Our good friend Scott Cramer of Futaba and O’Donnell fame sits down and shows you everything you need to do some work on your RC Vehicle. All the products he talks about can be found at BestRC.com.
‘Duratrax’ Category
If you own a Losi Mini Rock Crawler, and it’s been collecting dust, this may be what you need to spark a little life back into it! The Duratrax Gatekeeper GC-3 Chassis conversion!
Head over to the RC Reviews section or click the image to check it out!
Does ROAR have a beef with Pro-Line? They must have, because their recent ruling against the new PL Bulldog buggy bodies makes no sense otherwise. 8th scales have always looked Martian- they’ve never had a full size counterpart to emulate. To deem the Bulldog “illegal” because it doesn’t look realistic enough is a farce, and a waste of time and resources. While Traxxas, Losi, and Associated are pouring literally millions of dollars into cross advertising to the mass market, ROAR is fart’n around deeming one Martian body illegal, while every other Martian looking body remains legal. Just an FYI to the powers that be, your primary focus now should be keeping all those mass market noobs that Traxxas, Losi and AE are recruiting in the hobby. If done right, ROAR will have numbers that were previously unthinkable, if done wrong, they’ll have the same 1,500 members they’ve had since 93′. If the racing side of the hobby is to grow, the rules at the local level must suit the mass market noobs, not the local fast guy, and screwing around banning the Bulldog does nothing to accomplish this task.
I’ve driven (ridden?) the Duratrax DX450 dirt bike, and it’s a ton of fun. The DX450 is arguably the best motorcycle ever released in our hobby and is truly way super dope. But, the editors at one of the rags have voted the DX450 as their “Car of The Year“. Motorcycle of the year, Hell Yes, without a doubt, but “car” of the year? What in the hell were they thinking? Not just myself, but others in the industry and end consumers think this raises a lot of questions. Certain mags have steadily lost the trust of their readership by constantly printing kiss a$$ reviews, and now having a motorcycle as “Car of The Year” only worsens the problem. After this latest debacle, the consumers I talked to now question the validity of all the rag awards, not a pretty site for any of the mags or the companies that have been named as “winners”. Might I suggest having an impartial outside party handle all the votes next year to ensure there is no hanky panky going on?
BigSquidRCs first “Uber Charger Shootout” is set to begin 2 weeks from now. If you are a manufacture and want in, contact brian at BigSquidRC dot com, if you are a reader, you’ve got another shootout to look forward to.
The first edition of my new column “RC Myths, Fact or Fiction” will hit the front page this week. Ever hear that running a Lipo battery below 3 volts per cell ruins it and also makes the battery dangerous? Well that’s the focus of the first edition, where I do real world tests to determine if that is completely true or just bogus manufacture hype to make you buy another battery pack. Look for a full report with pics around Saturday. Btw, if you have an rc myth you’d like to see tested, shoot it to cubby at BigSquidRC dot com.
That’s it for this week, as always, support your local hobby shops, tracks and bash spots!
YOUR Cub Reporter
Duratrax has a new LiPo for those of you with Traxxas vehicles (or maybe even other vehicles with Traxxas connectors on your ESCs I guess… if you’d do something like that…). Yes, it comes stock with a Traxxas style battery connector. It also has a good bit of capacity at 4000 mAh, a discharge of 25c, and all of that at 7.4v. These should be on your local hobby shop’s shelves now or very soon, so check with them. Duratrax is listing the MSRP as $99.99. Street price should be a little cheaper. Go check out the Duratrax site for all the information you could shake a stick at.
Hey, remember those M5 Cross motorcycle tyres… er… tires… that Schumacher announced a day or two ago? Well Duratrax is bringing them Stateside for the MX450. So now you don’t have to do a £/$ conversion or pay for overseas shipping! There’s the “Chocolate” low profile square tread which is ideal for dirt oval tracks and there’s also a new slick tyre tire… for you guys that prefer your driving to take place on the street.
You should be able to find them on store shelves in late April. MSRP is $14.99/fronts and $19.99/rears for both styles.
Go check out the Duratrax site for some more info.
Everybody likes saving a little cash now and then. Lucky for us a few of the big dogs are making it easy to save some big cash right now. Rebates abound out there on some great gear and cars.
