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New member, new to me RC10 Graphite

Posted: Tue Oct 11, 2016 12:46 pm
by Rabidtrout
Hello! Didn't ever do a introduction post in that section as I have always been more of a lurker, so here it goes. This has gotten a lot longer than I anticipated, I will put cliffs at the bottom. There are some bonus pictures of my new project at the end. My name is Mitch and i'm currently living in San Antonio, TX. 37 or so years old (lost count). Not a Texan native, but I got here as fast as I could (or so they say).. Spent 10 years in Canada, 18 years in Vegas and now here. Anyhow. I was always infatuated with RC cars. I remember as I kid I would always look for RC Car Actions going through airports or whatnot and always fantasizing about getting a "real" RC car. My parents would always buy me those Tyco cars and I would break them less than a week later. Man, would they get so pissed. Luckily it was always within the 30 day return period.. So needless to say, we spent a lot of time at Toy's R Us.

When I moved to Vegas (89) my newly found friend had a gold tub RC10. Complete with the mechanical speed control. We would practice me intercepting his when it would that speed control would stick.. Always at full throttle. Well, after I sold the idea of a kit RC car to my parents and them knowing that I could fix it instead of just buying a new one, they were all about it and off to the hobbyshop we went. I walked out with a RC10T. One of the first ones. I was somewhere around 11 or so. I had that thing built like damn near no time.. Two days I think. Quite a feat for a 11 year old with zero help. I was pretty proud of myself. Hopped it up with RPM arms and a few other things. Still kick myself that I traded that thing for a Nitro Hawk when they first came out. Had to go Nitro as it was the buzz. Had the Nitro Hawk for awhile till I traded that for a RC10GT (black tub). Back to the AE roots I went. Eventually traded that for an SKS rifle and about 300 bucks. Good ole college decisions. LOL. The GT wasn't even running at the time. I know I got the better end of that deal, as I still have the rifle.

I got out of the hobby for about 10-15 years after college and all that. You know, life. I am sure that my wife now regrets allowing me to get back into this hobby. It all started with a RC10T3. I bought that thing thinking "well, the T4's are out and probably out of my price range, so I picked up a T3 thinking parts would not be an issue, boy was I wrong. I had to buy another T3 just for parts. After some thinking, I just picked up a T4 roller. Still have it (my RC hoarding gets a little bad because I dont want to regret getting rid of another one). Since I got that first T3, it has spiraled out of control. After getting that T4 and finding out that we had a local track here, started racing. The ST class was not that big (read-nonexistant) so I picked up a brand new B4.2. After that I got a B44.2, then a T5M. After that I picked up a 22 3.0 when it first came out. All of those I still currently race. During that time I also bought a E-Maxx (driven like twice and now it just sits there), SCX10, Yeti, TC4 (for drifting), RC18T, & a Losi Mini-T.

As it turns out, racing every week gets pretty expensive, so I have kind of changed my focus a little bit into the collecting part of it. As a kid, I always kept looking at RCCA and seeing the adverts for the RC10 Graphite. I always thought they were the coolest thing out there and that I had to have one. That picture of the Team Car and Graphite car side by side.. :drool:. Still to this day, I think they are one of the best looking cars out there. I just love them.

So with all of that said, I would like to introduce y'all to my newest addition to the stable. Picked this thing up on the bay and it just got here today. I have been looking at them for quite awhile looking for just the right deal and I stumbled across this thing WITH the box (kind of a big deal to me). There were no bidders for the entire duration of the auction, which had me a little worried, but I was pretty confident in what I saw.

This thing still looks pretty new. It is a 6025, however it has bearings from as far as I can see. Only other "upgrade" was new turnbuckkles. The nose is de-laminating just a little bit and the bottom looks pretty good, so my plan is to maybe do the superglue thing to that to at least stop it from getting worse. The plan for this car is to just putt around the streets a bit then sitting on the shelf. My initial thought was to modernize the thing and have some fun with it, but it looks like some parts are going to be hard to come by (CF shock towers for instance, bellcrank steering, etc). I will probably keep the electronics that are in it, in it, minus the receiver. Assuming they all work. I'm not sure.. Still kind of on the fence.. I was kind of hoping that it would be drilled for the stealth, however, it is not. For now, just a deep clean, re-grease of everything and a new body. Maybe in time Ill pick up the RPM arms and such and throw a mild brushless setup in it. I don't know yet.

Tear down process will start tonight and the order list will be created.

Cliffs:
Got my first car in 90-91 (cant really remember exactly)
Been in and out of the hobby for about 15 years
Started racing
Slowed down in racing
Started collecting
Found a RC10 Graphite with box

Sorry for the long story, but onto the pictures. Thoughts?

s-l1600 (10).jpg

Re: New member, new to me RC10 Graphite

Posted: Tue Oct 11, 2016 12:59 pm
by jwscab
nice example of an early 6 gear graphite. Soon after they went to the stealth and updated the front shock tower as well.

Re: New member, new to me RC10 Graphite

Posted: Tue Oct 11, 2016 4:48 pm
by DomEOD
Good looking car!

Re: New member, new to me RC10 Graphite

Posted: Tue Oct 11, 2016 7:14 pm
by yellowdatsun
That's a lot of words.

