Decent 1/10th or 1/8th scale RC car kit £250 ish?

[Zebrs]

Hi all,

I have the itch to get back into RC cars. Many years ago used to race 1/10 nitro but never seriously.

Looking for something to build in either 1/8 or 1/10 scale, do have a preference for nitro, but accept electric is more neighbour friendly.

Must haves:

- on road
- Kit form but with painted shell (was never any good at painting and far enjoyed the build more than the paint)
- everything in the box
- 2.4ghz radio unless I can convert my old 40mhz JR unit
- something with spares/hop up parts easily available

Things have moved on a lot in the last 20 years or so and I presume there is a whole bunch of kits available now from the Far East, but I have no idea what I’m looking for anymore.

Anything that might suit all the above for around 250 notes or am I going to need to up my budget?

Cheers,

Z

[nigelpugh7]

Zebrs said:

Hi all,

I have the itch to get back into RC cars. Many years ago used to race 1/10 nitro but never seriously.

Looking for something to build in either 1/8 or 1/10 scale, do have a preference for nitro, but accept electric is more neighbour friendly.

Must haves:

- on road
- Kit form but with painted shell (was never any good at painting and far enjoyed the build more than the paint)
- everything in the box
- 2.4ghz radio unless I can convert my old 40mhz JR unit
- something with spares/hop up parts easily available

Things have moved on a lot in the last 20 years or so and I presume there is a whole bunch of kits available now from the Far East, but I have no idea what I’m looking for anymore.

Anything that might suit all the above for around 250 notes or am I going to need to up my budget?

Cheers,

Z

Your biggest challenge at the moment would be finding some in stock that can ship.

Can i suggest a 1/8 HoBao buggy?

https://www.modelsport.co.uk/hobao-hyper-7-tq2-rtr...

I know its for off road, but i have one and put a spare set of wheels with on road tyres when we want to have fun on tarmac.

And having a car capable of off road gives you more choice of areas to play.

[nigelpugh7]

Sadly you wont get a kit for your budget they are all going to be RTR.

But with HoBao there are lots of options for mods and tuning.

Ours are probably almost 20 years old now, but still going strong.

First upgrade we did was to fit the two speed centre gearbox, getting the shift speed right and hearing it change is a real blast!!

[nigelpugh7]

This is the new version of the unit we fitted to our HoBao Buggies.

http://eshop.hobao-racing.com/p/87387-2-speed-tran...

[Jasey_]

That suggestion is rtr which of course is not a self build model which I think is the primary requirement.

But yes finding deliverable stock might be an issue.

At the start of lockdown I got 3 tamiya kits to build during the pish.

Tt02 drift chassis, tt02 Audi quattro (full kit with everything) and a Sand scorcher.

The problem with the tamiya kits is they dont really take that long to build.

I'm a bit like you had a long break and just wanted something to break up the potential boredom.

Hopefully someone will be along with other suggestions but the tamiya kits do still seem to be pretty good.

[Jasey_]

https://www.jadlamracingmodels.com/radio-control/c...

When I got my Audi from these guys (via amazon) they must have had 30 or 40 bundles available - Now they have 2 and none are listed on Amazon !

I'm guessing they've been busy

[Terra1]

I think the issue is high demand plus no replenishment due to lack of container deliveries from Asia. I was in the same position so ordered from Germany - https://www.modellbau-berlinski.de/
Ordered late Monday afternoon and it arrived yesterday which I thought was pretty good given current circumstances. Delivery was c.£15 but overall price was still cheaper than UK where there is no stock! The kit (Tamiya Aqroshot 1/10th) I got included brushless motor and LiPo battery etc and was £203. They have quite a few different bundles in stock.

[uncleluck]

Demand is off the charts for RC cars. Every online store is almost sold out of Tamiya kits.

I spent ages trying to find something specific that was in stock somewhere (and that was a more obscure website that doesn’t come up easily in google) and when I went to order I rang to ask about post and was told it wasn’t actually in stock.

The German sites seem to have the most stock of stuff but someone I spoke to today said their stock comes from Tamiya Japan via Germany so I assume someone like Tamico.de distribute to the trade maybe?

I have also read Tamiya closed it’s doors for c19 which probably hasn’t helped.

I guess there could be a lot of bargains on eBay when people build and offload them all. Already seeing it starting on the RC forums. Trouble is the Tamiya kits take about an hour to build as an adult! So a lot of people will be offloading them I’m sure.