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

Starting with a never run GT that had some nitro gear in it, which I sold so that I got the truck for better than free.

2 hours later after some planning and gear range guessing:

a little more than an hour later:

and gave it the big ol weight like an rx pack:

on track, it drives beautifully, even on unprepped, rain damaged track it has good traction, turning, jumping. my initial gearing of 20/87 is too conservative, which is great b/c I have plenty of room for bigger pinions

Better brace that chassis. The nitro engine mounts perform that function, but with the e-conversion, you have nothing to reinforce across the cut-out on where the motor sits.

Honestly, you should have sold that never run black tub on eBay and bought a blue flat chassis. You probably would have come out with your electronics paid for, someone would have got a nice GT to build a shelfer, and you'd have a tougher chassis. Too late now, though; a few scratches, and that black tub roller goes from being a $150-$200 roller to a $65 used truck.

the chassis is braced with the motor mount (a 10L motor mount) as well as the turnbuckles.
I enjoy running actual vintage vehicles.
They were built for scratching not shelving and counting its worth.

[youtube]NPFiGzM9uBY[/youtube]

Sixtysixdeuce wrote: Honestly, you should have sold that never run black tub on eBay and bought a blue flat chassis. You probably would have come out with your electronics paid for, someone would have got a nice GT to build a shelfer, and you'd have a tougher chassis. Too late now, though; a few scratches, and that black tub roller goes from being a $150-$200 roller to a $65 used truck.

+1 to this, people pay a nice price for a never run black tub.

Good thing I got the truck for free then

the chassis is braced with the motor mount (a 10L motor mount) as well as the turnbuckles.

Ah. Couldn't tell what kid of mount you had, and I didn't notice the turnbuckles.

They were built for scratching not shelving and counting its worth.

I agree, which is why I have only one shelf queen (a black tub GT, incidentally). Point is, these have been out of production for 15 years, and while you might not care about it being pristine, someone else would, and would have paid a respectable sum for that. Meanwhile, you can buy straight blue chassis rollers all day long for $50 or $60. You could have likely sold that truck, scored a blue tub with some decent aftermarket parts and still pocketed $100, maybe more.

I spent about $600 putting my shelfer GT together with a lot of NOS parts and other like-new parts from more than one kit. Granted, I wanted a white parts truck, but not everyone does. There just aren't that many never run GTs out there anymore, and the market reflects the relative scarcity.

I too cringed a bit seing this being run. I'm all for running cars and the GT-E conversion is cool but running a new example.... Looks like it runs well though.

I spent a bit restoring mine to new but finding a true unrun car is nearly impossible .... This photo is older as it now has a new pipe and header.

the economic case for not running it doesn't work either, I was prepared to pay 100-200 for a clean, fresh truck, I got super lucky getting a shelfer with a thin, light chassis for basically free. I am getting super enjoyment happy times with this truck, so it is worth it.

Regardless if you get $100-$200 enjoyment out of it that makes it worth it. What turn motor are you running?

You don't need to justify what you've done, it's your kit. I just think you were expecting a bunch of applause for this, but a bulletin board full of vintage RC enthusiasts is the wrong place to look if you want kudos for bastardizing a nice, clean, original & never run truck that many of our members would have loved to acquire, clean up and preserve in new condition. There's plenty of hacking up vintage kits done here, but not with a never run example of a sought-after vehicle. Nobody that knows what that truck is will likely appreciate what you've done. It's like going on a gun forum and gloating about sporterizing an immaculate original M1903 Springfield, or really any other example of ruining the collector value of something in excellent condition by doing what could have been done cheaper and more effectively to a well used or already altered version of the same.

awwww

You're right, I don't fit in with the shelfer crowd, I don't fit with the buy-a-ton-of-shiny-expensive-parts-that-may-or-may-not-work-well-together-and-make-everyone-drool crowd, I'm not popular at the track, the list of my faults is long and distinguished.



I got to put in a 21 tooth pinion today and the truck had more torque and more speed, a sure sign of being way high on the ratio.
GTs make wonderful electric trucks!