What’s the word Cubby? So here is my question that I am sure a lot of Father’s will ask. I have just recently (in the past two years) have gotten in R/C trucks. Mainly I bash and tear up the neighborhood. My son is getting older and I am hoping that this is how he will learn about mechanics, electronics, and general wrenching from his trucking fun. He is around 4. The question I have is what is a great truck to start a young kid on that will last and he can work on and bash as he gets older? I am not going Lipo and I currently have a Traxxas slash ultimate so the wife doesn’t want to spend that $$. Looking for electric and fun out of the box but very indestructible. What can you recommend?
Thanks
Sean M.

Cubby- Hey Sean, thanks for the email and be sure to shoot Brian your snail mail for some free stickers to slap on your Slash 4×4.

So… you are looking for a fun RTR that is nearly indestructible for your 4 year old son. For you are I am going to say buy the ARRMA Granite monster truck. Why? For a few reasons…

1. It was our “Bash Vehicle Of The Year” for 2012, meaning it has proven itself beyond a doubt in our eyes.
2. It steers slowly but predictably, making it a great learning vehicle for a noobs. Some vehicles have way too much steering- this is a nightmare for noobs who give too much steering input the way it is. The Granite doesn’t push, but it doesn’t react too quickly to steering inputs either, perfect for a beginner.
3. Ya, it’s crazy tough. Your son can slam into a LOT of solid objects and you won’t be running to the LHS every day.
4. Because it’s a monster truck it has a decent amount of ground clearance. This comes in quite handy for noobs who love to drive in the grass.

One tip I will give you if you do happen to buy the Granite- water dip the motor (if possible) and drop a couple teeth off the pinion. The stock motors aren’t known for long life, water dipping and dropping the gearing will help keep the motor alive.

Good Morning,
Saw your review and thinking of doing the whole Pro-Line conversion to my Slash 2WD.
In the end it ends up costing about the same as a 22SCT etc., but its something different and cool from other guys.
Do you think the Pro-Line slash is roughly equal to the other big 2WD names? Looks pretty competitive to me.
Cheers,
Derek A.

Cubby- Hey Derek, thanks for the question, it certainly is a good one.

We haven’t gone directly back to back between the Pro-Line Pro-2 Slash and its competitors. Actually we have driven them back to back, but not with set-ups that were identical (like electronics, totally stock, similar tires, etc). So while I can’t give you a precise answer on this one, I’ll give you some of our general observations. Oh and… a legit 2wd SCT shootout sounds like fun, hum….

Does the Pro-Line Pro-2 Slash roughly equal a full scoot “racer” SCT? At this time, not having driven them under equal circumstances, I would say yes and no. I would say on blown-out, loose, outdoor tracks that yes, the Pro-Line can haul ass with the best of them. On a high bite blue-groove or damp indoor clay tracks, I feel it’s at a bit of a disadvantage. Because all the Pro-2 parts can bolt onto a Slash, it inherently has to keep certain aspects of the stock Slash geometry. The stock geometry that it retains seems fine for outdoor/loose tracks, but limits its maximum mechanical grip on high-bite. But like I previously mentioned, until driving them all back-to-back on an equal scale, its really hard to tell for sure.

What I can assure you from first hand knowledge is this- all the Pro-Line parts are of extremely high quality, much better than the stock Traxxas parts they replace. Pro-Line perfected the geometry where they could and use high grade materials throughout, at the end of the day the Pro-2 is a great quality machine.

For bashing purposes the high quality parts mean less breakage and fewer worn out parts. Whereas you might blow a couple spurs a month on a stock Slash, you won’t blow any with the PL tranny. Where you might pop off a shock cap on every run with the Traxxas, it never happens with the Pro-Line gear. Where the stock hinge-pins are all taco’ed out and your a-arms refuse to move on the stock Slash, the Pro-Line pins and arms continue smoothly through their entire stroke without issue.

To boil it down, if you are looking for an uber blue groove racer, at this time I’d recommend elsewhere, but for pretty much anything else, the Pro-Line Pro-2 Slash would be incredibly hard to beat.

YOUR Cub Reporter

The folks from ARRMA have finally announced the new brushless versions of their line of vehicles. We have been waiting on this for a while! Their new line has BLX attached to the name. So the ARRMA Granite BLX will be the brushless version. The new versions promise TONS of improvements over the previous models as well like waterproof ESCs and servos.

