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

One thing that is very cool about the RC10 Tub cars is the sheer time frame they were competitive at the top level. Had the B2 and B3 not come out it would have been even longer. I imagine AE tweaking the design a bit to something akin to the what's old is new cars here and it would have been going strong into the millennium.

Curious what other cars you might think could have pulled that off had not entered what I will call the we need a new version every few years to sell more cars era.

And for conversation sake, no major revisions allowed. IE, you can take an original RC10 with Stealth and with a few tweaks and modern rubber still get it done today but it still looks very close the original. Losi XX is closer to today's cars and not much tweaking needed for example.

What car would you have like to see around longer and know with the benefit of hindsight was a top design?

We all know we can make vintage cars hang today so I guess any car really but hopefully my question comes across if nothing else for conversation and not a who wins type thing. Given the name of this Forum we know one car has been pretty well covered. Pick your weapon and make your case

With like-for-like driving skills, you can make vintage cars "hang" at "mild" club-level racing where people make mistakes. Anything above sportsman class where people can run 5mn without making a costly driving mistake (not miss an apex - but requiring marshalling) and suddenly they don't hang that much any more

But within the framework defined above, the RC10 is the Kaiser of the breed... 4wd, I'd say some LWB Mid can do the trick, maybe Cat 2000 a bit later (because this is when Schuey cars become reliable...). The BJ4/B44 is a worthy contender too (dating back to a late 90's concept), but more recent.

in 8th scale offroad, the Inferno MP-5 maybe.

Touring cars: no way. Every tenth counts, and it's about a tenth per year of progress on a normal-sized track I'd say.

So, yes, the RC10 is definitely one-of-a-kind

I would think quite a few vintage cars could be competitive with a bit of updating/ re-engineering for modern power, tires and tracks.

I know I know, I am in fantasy land a bit. Let's stay there. And for conversation keep it not to major re engineering. And yes maybe not winning A mains but with new batteries the playing field is a lot more level and I am just talking a car that if you look at today still can hang in there at least if nothing else.

A good example, a 5 link JRX2 is not at home on today's high bite smooth tracks, a XX is not all that far off today's modern cars design wise. So you could argue the XX has a lot more eternal design flavor. Had tracks stayed bumpy rutted loose messes they once were the 5 link car might be. So the XX one could argue is more eternal in a spanning racing generations way. And this coming from a 5 link lover, so that is hard to say.

I'll add in one data point, let' cut it off at 1995 because I started this . Back to the program.

Well, you know I have to plug the TRX-1 here. In my mind it's the best ever. But my mind might need some new stainless hex hardware, because somebody has to be thinking ," this guy has a screw loose!". I can't defend or justify my thought process, however......because I'm NUTS.

A similar topic was discussed years ago:

http://www.rc10talk.com/viewtopic.php?f=39&t=32910

The Yokomo Dogfighter was the first 4WD car designed for racing, but the Optima was a game-changer and was arguably responsible for causing 2WD and 4WD racing to be segregated into separate classes. Up to that time, 4WD cars were relatively heavy, slow & clunky and couldn't compete against RC10's and other 2WD cars, so they were allowed to race together in mod class. Then the lightweight Optima came along with a fantastic suspension--especially with Kyosho Gold shocks--and the 2WD cars could no longer keep up, unless on high-bite tracks, perhaps. In the Tower Hobbies catalog from 1985 or 1986, it was stated that Optimas won 1, 2, 3, 4, 7, 8, 9, and 10th place in the ROAR Nats.

But for an "eternal winning design", I'd concur with the Optima Mid (for 4WD), as the original Optima had many rather serious design flaws; prone to understeer, chain stretching and always needing maintenance, weak final pinion that was a major pain to replace, weak front end that acted more like a crash zone than as protection...but you add the Kyosho Gold shocks and the improvements in the Mid belt drivetrain and tweaks in design and you had a 4WD car that performed as good as any. Looking at the engineering of those late 80's cars, not much has happened since to truly revolutionize performance, if you look past electronics. The late 80's/early 90's were the apex of RC car performance and IMHO, not much has been ground-breaking in the decades since, other than changing materials (plastic/aluminum/nylon replaced by carbon fiber, which is nice but not revolutionary).

