oOple 2010 Austria Euros Coverage
oOple’s server is sadly down, so they’ve wacked up the Euros report on another site, so you can still get all your oOpley goodness.
So far Lee Martin topped 2wd, can he do the double in 4wd too? He’s racing a Tamiya Manta Lee out in Austria. His team-mate Marc is running a Manta Rhein. How many more Manta Ray jokes can I come up with? And where’s Jamie Booth when you need him?
Check it out here: http://10thoffroad.com
Written by simon.
Tamiya TRF 2wd Buggy
Tamiya TRF 2WD Prototype Satoshi Maezumi (Pic: Jun Watanabe)
It’s been many years since a proper Tamiya 2wd racing buggy. And now finally there’s one on the way.
There’s a pre-production prototype being raced by TRF team drivers, and photos are slowly leaking out.
It was first spotted at the Yatabe Arena being raced by Satoshi Maezumi. And now there’s (at least) one in the UK, it appeared at PDA piloted by Lee Martin.
Tamiya TRF 2WD Prototype Lee Martin @ PDA (Pic: Ross Whitelock)
(Pics of Lee’s 2wd at PDA by Ross Whitelock, click here to see full set on Ross’ site.)
So from the photos, and the gossip, what does it appear to be so far?
It’s all pretty traditional 2wd layout, rear motor affair, but we don’t expect Tamiya to reinvent the wheel, they know better than that, just improve on what already works.
The details?:
- Moulded tub chassis
- Rear motor
- Front TRF dampers behind moulded front shock tower
- Rear TRF dampers behind moulded rear shock tower
- Rear wishbones from 511
- Rear hubs from 511
- Rear driveshafts NOT from 511
- Bearing in wheel front wheel fitment
- Cells down centre
- Servo in front of cells
- 511 steering rack
- Body clip wing mounting
- Moulded rear motor guard
- Slipper clutch
- 3 gear gearbox
- 511 type ball diff with geared pulley
It all looks very familiar, suitable for Tamiya to do a normal ‘plastic’ kit, at a cheap price, and a TRF bells and whistles carbon fibre one.
I had a quick chat with Lee, and got a few confirmations out of him, and it’s close to production and the above list is pretty accurate…
One rumour is it is to be released end of May. There’s the Euros warm-up around then, so I guess we’ll see lots there. I’m certainly sure we’ll get it this year though.
But, the big question, what will it be called? 211? 212? Manta Lee?
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- Tamiya TRF 2WD Prototype Lee Martin @ PDA (Pic: Ross Whitelock)
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- 511 rear suspension (Pic: Ross Whitelock)
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- Rear motor (Pic: Ross Whitelock)
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- Tyre… (Pic: Ross Whitelock)
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- Big Air (Pic: Ross Whitelock)
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- Underside (Pic: Ross Whitelock)
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- Tamiya TRF 2WD Prototype Satoshi Maezumi @ Yatanabe Arena (Pic: Jun Watanabe)
Written by simon.
Has RC Ever Been This Big?
Just lately I’ve been amazed at the amount of effort going into the RC car industry. The sheer number of manufacturers, tracks, racers, specialised press websites etc is so encouraging. Has RC ever had it so good?
The Cars
So many manufacturers are out there these days. Back in the day there used to be the big ones, such as Tamiya, Kyosho, Associated, Schumacher, Yokomo, Losi.
But now we have fantastic efforts coming out of much smaller companies such as Xray, Durango, V-Dezign, Atomic Carbon. And that’s by far not a comprehensive list.
And these new companies are winning too – V-Dezign did jolly well in the recent 12th Euros.
Durango is busy, no sooner has it brought out a 4wd buggy than we’ve seen not one, but two flavours of 2wd prototype.
And Tamiya seems back on form with it’s TRF efforts, topping the touring car and off-road mains everywhere. It too seems to be working on a 2wd buggy as well.
So much development is happening at grass-roots level too. People such as Fabien Simonini busy working on a mid-motor chassis for the RB5. And other’s working on their own custom chassis cars.
It’s all so very healthy, a lot of competition, a lot of manufacturers.
The Racers
RC really does have professional racers these days it seems. Manufacturers are now employing top racers to race and develop products for them.
Watching the international reports, you see some of the top guys racing all around the world, all the time. One week they’ll be in Europe, and the next in the Far East. Racing multiple classes, working hard.
And club racing has never been so good. In my local area there’s no less than 3 or 4 clubs within 10 miles or so. And I’ve heard of some local clubs getting 70-100 drivers for normal club meetings, OUTSIDE IN WINTER!
That all means there’s more and more racers all the time.
The Tracks
Tracks come and go, but there’s been more and more interest in the UK of late for indoor facilities. Maritime, PDA, Ardent are all excellent indoor facilities.
Then you look overseas and see even more amazing facilities that must have cost someone tens of thousands to set up. Multiple tracks open all week long. Sounds brilliant!
And it’s not stopping, I know of several more tracks that are in the planning stages in the UK. There are certainly some gaps to fill geographically…
I’d predict in the next 5 years we’ll have year-round racing on whatever surface you desire.
The Press
There’s many websites out there now, Red RC, oOple, RCRaceChat, RCTech, etc, etc, etc, there’s dozens of them. I can’t keep up. I should probably get my act together and create a directory of them.
These sites are mostly amateur affairs, but more it seems they are gaining sponsorship, especially to cover large events. The quality of event coverage has increased so much in the last year or two.
And we’re not only limited to words and pictures, video is getting bigger and bigger. And RC Racing on Motors TV is bringing RC direct to the television too.
The Future?
I guess where all this is heading is soon the sport will move out of it’s traditional cocoon, and begin attracting sponsorship from companies outside the sport.
And when that happens, more and more money will start pouring into the sport, meaning bigger and better everything.
What will we all do? We’ll carry on messing around with toy cars!
Written by simon.
PDA Dirt Challenge
This weekend sees the first PDA Dirt Challenge.
A 2 day event at the Proline Dirt Arena for 1/10th off-road, 2wd (and short course trucks) on Saturday, 4wd on Sunday.
4 qualifying rounds, plus finals, and finals will be in the Nirto popular double-sided christmas tree format. So opportunities for bumping up finals.
Team rcLazy are racing both days, and are expected to finish in the lower finals. The organisers certainly think they will, judging by where they’ve been placed in the heats…
A dirty weekend!
Written by simon.
Tamiya Minis at YMCC
Dan from Blink Studio got in touch with this ace video, the Yateley track looks ace fun for the little front wheel drivers.
Prediction: in-car / on-car video is going to be big in 2010…
