RC10Talk - The Net's Largest Vintage R/C Community

Original RS-4, picked up for about 35 bucks, in great condition, came with dual ball diffs, full ball bearings, alloy shocks, universals, etc., with some vintage and modern options added:

- HPI 15T one-way pulley
- Speed Max alloy front lower hinge pin mount and upper arm mount
- GPM front alloy gearbox
- GPM rear alloy uprights
- Factory Works ball bearing steering set
- and a hyper-rare MR Planning dual belt conversion set for the original RS-4 (which is why this original RS-4 has two belts instead of one + a sealed gearbox)

What was less fun was rebuilding the shocks, which have a horrible lower cartridge design that is prone to leaking. And although HPI still uses the same size diff puilleys on their modern cars, the outer diameter is just a bit larger, requiring some sanding to fit in the old car.

To do: electronics.

Nice find. I still have a set of those shocks from exactly the same car and another one also as centershock at my RS10G pancar but none of them did leak until now.

I have two hpi rally cars sitting in storage. One of these days I should do something with them.

I have 2 rs-4 as well, in a ae box on a self . Some day I will do something with them.
steve

didn't the original rs4 have a rear gearbox?

Rootdown4594 wrote:didn't the original rs4 have a rear gearbox?

As I wrote in the opening post, this one has a special 2-belt conversion set for the original RS-4. This belt conversion set won't work with the later versions of the car because it uses user-modified parts of the original gearbox which are not included with the later cars: the original rear hinge pin mount, the original upper arm mount with a piece cut out, and the original rear shock tower mount with lots of plastic shaved off.
These parts are either missing or different on all other versions of the RS-4. I still have the parts for the rear gearbox.

I got this fancy conversion set NIP in a lot of parts and and figured that to use it, it would be better to pick up the correct car model, instead of a newer one and try to source the (impossible to find) parts required for making the later version like the original version. In the case of the original RS-4, it is nearly impossible to find the original rear gearbox parts and (especially) the front suspension parts.
The front suspension is also unique to the original RS-4: the uprights hinge on balls and it is possible to adjust both caster and camber. The later cars use C-hubs and different arms, and only camber is adjustable.