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

Background: Never owned an RC10 it was what I always wanted when I was a kid. Had a used Tamiya Grasshopper I upgraded to a Hornet. Then I bought a Tamiya Fire Dragon 4wd new. Ran those for years in the early 90's. Never raced but had a few friends that did. Tamiya Blackfoots and the original RC10's. Those were super cool and way out of the price range of a kid working as a bag boy at Winn Dixie.

Present day: Am 42 and have a girlfriend with a 14 year old son. He thinks RTR Traxxas "stuff" (I am being nice, its not bad but c'mon RTR!) is the way to go. Thinks kits are too much work and that you cannot work on your own RC cars. Sigh...

Purpose: I like the old gold pans and think you can still do a lot with them. The boy and I are going to rebuild this car from the ground up. Not looking at making a replica of a past championship car, just a have fun car. Plus it would not hurt to beat his Traxxas Slash or Stampede. I also want to teach him how to build his own parts with a metal lathe and mill. My father was a tool and die maker for General Motors and would like to pass on his knowledge. If he can drop the attitude I may give him this car.

What I have so far is the accumulation of several eBay auctions. It is all bolted together.





Some of the parts are in pretty bad shape, see the bend on the tub.



An RC10 is like a Jeep. The Jeep was made for WW2 and they produce every part for that Jeep and every Jeep since still to this day. It is not about if you can repair it it is about when you give up on it. I will straiten this tub on my press brake and make it a runner. As of right now it is all taken apart and is sitting in a cleaning solution.

The wheels and hub carriers will be upgraded to take modern 2.2" wheels. The tub will be drilled to take a Stealth Transmission. The Stealth tranny will be 100% new, with a B4 top shaft and VTS slipper. Will go with a waterproof brushless setup. Anyways this is the start.

You will get used to re-bending the chassis flat again it's just part of ownership

Some wood, a clamp and a size 11 is the best tool

Your 'beater' is going to be better than some people's runners.

Wish I had gone with Brushless when I resurrected my RC10WC instead I listened to friends who are still running old brushed motors. I torched a midnight motor last night.

I cringe when all you can get is an assembled RTR car, I ask myself how many of those fasteners do I have to remove and put loctite on before running it....all of them, pffff so much for RTR. Every car I have minus the ProRally I just ordered Thursday night will have been in bags needing assembly, the things you can learn from DIY is limitless it makes your mind wonder and lets the cat out of the bag so to speak - creative minds think alike. I don't think there really is any place you can do improvements on this car its not like the Gas-to-electric conversion I did on a 3.3 Revo where there is still tons of room for improvement. AE pretty much makes top shelf stuff.

RC10 buggy as far as I know is the simplest of simple RC cars available (you can find parts anywhere) and its race proven heritage will allow you to beat just about anything on the track as long as the driver is with it that day and the tune for the track or coarse is set up.

I did a conversion from cross pin to 12mm hex on the rear and made new universal hubs for the front axles so I could mount generic hex type wheels & tires on the chassis. $12 for a set of 4 wheels and tires was too good to pass up. I might throw some aluminum in my logan lathe and turn out more solid reusable hubs for another day but its working so far.

That's got to be the most bent chassis I've seen. I loose my crap when I get a chassis with the front end bent just a little, wow.

Incontinence is a nasty problem to have for a bent chassis VAE!

So I tried fixing the "A" Stamp chassis to no avail.





In the end I ended up stretching the metal and making it dish shaped. Could not shrink it back to shape...



But lucky for me I have a "B" stamped chassis as a backup. Really wanted the gold chassis but this is a beater build so ohh well...





I will put on the milling machine a bit to clean it up. At least I don't have to drill holes for the Stealth Transmission.

Thursday night we are going to build a brand new Stealth Transmission. A used one could have been bought but I would have gone through it and replaced the gears and bearings anyways so I just bought all the parts. It cost just shy of $100. If I did not go with a Hot Racing VTS slipper conversion I could have shaved $20 off that. If I already had the black grease and lube it would of been another seven bucks off.



This is one part I am not going to skimp on.

Quick question about the nose tubes. Are these dimensions right? All my tubes are bent like limp pasta. Will make these on the metal lathe.

Try giving the chassis another go. As long as it's not creased or hairline cracked you can save it.

This was the most bent chassis I've had but with patience it turned out as square as a new chassis.

Why not just buy re-re tubes?

Unfortunately it is creased and dished. I hate that happened. But it is what it is. I may keep it to play with.

I would buy re-released tubes but it is a simple part and I have a metal lathe so it should be easy to make. If not I will buy one.

Joe6Pack74 wrote: ↑Tue Jan 24, 2017 10:04 pm Quick question about the nose tubes. Are these dimensions right? All my tubes are bent like limp pasta. Will make these on the metal lathe.

Try these. They are very similar to the wing tubes.
Should be easier than manufacturing new in a lathe.

K&S Tappable Aluminum Tube 3/16x.049 83060

Last night we put together the transmission and the suspension arms.



But there was a problem with the Stealth Transmission. I used all new parts from the WC manual and a B4 top shaft. But for some reason when I spin the top shaft it does not move smoothly. It feels like turning the shaft of a stepper motor. If I split the case it works fine. Have put in a different b4 top shaft and have the same result. Do these gears need to wear in or am I doing something wrong?



My two RC10GT transmissions run smoothly.

WC rerelease transmissions are too tight and never turns smoothly when new.

I've tried with good result a break-in method: put a little amount of polishing past on the gears and pin the spur gear at high speed with compressed air.