Here are a few shots of the ARRMA booth at the Nuremberg Toy Fair. Notice the awesome Basher Approved Logos!

In these shots you can also get a look at their new controller, and a line of -hop-up parts! Looking forward to those and that wheelie bar!

Grabbed a few images off the ARRMA site.

Looking for more ARRMA News? or maybe want to see why they have that Basher Approved Logo in their booth?

All that being said, we’d like to congratulate ARRMA RC on the ARRMA GRANITE as winning our BASH VEHICLE of the YEAR 2012! The Granite proved basically indestructible as you can check out in our Beat Down VIDEO, and it also won the 2WD Monster Truck Shootout, and Basher Approved Status! It’s at a great price point, and a awesome vehicle to get into the hobby with that will bring smiles to many backyard bashers.

Props to the runner up. In a VERY close second was the ECX Torment! The Torment has been a great go-to vehicle for the last year, but there were just a few more things keeping it from winning. It is also a great truck, and you can’t really go wrong with choosing one. There are a lot of companies that should take a look at the durability of this short course!

Other considerations were the Axial EXO and Atomik 1/18 Metal Mulisha Rally Car. Both great vehicles that saw a lot of use this year.

Congrats again to ARRMA RC and their awesome monster truck, the ARRMA GRANITE!

Biggest news of the year- There was tons of “big” news in 2012, but the biggest of the big was the announcement that Traxxas was entering the air market with their QR-1 quad and DR-1 heli. Announced late in the year Traxxas was still able to get these on LHS shelves before X-mas, and speaking to shop owners they sold very well. However, hard-core Traxxas loyalists were left in disbelief, not understanding why Traxxas would jump into the air market while so much of their surface line is in desperate need of updating.

While the air gear was their biggest news, Traxxas kept themselves in the limelight all year long. The XO-1 Supercar was announced late in 11′, but shipping in Feb 12′, and you couldn’t get away from the hype machine around it. A couple months later came the widely publicized but poorly received Traxxas drag car. Throw in their new Rally car and LCG Slash 4×4 and Traxxas had yet another year at the top of the buzz (and sales) charts.

Second biggest news- Early in the year it was announced that the Champaign behemoth Hobbico had made a deal to acquire Axial, Durango, and ARRMA. This was some serious eye popping news to many industry peeps, they knew Hobbico has the cubic cash and market savvy to use those lines to take their world domination to a completely new level. Axial was already a hot name brand in America, but during the year you would have to blind not see how Durango and ARRMA climbing the sales charts here in the USA.

Biggest dropping of the ball- It was August 2011 when HPI first announced that they were attempting to put gas (not nitro) engines in regular 10th/8th scale rc vehicles. A few months later in February 12′ at the Nuremberg Toy Fair, HPI had multiple models on display all showing off their “Xtreme/Octane” series engine. While HPI did tease us once again a few weeks ago in mid December, we’ve yet so see one come to fruition. We really just want to drive one.

Biggest head-scratcher of the year- When the announcement came off the wire that HPI was now the exclusive distributor for Hobao in North America we weren’t the only ones scratching our heads.

Euro gear coming in style- You may or may not still consider Durango a European name, but alas, companies like X-Ray, Serpent and Schumacher also made positive strides in America. Many industry types make claims like the Euro’s are just trying harder right now, they are more focused, pushing harder, the internet is changing the game, etc, and I think you can look for more European brands to start making waves in the American market in the next 12 months.

Product trends of the year- 2012 will go down as the year that saw the emergence of the Rally car, quadcopters, scale off road buggies, nitro powered SCT’s, an uber battery charger war, and of the 8th scale roller “XO-1″ killers.

Rally has never been “so cool” here in America, and both Traxxas and HPI capitalized on this by putting out new rally style cars.

Quads which were once considered $19 stocking stuffers by true hobbyists, but they became a hot item after Traxxas announced their QR-1.

For scale buggies, Axial got their EXO Terra Buggy to the market, the HPI Apache hit (and missed), and even Associated threw their hat in the ring with the SC10B.

Associated made the news again with their SC10GT, Losi announced their Nitro Ten SCT, and finally Traxxas showed their hand and entered the nitro SCT market with their Nitro 2wd Slash. New offerings for the nitro crowd have been minimal in recent years, but the nitro SCT’s of 2012 gave fuel burners something new to play with.