Basher friendly Duratrax is giving $15.00 back to you when you buy an Evader EXB or Evader EXT (check out our review!). Considering the already ridiculously low price points of these two RTRs, we might just be approaching ludicrousness. These rebates are good until May 31st. Get all the details and your rebate form straight from Duratrax.com.
If you’re in the market for something a little larger, say a 1/8 scale truggy, you might want to have a look at the rebates on Losi’s line of 1/8 scale race rollers. You can save up to $150 depending on which car you choose. And just because they’re cool like that, Losi also has a $50 rebate on their crazy cool Comp Crawler race roller. These rebates last until April 30th, so now would be the time to buy. Losi’s site has all the info you need.
Perhaps you’re thinking “come on man, I already have enough cars,” to that we say there’s no such thing as enough cars! What are you doing reading this site?! Around these here parts we don’t take too kindly to that kinda nonsense talk. But if you insist that you have enough cars, then how about a new radio? Futaba has a special deal going on right now that lets you to buy a second receiver for only $10.00 when you buy a qualifying FASST radio such as the 3PKS or 4PK. Considering the normal cost of Futaba’s FASST receivers that’s a pretty freakin’ good deal. This offer is only good at participating hobby shops and ends on April 30th. Click on through to Futaba’s site to get what you need to know.
These deals aren’t going to last forever, so get to your local hobby shop and get to buyin’ fool.
Breaking iHobby Expo News! Guessing at the name on this one, but I think it’s the DuraTrax MX450. The video of this off road dirt bike in action was pretty cool! The fact that it’s brushless, AWESOME! Looking forward to bashing the heck out of one of these! Will get all the details when the show opens.
Remember, where to get your iHobby news first! This iHobby Expo 2009 link will get you all the 2009 updates as we post them! So keep an eye on it.
Breaking iHobby Expo News! I waited till after midnight to post this, so Durtrax couldn’t yell at me too much, but here is probably the first picture of the new DuraTrax Vendetta SC 1:18 Short Course Truck! The show isn’t open yet, but as we were doing some investigative reporting, we spotted this. It’s a pretty sweet looking body on there! We’ll get all the details when the show opens.
Remember, where to get your iHobby news first! This iHobby Expo 2009 link will get you all the 2009 updates as we post them! So keep an eye on it.
Ok, this caught our attention today for sure! It looks like DuraTrax is coming out with a whole new line of RC Rock Crawling products under the name DuraTrax “GateKeeper” products! These new RC crawling products are coming from Austin “GateKeeper” Dunn who’s a pretty big name in the crawling scene! First up with the GateKeeper Mini GC-3 Chassis Kit with everything you need to turn the Losi Mini Rock Crawler into an uber 1.9 setup! The kit has gunmetal side plates, axle mounted servo plate, and rear axle link plate among other things. Looks pretty sweet.
Check the DuraTrax web page for more details.
Looks like DuraTrax is really starting to crank out the liPo packs! Their 1600mAh LiPO packs can be bought with a mini plug, or Traxxas plugs, and their 1800mAh hard case packs come with a female bullet setup. All for a pretty low price point. They say the packs are designed for the Mini Traxxas Slash VXL and Mini E-Revo VXL 1/16th scale vehicles.
Check the DuraTrax web page for more details.
DuraTrax has just announced their new 2500mah 7.4v LiPo Packs that can be bought with standard or Traxxas connectors. They come in the same size and shape as their NiMH packs, and are wired for balancing.
The New DuraTrax DTX5000 NiMH Stick Packs mean longer run times than ever before! Ideal sport packs for cars, buggies, trucks and boats, the packs are available in 7.2V and 8.4V, flat, stick, and hump configurations. You can choose from Traxxas-compatible plugs, Deans, or other popular plug choices.
It’s been a while since we have seen a vehicle release from DuraTrax, so this is a welcomed press release. The Duratrax Vendetta Rally Car is 1/18th scale and RTR. Some of the highlights, 2.4GHz radio system! It’s compatible with many of the already existing Vendetta hop-ups, oil filled shocks and diffs, 380 motor.
I have always been a big fan of Duratrax’s 1/18th scale stuff, and I’m sure this will be no exception.