I of course agree with the RC10 and the many variants as being an eternal winning design. From RC10, 10T to DS, I don't think any other 2WD chassis could so easily transform from one racing design to others and still perform excellently. (The exception being the attempts to transform the RC10 into 4WD, which was a mal-performing kludge at best...but perhaps best illustrated AE's desire to compete with the "new lightweight 4WD cars" like the Optima.) They had to scrap the kludge idea and start with a clean slate and design a totally separate 4WD chassis because trying to turn an RC10 into 4WD just didn't work. That's probably the only thing the RC10 failed at.

Good old thread. It got me thinking I will toss in the JRX Pro Se. As a lover of all things five link JRX it does not translate well over time and was not the most durable. But if we go JRX Pro Se, rear H-Arms, molded chassis, upper deck, the LRM transmission was every bit as good as the Stealth with the cool external adjustable ball diff. And that car shares overall DNA with original JRX unlike the next XX series. So I say it is a lasting design.

I've thought about the non double deck graphite cars of the time which I love the look of better but in hindsight they are very flexible and from a pure racing standpoint with say a modern brush-less mega motor rigid is usually better. Hence why I would say the JRX pro SE had a slight advantage over a JRX pro if we are talking what stands the test of time, which we are.

But of course I just received my Turbo Ultima and now I am loving the look of it too. I agree with poster above late 80's early 90's cars set ground work for what we have today. Of course no original RC10 or even cars before that, we are not here at all. But late 80's early 90's cars rereleased today with modern materials and a few tweaks only are basically today's cars.

TRX-1-3 wrote: ↑Fri May 05, 2017 9:56 am Well, you know I have to plug the TRX-1 here. In my mind it's the best ever. But my mind might need some new stainless hex hardware, because somebody has to be thinking ," this guy has a screw loose!". I can't defend or justify my thought process, however......because I'm NUTS.

Makes sense. To me, RC10-G and TRX-1 are the pinnacle of single-deck graphite-based cars. And they were each other's nemesis on the track... if the RC10 makes the shortlist, so should the TRX-1

Pinnacle of Graphite Deck cars you say. While short lived I would throw Kyosho Triumph in there. It had the best features of the time, double deck graphite, belt drive, adjustable toe, long arms like today's cars adjustable front rake, silky gold shocks, yummy. While it may be lesser known, it has to be up there.

I would say the Tyco Rebound, it required no marshelling. Plus you also got a buggy and a truck with one vehicle... Genius!!!

Great now I need to go find one of those and spend money on finding all the hot aftermarket parts for it

RCveteran wrote: ↑Sun May 07, 2017 7:31 pm Pinnacle of Graphite Deck cars you say. While short lived I would throw Kyosho Triumph in there. It had the best features of the time, double deck graphite, belt drive, adjustable toe, long arms like today's cars adjustable front rake, silky gold shocks, yummy. While it may be lesser known, it has to be up there.

I said "single deck" Plus I thought the title of the thread was WINNING cars?

Touche. I have a Triumph with a cut upper deck so it's somewhere in between and the fastest car on my shelf, it wins just sitting there. It's so fast it scared the Ultima in front of it out of its suspension.

RCveteran wrote: ↑Wed May 10, 2017 6:39 pm Touche. I have a Triumph with a cut upper deck so it's somewhere in between and the fastest car on my shelf, it wins just sitting there. It's so fast it scared the Ultima in front of it out of its suspension. Triumph.jpg

Still a cool and desirable car for sure nonetheless! but it's got a bad rap on the track... and was quickly phased out Belt tranny on 2wd's were already out of fashion when it got released

The B4 won the worlds in 2003, 2005, 2007, 2009, and 2011, and was competitive before and after that, so thats not too bad.