After years of brushless/Lipo dominance, the battery charger companies went balls to the wall in 12′. Everywhere you turned was another company putting out some uber mega high current charger. Venom put out a charger with built in speakers, iCharger put out a charger you can probably weld with, and TrakPower put out one of the most esoteric chargers the market has ever seen. And.. uber chargers weren’t only about putting out ridiculously huge amounts of power, they were also about doing so on multiple channels. Reading some of the specs now days reminds me of the old car stereo days- 4 channels, bridgeable, mono-block, 500 watts, etc.

Why pay over a grand for a Traxxas XO-1 when you’ve already got all the electronics sitting in your garage? Late 2012 showed multiple brands putting out 8th scale roller on-road cars ready to bust out triple digit mph numbers once you’ve slammed in your own electronic goodies. Going crazy fast on-road should continue to be a big trend in 13′.

Accessory companies blowing up- Pro-line is no stranger to having huge years, but a number of other accessory companies put their dent on the scene in 12′ as well.

Pro-Line was everywhere in 12′. Their product line-up exploded with items for not just racers, but also for scalers and bashers. Pro-Line also went WFO on the 2wd Slash, now offering nearly a complete truck of their own in replacement parts. Also of note was the staggering amount of product give-aways that Pro-Line did over the course of the year. 2012 was Pro-lines 30th anniversary and they certain did it up the right way.

JConcepts made their waves too. They are living the dream, getting bigger and bigger and 12′ was a banner year for them. From spur gears for the Slash, to a high speed Traxxas truck body, to tons of racer gear, to sponsoring tons of races across the country, JConcepts was pushing it hard all year long.

RPM ventured out to numerous new models in 2012 and put out perhaps their most involved product yet- a tranny case and metal motor mount for Traxxas 2wd trucks. Consumers have been asking RPM to branch out a bit for years, in 12′ they arguably branches out more than ever before.

MIP, who has been a player in the rc game for years, saw a fresh resurgence in 2012. Their Pro4mance kit for the Losi SCTE and uber shock pistons got the ball rolling early in the year, and they are looking more solid than ever going into 13′.

RDRP blew up on the accessory scene in 12′. A little known Euro company a few months ago, they are now one of the “hot” brands to have in your pit at the local track.

Exotek was once a tiny company making a few 18th scale parts, in 2012 they really expanded their product catalog and market share.

You can’t talk about upgrade parts without talking about STRC. They landed a big deal with Great Planes and keep putting out more and more parts for nearly every vehicle (worth owning) on the market, plus their LCG Chassis for 2WD and 4WD Slash Vehicles!

Other significant happenings-

Thunder Tiger was once a joke in the American market. Today, with distribution from Great Planes, they are one of the biggest names in the bashing market. After multiple new releases in Q4 of 12′, expect their market share to keep on growing in 13′.

Firelands Group is making some waves. From Anza hop-up parts, to Helion, to Radient, to Ares, they might just be the model company of the future.

Venom Group had a big year. From putting out loads of innovative products, to changing their name to Atomik (and seemingly failing, everyone still calls them Venom), to inking a deal to sell Brian Deegan/Metal Mulisha gear, Venom is working their way towards the front of the pack.

Associated made the news here and there, the introduction of their SC10B was huge news, as was their announcement of their new “Qualifier Series” basher line-up.

ECX also had a big year. Sales were solid and they ventured into uncharted territory with their new 8th scales, one electric, and one nitro. Expect to see more big things from ECX in 2013.

Kyosho made a push in 12′ with loads of new products (the Scorpion XXL Ve for example) and a solid marketing push. Unfortunately their distribution blows here in the states and most consumers only saw the new stuff on the web, not in their LHS.

Oh ya, BigSquidRC had pretty good year too, thanks to you guys-

Our March Bash-Ness contest was huge again, and it sported a controversial winner, the Helion Dominus. We did a great job of busting out juicy Traxxas news in good time and our “chat with us in the forums” morphed into our live Google Plus show. We also had solid coverage of not only iHobby, but of RCX SoCal, Nuremberg, and the HobbyTown USA show. And lastly… traffic was once again way up, for that we must salute you guys out there!

That’s it for this week ya’ll, next week will be my also annual “looking forward to the coming year” Cub Report, till then, support your local hobby shops and bash spots!

YOUR Cub Reporter

Other big news tonight? We will announce another BASHER APPROVED Winner!

