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

I don't recall this being discussed on here, I certainly never saw the topic broached...

When it comes to drums, the general rule is "NEVER let someone else play your drums!" because you just KNOW the guy is gonna beat the crap out of your instruments with complete disregard for somebody else's hard-earned possessions and correct drum-playing technique. But what's the case when it comes to RC cars?

I'm guessing the majority of us are far from elite-class RC drivers; those who are, are making a name racing their cars, not writing on forums.

I would be intrigued to let a person with real racing skills test-drive one of my builds around the track to see how well they perform...because my driving skills would hardly be up-to-the-task. You could give me the top-of-the-line, modded-to-the-nuts cutting edge race car and I'd probably crash it so often, it would make Windows Millenium look good. But under the control of a good driver, who knows?

How many of you guys would trust a known 'good' racer to test-drive your custom RC builds to evaluate & tweak performance?

There are some people I would hand any remote I have and trust them... whether it be airplanes, helis, cars or boats. BUT I can only think of one or two people who qualify in every single category though.
I've seen the most experienced heli pilots not be able to fly a Cub without dorking it... and most land-based drivers have issues when you go beyond two axes of control. At least the ones I know... most of it boils down to exposure.
I would not trust most people with my toys, especially after all the effort, money & time that goes into each one.

That said, there are certain local racers (and people on this forum) that I would love to see wring out my buggy to see what it can do in the right hands. When I raced in the 80s I would read the magazines and daydream about what Halsey or Masami would tell me to change on my setups.

i would hand my m11 transmitter over to my 6 year old son and let him wheel any of our cars. but letting others beyond the people who live in my house is something i don't think i could bring myself to do. now the day my son says "hey dad watch this!" he will loose my faith.

I let my 5 and 7 year old girls drive my cars. To me, they're meant to be enjoyed. And if they break something, I can hide away in the garage and work on the cars...buy stuff on ebay ("I needed this part to fix it.") and upgrade stuff.

My opinion remains the same as below. I laugh my ass off and enjoy it every time someone new drives one of my cars. I hate it at the track though... They always prove that my car is capable of turning much faster laps than what I'm turning.

http://www.rc10talk.com/viewtopic.php?f=39&t=12622&hilit

EDIT: I love when they're driving my car and I hear:
"Man, this thing is hooked!"
or
"Man, you'll make the A for sure with this thing!"

I'm like- "Ugh, yeah... see you in the A... hehe..."

"I'ma switch bodies and tell him I'm running a different car. That other one caught on fire."

Many of us are able to afford or fabricate all the various hop-ups & modern electronics to make these vintage cars run better than they ever did, bitd. I wonder how well some of these builds would perform if you could eliminate driver variability and have a pro test-run them?

i have let many people run my cars. a few examples, let a little kid and his sister run my blue eagle ls in the field next to the track afew months back because the dad and kids were looking to get in to the hobby, when i still had my megatech propulse b100 (rc18 clone) i would let people run it all the time. let a few of the younger members of the rc club run and race my cars too. my 100% homebrew cars not so much but the rest sure! let a 14 year old kid run my truggy and rc10gt all the time and hes about as bad a driver as i am. thats not to say im quick to hand over the radio of whatever car ive got with me but ya know im not one of those guys who hides his cars under a towel in the pits either.

only have 1-2 exceptionally good drivers at the track so ive never had the opportunity to hand a pro guy the radio

the only issue most of the time is that i steer backwards (left is right and vice versa) so i have to fiddle with the radio a bit when i lend it out but thats what, 30 seconds?

as much as i value the cars i own (and i really do) they are just toys when you get down to it and so what if they break an a-arm or something like that. i dont have any really super rare cars and the ones i wouldnt let anyone run i dont run either!


__________

now the one time i was kinda burned was when my little brothers friend was driving my rustler xl1 and shot it under a moving car and it got creamed (after i told him to park it in the grass when i saw the car coming down the street). wasnt happy about that in the least and his mom had the gall to come out and yelled at me afterwards.

Brandon G helped me sort out my car at the Vonats and I asked him to take it for a while to see how it drove. (as I cant drive at all ) it was a thing of beauty to see my car carving up the track like that. He can Drive!! me not so much but it gave me a feeling of real pride to see it run like that

That's a tough one. I have propably driven hundreds of peoples cars over the last 20+ years. I do not however let very many people drive my cars. When I do, it is usually to bounce ideas, and watch my cars to be able to see things that maybe I don't when I am racing (perspective differences). This is a slippery slope however, because you may want to have someone fast, with a similar driving style, or someone fast with very neutral setups on their own cars drive yours. I have known many world level drivers over the years, and some of them have very unique setups, and driving styles (Matt Francis comes to mind ). Incredibly fast, but unique driving style and setups mean they can be hard to get information about setup that transfers to you and your cars. Not to say they are tight lipped about setup (some are a-holes though), but how adjustments effect their cars is different than yours because of driving style differences. Matt was always extremelly helpful, and never balked when asked to drive my cars or offer setup advice.

That all being said, most world level drivers have a great knowledge base and would be able to give allot of good feedback -if they are willing. Just be carefull who you would want to drive you cars. -Jeff

most my builds i dont even let myself drive

I'll hand my car down to anyone I trust to be carefull.
Luckily she doesn't want to or I'd have to refuse my wife the radio. The only time she did drive one of my RC cars she bluntly illustrated not falling into the category

I think it would depend.

I was reading an older issue of some RC mag, the article discussed a race back east or mid west. There was a challenge given to a local hotshoe that he couldn't be fast in an older RC car with current electronics etc. he was loaned an AE Team car, with a few mods, and i think the driver still managed a 2nd place finish despite the age of the car.


There are several builds on here of "hybrids" mixing the old with the new. I personally want to build a vintage racer that could run with the current cars. Sadly, my workbench is quite full of projects and afore-mentioned has fallen way down on the list.


I've let a few people drive my vintage stuff, but typically they are competent drivers already. I'd never hand it off to an inexperienced driver. My kids included!



MOmo

I had a friend visit me and I just happened to have a T2 running, it had Fibrelyte (spelling?) front and rear shock towers. Well, we were driving it around and he flipped it on its lid a couple times. Only I didn't have the lid on. When I got in the garage I took a good look at the rear tower... chills went down my spine when I saw the damage done from only flipping 2x. Arg... I still regret that "bash" session to this day haha. I think the following couple weeks from that incident I went on a binge of buying t2 carbon fiber towers, never picked up another fibrelyte set though.

I have built a buggy from beat up spare parts and let everyone thrash on it. That was fun. It had a pink Reedy motor.

It depends on who the driver is and what car. If it's a competent racer, i'll happily let them have a go of one of my modern buggys. If it's a really nice recently rebuilt buggy i've been working on no-one gets a shot Although i sometimes take pre restoration cars down to my local club for a thrash before they get rebuilt and i'm happy for most to have a shot.

I remeber taking an RC10L down to my local indoor carpet club where we run mostly 1/12 scale and i had a queue of people on the rostrum waiting for a go

Paul.

i put A LOT of work into each car. it would be like lending my home to snookie and the situation. i did let someone drive one of my race rigs once. but that was because i trusted him. i was still on egg shells the whole time.

i have had a few people ask me if i could drive their rigs. sometimes i do, sometimes i don't.