Re: New member, new to me RC10 Graphite

Posted: Tue Oct 11, 2016 8:18 pm
by Rabidtrout
jwscab wrote:nice example of an early 6 gear graphite. Soon after they went to the stealth and updated the front shock tower as well.
Yeah, tried to do a little research to see what it was, but figured I wouldn't be able to figure that out until I had it in hands.
DomEOD wrote:Good looking car!
Thank you! I thought so. I am positive she will clean up real nice.
yellowdatsun wrote:That's a lot of words.
Yeah. I agree. That's why I did the cliffs at the bottom. Sorry about that. I guess I was just overly excited about my recent acquisition and I'm and married, so I don't get out much. haha.

Re: New member, new to me RC10 Graphite

Posted: Tue Oct 11, 2016 9:28 pm
by klavy69
Rabidtrout wrote: I'm married, so I don't get out much. haha.
:lol: thats why we have hobbies...mine don't let me outta the basement except to go to work and when she's away I sneak upstairs like the dog does when we all go to bed :mrgreen:

Welcome to the board.

Todd

Re: New member, new to me RC10 Graphite

Posted: Wed Oct 12, 2016 9:41 am
by Rabidtrout
klavy69 wrote:
Rabidtrout wrote: I'm married, so I don't get out much. haha.
:lol: thats why we have hobbies...mine don't let me outta the basement except to go to work and when she's away I sneak upstairs like the dog does when we all go to bed :mrgreen:

Welcome to the board.

Todd
Glad i'm not the only one. :lol:

Thank you! I am sure I will enjoy my time here!

So, I just couldn't help myself. I soldered on a new plug to the ESC and threw a battery in her last night and all of the electronics in there still work. I just took a few short slow laps around the cul-de-sac for about 2 minutes. Too much fun! Can't believe she still works. Afterwards I completely took her apart. Gonna clean all the parts tonight and get them ready for a peroxide bath.

The nose wasn't as bad as I thought.. There is a small chip, but other than that the carbon fiber is in good condition. Just threw some superglue on there to make sure it doesn't get worse.

With these carbon fiber chassis, is the best way to freshen them up with some wet/dry sandpaper and then buff or just buff? The bottom has a few scratches that I would like to take car of.

Re: New member, new to me RC10 Graphite

Posted: Wed Oct 12, 2016 10:20 am
by jwscab
you can, but you have to be careful. I would just lightly buff it and be done with it if its not too chewed up.

find yourself a shorty bumper and install it on the car, this will keep the chipped edge protected.

Re: New member, new to me RC10 Graphite

Posted: Wed Oct 12, 2016 11:20 am
by Rabidtrout
jwscab wrote:you can, but you have to be careful. I would just lightly buff it and be done with it if its not too chewed up.

find yourself a shorty bumper and install it on the car, this will keep the chipped edge protected.
10-4.

I was going to try and make one out of plexi. I have a ton of it laying around and I think it would be pretty easy.. Worth a shot anyways.. If it looks like garbage, ill just hunt down a shorty bumper. Thanks for the suggestion though!

If I do change my mind and plan on running this, I will be buying all mostly new re re and RPM parts and whatnot while keeping all the original stuff in a bag in-case I ever want to go back. I would just cry if I broke any of the original stuff.

The original plan was CF shock towers and the new big bore shocks. But it being a 6 gear, I am kind of re-thinking about just leaving it completely stock with the electronics that are in it. Thinking of doing box art body paint on protech body. I know it isn't the original body, but I like the protech one FAR better.

I better get off here before I start rambling again. :lol:

Re: New member, new to me RC10 Graphite

Posted: Wed Oct 12, 2016 11:32 am
by jwscab
protech is OK, was never my favorite. The protech 2 is really cool and also hard to find now.

Re: New member, new to me RC10 Graphite

Posted: Wed Oct 12, 2016 2:11 pm
by TRX-1-3
I love the graphites. Something about that single plane deck. I'd have a hard time not going through it to put it in light runner, occasional club racer status. If that T4 (ESC) works you could still use it with a little 2S lipo and a brushed motor. That's what I started thinking about when I saw it.

Re: New member, new to me RC10 Graphite

Posted: Wed Oct 12, 2016 2:23 pm
by Rabidtrout
TRX-1-3 wrote:I love the graphites. Something about that single plane deck. I'd have a hard time not going through it to put it in light runner, occasional club racer status. If that T4 (ESC) works you could still use it with a little 2S lipo and a brushed motor. That's what I started thinking about when I saw it.
Me too! After I tore it apart last night, I was sitting there thinking to myself "man, this is such a simple design. I wish tearing apart a new car took this little of time"

Indeed it does still work. Both motor and ESC. Motor is in dire need of a cleaning and probably some new brushes, but I think that's the plan of attack, thus far.

In all honesty, I would be only kidding myself if I said that I wasn't going to run it.

Re: New member, new to me RC10 Graphite

Posted: Wed Oct 12, 2016 2:24 pm
by Rabidtrout
jwscab wrote:protech is OK, was never my favorite. The protech 2 is really cool and also hard to find now.
Poking around on the bay for one of those the other day. I think there was one dude that makes them in Canada.

Edit: Yep.. Still there.. 24.99 from Ontario, Canada

Re: New member, new to me RC10 Graphite

Posted: Wed Oct 12, 2016 2:39 pm
by jwscab
If you haven't already, take a cruise (or hours) through this thread to describe a little history around the various models.

http://www.rc10talk.com/viewtopic.php?f=35&t=13059