Did we mention we are giving away another BRAND NEW ARRMA Vehicle?!

Update: Live show is now over. You can watch a replay above or on our YouTube Channel.

Rules for the ARRMAcontest: You must leave a comment below in the comments section DURING THE LIVE SHOW. Chatting in the live chat won’t get you an entry, you must leave a comment in the COMMENTS SECTION (protip: click that link) of the post. It’s not ideal, but it’s the only way we can get a confirmed email address for the winner. So be sure to do that, then come back to the live chat box and get your chat on. This contest is limited to US residents only. A random comment will be chosen towards the end of the show, live, and a winner will be announced!

Special thanks to this evenings sponsors, ARRMA RC for the giveaway vehicle!

Next the ECX Torment short course truck. You can read our Updated Review Here to get our overall opinion, but the short version is this truck is indestructible. We have been beating on this truck for months, and it does not even blink. I feel sorry for the hobby shop that bought a bunch of parts to have in stock for people, because they aren’t going to be selling them any time soon.

You can read all about our BASHER APPROVED AWARD as well as get more details about the winners, and see other vehicles that have achieved this elite status.

What say you? What is the best 2 wheel short course available right now?
Keep up the good work
George F.

Cubby- Hey what’s up George, thanks for the email and shoot Brian your snail mail so we can hook ya up with a BigSquidRC sticker pack.

The word “best” is a very powerful word. Not that I’m going to skirt around the question, but the word “best” used in conjunction with short course trucks can have many different answers. For example, what is the best turning 2wd SCT? IMO it’s the Venom Gambler in mid-motor configuration. With proper tires and tuning nothing rails corners like the Venom can. What is the best overall handling 2wd SCT? For pure bashing I’d say the Slash, but for track use my vote would go to the Durango. For pure toughness, which is the best? IMO that would go to the ARRMA Fury. Which is the best value? My vote would go squarely to the Torment.

However… none of those “bests” mean a darn thing to you George, or any of our other readers out there. The only “best” you give a dern about is which of those trucks meets your criteria making it the best one for you and your specific needs. Your email you give me absolutely zero specifics to see how you would be using a new SCT, so I would highly recommend you read a bunch of our reviews and make your buying decision based on those.

But… as I attempt to never “dodge” a question, I will blindly say go for the ECX Torment if you are looking to save some bucks, or take home a new Durango DESC210 if you are looking for something for both bashing and track use. But those are just my personal picks, if you would ask one of the other guys sitting around the office I’m quite certain their picks would be different.

Hi Cubby,
I caught the bigsquidrc live show last night and I had to shoot your an email and say that was one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen. Keep it real guys and thanks for taking rc talk to the next level.
Henry

Cubby- Hey Henry, thanks for the props on the show. It wasn’t ment to be uber polished, nor some super high buck production, what it was ment to be was just some good ole’ laid back rc bench racing, and I hope it came across that way. Well actually, I hope it was at least worth your time and kept you interested for at least 10 minutes.

First off, expect us to be doing more “BigSquidRC Live” shows each Wednesday evening, for at least a few more weeks to sort out if they are truly worth doing or not. So if you haven’t already made plans, make them now for next Wednesday evening 12/5. It might be at 10 pm CST, but we are also considering 9 pm CST to make it easier on our East Coast viewers.

We had talked for a long time about doing a podcast, but I rarely listen to them. In fact most of our guys don’t listen to podcasts as they take up a lot of time and most come across as boring. We had also talked about doing something video related, but that also sort of fell short of what we were looking to do.

Then… the Google Plus Hangout technology came along, and with most of us being “tech” types we latched onto it. We’ve had a blast over the past few weeks using the technology and we were hoping you guys would enjoy watching us goof around while doing some rc talk. The G+ tech also allows for soooo many possibilities in the future, the current set-up is cool, but I think it will really come to fruition when our readers can join in live on cam as well. Full live video chat between us and our readers is ultimately the goal I think.

We’ll be trying out a bunch of stuff in the coming weeks, everyone please shoot us an email telling us what you think is working, what is worth watching, and what’s not. I think as long as we are all having fun it will be entertaining. Yes certainly its needs some polish, and none of the BSRC staffers are models nor incredible speakers. But… what we are is average Joes just like most of our readers, and I think that relationship can make the “BigSquidRC Live” concept really take off.

