Advice and help on RC cars / vechicles etc

[Workaholic]

After watching 2 collegues race their electric and petrol remote/radio controlled cars in the private car park of the retail park, I got very interested and now want one too.

Now I know what type of bits I will need, but as I'm a beginner I was wondering if anyone knew any good trusty shops dealing in these (with a website) so that I can work out how much it will cost and see what shells/bodies I can get etc.

Better still if anyone knows of any such shops in Manchester that would be great (apart from the Model Shop )

Comments please, and how much should a beginner expect to spend on such a car?

[BenW]

You're best off asking your colleagues for shop recomendations, AFAIK there aren't really any nationwide RC car shops.

You need to work out if you want nitro or elecctric, personally i'd say go electric as they need bugger all maintenance and are cheap to run. But if you want to go the full way you can't beat a savage for pure enjoyment!

[Workaholic]

I have asked them for a few links but 5 hours on, nothing in my email inbox plus there's 2 of them and 15,000 members here who can give me input and comments.....

The petrol looks cool but the amount of leakage is a bit much plus petrol won't be as cheap as electric batteries.

[Funkstar]

i've always wanted a decent petrol one that i can build up from a kit, perhaps even an offroad capable one.

Not really interested in racing it, but it's the building and tuning etc. i'd like to have a go at

[Howard]

Paging TomWilko

[ctid]

In case you didnt see my other post:

www.modelsport.co.uk is a good site for rc stuff. I'd recommend you go for 1/10 scale electric stuff. It's the best for beginners, and can easily be upgraded if you get into it seriously.

Rather than buying for new, youre better off buying stuff used from somewhere like ebay. A couple of models you should look for are the Associated TC3 Factory Team and the Losi XXX-S.

If you want anymore info, PM me and ill give you my MSN address. I race 1/10 scale indoors electric in Stockport, so if you do get into it seriously, come down .

[listy]

if i had choice i would buy petrol one since they last alot longer and dont need loads of battery changes

batterys never used to last long when i had them but been few years now

[Lead_Head]

Paging TomWilko

He hasn't got one, it's mine he takes photo's off

You basically need to think about the following:

Nitro or Electric?
On road or Off Road? - Where will you be using it? What surfaces?
What type of car? Buggy? Monster truck, touring car?
How much you want to spend?
Do you have any experience in RC?

Basically, there are two types of RC 'vehicles' you can get... RTR or kit. RTR stands for ready to run. In this you'll get a trigger handset (transmitter or tx) and a ready built model car, including the engine installed etc. What you'll need to buy is batteries, glow starter and fuel(if nitro).

With a kit you get all the bits needed to build it, but they are all broken down and you have to build the vehicle yourself. This gives a good sense of satisfaction once it's complete, but when I got my Savage it took me around 6 hours to build from start to finish with the help of a mate. If your good at things like this then it's great, but if not it can be incredibly frustrating. The main benefit of building it from scratch is that when you break it (and I say when on purpose as it will happen) you know roughly how the broken part USED to look, and what bits you have to dismantle to repair or replace the part. Generally kits are more expensive as you need to purchase a handset, crystals to use, receiver, servo's, and again glow starter (or rotostart) and fuel for nitro along with batteries.

Take a look at a couple of sites....

www.microtechracing.com
www.modelsinmotion.com
www.JEspares.com (idea on prices for spare parts / upgrades)

[TomWilko]

I got scared there...if its about how to take photos of RC cars then I can give you some tips...how they run?? I don't know, I just wonder off taking other photos when Nicks car breaks

[Lead_Head]

See... told you they break *whistles in to the distance*

[bsodmike]

Get your self a savage RTR. They are hardy and are hard to break unless you are outright silly

boltonmodelmart.co.uk are said to be good too, but I tend to get all my stuff via TowerHobbies.com (US) and Amainhobbies.com(US) but the taxation on import tends to kill me - can't help it though as I'm after specific bits of kit.

http://www.bsodmike.com/gallery2/v/p.../project_logs/ << got a quite a few RCs listed there if you are interested. If you'd like to chat about RC, catch me via MSN and I can fill you in on the basics

Cheers, Mike