fronts" on the rear of the car. All 4 shocks are 50mm compressed and 65mm extended. At some point along the line someone covered the coils with what appears to be a rubber band, so there's dried up goo on them and the springs are rusted.

[jeepme79]

Here are the shocks

[Coelacanth]

Yup, those look like Duratrax shocks. You can see in the top pic there's a little beveled edge machined into the bottom circle of the shock bodies. With Kyosho Golds, there's no beveled edge. The length of Kyosho Gold rear shocks is ~90 mm. The yellow tubes covering the shock springs are boots to keep dirt out. I think they look better without, at least if you have Kyosho Gold shocks installed. The champagne gold color is classy.

[Scooter]

Found my old one too

[R Cane]

Yup, those look like Duratrax shocks. You can see in the top pic there's a little beveled edge machined into the bottom circle of the shock bodies. With Kyosho Golds, there's no beveled edge. The length of Kyosho Gold rear shocks is ~90 mm. The yellow tubes covering the shock springs are boots to keep dirt out. I think they look better without, at least if you have Kyosho Gold shocks installed. The champagne gold color is classy.

This is a nice clear comparison...

image.jpg (37.48 KiB) Viewed 1710 times

image.jpg (37.48 KiB) Viewed 1710 times

[cheropache73]

Thanks for the shock comparison. I always wondered how to tell the difference, lol.