That’s it for this week folks, shoot me your questions, rants, rants, or anything else in that deviant mind of yours to Cubby at BigSquidRC dot com! If your question makes the bigtime on the front page you’ll get a free sticker pack, if I proclaim your email as “email of the month” we’ll totally hook you up with a free BSRC t-shirt.

YOUR Cub Reporter

BigSquidRC: Why the twin spar frame on all your models?

When we design a car, we do so in such a way that the car not only looks good, but it is extremely durable and robust. The TVP chassis design achieves all of these things. The narrow chassis design allows for a low Centre of Gravity and gives the ARRMA cars a nice balance. This is one of the reasons why so many people have told us how well the cars jump. Also, by using aluminium, we can anodise the TVP plates to make your ARRMA car look really cool. We’re working on a number of optional upgrade parts for all of our cars.

BigSquidRC: We’ve found every ARRMA model we’ve tested to be quite durable, especially the Granite. What are the keys to putting out an ultra-durable platform?

Thank you! That’s a BIG compliment to us. We take the design of our cars and each component very seriously. We design every part to perform its function as well as it can. The key is very simple: ‘DESIGNED to be FAST, DESIGNED to be TOUGH’. Everyone at ARRMA loves, and we mean LOVES, RC cars. We all grew-up using them, racing them, bashing them. A lot of us still do. The passion we had as kids for RC cars is with us today. We want to bring that passion and enthusiasm to a new generation of RC car fans. We want people who have one of our cars to love using it so they tell their friends, and they tell their friends. The more people who use RC cars, the better the world will be.

BigSquidRC: When ARRMA started with a blank piece of paper a couple of years ago what was the biggest priority during the design process?

Great question. Priority #1 was to ‘DESIGN to be FAST, DESIGN to be TOUGH’ a new platform of RC cars. This means using all of our years’ of experience to create something new. Priority #2 – Don’t copy other manufacturer’s designs. Design is what we do and what we love. Priority #3 – make products people will enjoy and enjoy sharing. Priority #4 making RC cars fun.

BigSquidRC: How long till we see brushless RTR ARRMA’s?

We see a lot of ARRMA brushless cars already. Because we designed our cars to be brushless ready from day one, a lot of people have already converted their ARRMA cars to be brushless. It seems like a lot of our customers got used to their brushed cars, and once they wanted to go even faster, they bought their favourite brushless system. We know people love brushless cars, and you will definitely see brushless ARRMA cars in 2013. We’ve done a lot of research and testing into developing the right brushless systems for our vehicles. Like I said, the ARRMA cars were designed from day one with brushless power in mind. That’s why the gearboxes and transmission are made from quality materials. We’ve done plenty of speed tests with highly accurate speed guns and other devices to check how fast our brushless systems as. Let’s just say we’ll be as fast as anything else out there. Pound for pound, we’ll go wheel-to-wheel with ANY other manufacturer’s car.

BigSquidRC: ARRMA, thus far, is a basher specific brand. Can you hint to the next product segment ARRMA may enter next?

Bashing is where we will be for a while. We have no intention of going into racing cars (we have Team Durango for that). We have LOTS of great ideas, but I can’t say more than that right now. We will always wait to deliver products we believe are the best we can make, rather than rushing a product to market. ARRMA products have to be tested to obliteration point (and beyond). We have an office full of dead cars. These cars sacrificed themselves to make their offspring stronger and faster than they were. It’s sad, but there is an emotional cost to developing great RC cars; unfortunately, sometimes, cars have to be seriously hurt in the process.

BigSquidRC: Does the ARRMA name have any special meaning we don’t know about?

ARRMA is a play on words. ARRMA sounds tough, a bit like the bullet-proof clothing worn by soldiers to protect them. ARRMA sounds like what’s on vehicles to make them withstand foreign bodies and attack. ARRMA describes strength, resilience and toughness. The back-to-back R logo looks a bit like a warrior’s helmet from the film 300. We want our ARRMA cars to be tough and to withstand abuse and come out on top of any RC car fight.

BigSquidRC: ARRMA covered a lot of bases quickly with 6 different vehicles out the door. It’s been quiet lately, is the next thing we hear about going to be 6 more vehicles at once? Or will they be more one at a time?

When we had no cars, we decided we needed to launch six cars in one go to announce ourselves. We needed people to realise that ARRMA was here to stay and that we could make multiple, great looking and great handling cars. Now that people know about us, and we have a small range, we will release cars more evenly, maybe one or two at a time. Though it has been a while since we released a new car, we’ve been extremely busy behind the scenes, working on new cars and new ideas, not only for ARRMA but for Team Durango too. We’re constantly developing and testing, and with Hobbico behind us we have a very exciting future.

BigSquidRC: Have people been receptive to the new transmitter design? It was pretty shocking to many. We enjoy having contests to see who can win a few laps driving lefty. Do you hear stories of people changing out the radios, or keeping them in?

A lot of people liked our unique, patented, ambidextrous transmitter. Some people didn’t, so we guess you could say it divided opinion; it has certainly been a talking point. Maybe it was a little bit too different to what people were used to; what do you guys at BigSquid think now you’ve used our ATX-300 transmitters for a while? Perhaps in time people will see our ambidextrous transmitter as a revolutionary idea. One thing is for sure, RC car fans can have no doubt that ARRMA designs things with a lot of thought and purpose. We personally haven’t heard of anyone swapping their ARRMA transmitter out for another type, but we’re sure it has happened. We’d say that more people like it than don’t like it, so we think that most ARRMA fans stay with their ATX-300.

BigSquidRC: We are all going outside to bash, you can bring 1 vehicle with you, what do you bring?

A Granite that’s been upgraded to brushless. It would be stupidly fast and more fun that we could say. Why doesn’t BigSquid put a brushless system into a Granite and review it in the only way BigSquid can?

BigSquidRC: Rally vehicles seem to be the flavor of the week. Is someone there working on a ARRMA Rally built from other ARRMA vehicles?

Maybe …

BigSquidRC: Will ARRMA make the jump to 4WD on any of their previously released vehicles?

4WD yes, but not based on any of our existing chassis. We’ll look at the design for the 4WD platform afresh, like we did for the current 2WD platform. We’ll only release it when it’s as good as we can make it though. If you mean, will you see a 4WD Granite and 4WD Fury, then almost certainly the answer is YES!

BigSquidRC: Thank you for your time, is there anyone you would like to thank?

Thank you for giving us the opportunity. We’d like to thank EVERYONE who has bought an ARRMA car. We’d like to thank everyone who owns an RC car, no matter who the manufacturer is. The more people who get into RC cars, the more we can all keep on having fun. Finally we’d like to thank BigSquid for honestly testing our cars and beating them up like no-one else. We know if an ARRMA car gets tenticles, it’s got to be
bullet-proof.

Thanks guys and have fun!

Our final giveaway vehicle in the Dozen Mystery Vehicle Contest!! Thanks to everyone for all their entries, and their comments in the last round!

The official winner is Tom Frankito!! (tfrankity@). You have won a brand new ARRMA Granite!! Congrats! An email has been sent to get your information!

Don’t worry if you didn’t win! Even though the Mystery Vehicle Contest is officially over, we have a TON of contests coming up. I believe we have enough stuff that we will be having a contest EVERY WEEK for the rest of the year! So keep your eyes on the front page!

Thanks to ARRMA for our 12th and final giveaway vehicle! The Granite is a awesome bashing vehicle, and we thought it would be a great way to end the contest.

Need more ARRMA news? Click HERE!

This is it! Our last week of the Dozen Mystery Vehicles Contest!
I’d like to thank everyone that has participated in the past 11 weeks! The contests were fun, and a great way to help give back to the readers!

We gave away one new vehicle a week for 12 weeks! The vehicles may by nitro or electric and are from the following companies: ARRMA RC, Team Durango, Duratrax, and Thunder Tiger!

IMPORTANT RULES:
To enter, tell us something you like or don’t like about BSRC in the comments below. Tell us what you think we are doing right or wrong. (We’d prefer more right!) Or tell us something you want us to do more of. Or that we don’t do, that we should.. we can take it.. I think. I’ll get Cubby some Kleenex.

ALL entries must be in by 8pm cst. Monday November 5th. And we will announce a winner at 10pm CST. Don’t worry, the winner will still be random from all valid entries.

Because of shipping issues, this contest is limited to the continental United States Only. Sorry. Getting radio and other equipment overseas and across boarders lately just isn’t that easy any more, and costly.

Comments are turned on for this post, if you feel in the mood to chat it up.
Good luck, and have fun!