ASK Cubby, 01.16.2014, Version- Your Healthy Questions, My Sic Answers

“Hey Cubby,
I implore you to please quit using the word manufacture when you should be using manufacturer. A manufacturer is the company that manufactures the products.
Thanks,
Joshua H.”

Cubby- Yo hey Josh, you’ve made the big time, hit Brian up with your snail mail for a BSRC sticker pack.
Ok, a couple quick things here-
1. While I merely dislike Grammar Nazis, what I really hate is a bad one, and that would be you. When other Grammar Nazis write in they typically list dozens of issues, you only list one. If you are gonna live in a dictionary the very least you could do is pay attention.

2. I’m betting you were born after the internet was, thus you’ll never know the freedom that comes from letting misspelled words go, using internet shorthand, using lots of …. before and after each sentence, etc. You see in the era I grew up we had teachers breathing down our necks ready to bust out the red pen of death for every “i” we forgot to dot. Sadly you’ll never know that feeling of “freedom” by writing however you want to like in the early days of the internet.

3. I’ve explained multiple times that BSRC made a conscience decision years ago to not look like the dinosaur media. While some former 5th grade English teacher may be proofing every sentence at a dinosaur mag, we basically don’t have anyone. We do it this way so our readers see we are human just like them, making a few mistakes here and there. We want our readers to know 100% that we are just like them, down in the trenches of rc, more worried about how high the new HPI Octane truck can jump than the finer points of the written English language.

“I need expert advice
I’m a gearhead looking for a new hobby. Drag racing has gotten cost prohibitive and I stumbled across the RC world just recently. I’ve done a lot if reading and you guys have become my favorite source of what seems to be unbiased info.
I know from reading your stuff that I am going to be a basher so I need your opinion of the best 4×4 sct rtrs in electric and nitro. I love the test result and review of the ECX Torment but it was a 2wd. I live in rural Arkansas so parts will be mail order.
I only know what I read, mainly on Big Squid, so I can use any help you’re willing to give.
Thanks,
Chad P.”

Cubby- Ya know Chad, we have really worked hard to attempt to be unbiased, but… I am absolutely sure that we are. When it comes review time we attempt to blind test as much as we can and spread out our test ratings over as many reviewers as possible to fight this, but in the end it is impossible to be unbiased.

And why is it that I think it is impossible that we are unbiased? Because some companies treat us extremely well, while others treat us like dirt, so of course we can’t help but want to “like” the companies that treat us awesome. Still, when it comes review time, we do our best to block all that out.

Anywhos… on to your question. What are the best 4×4 SCT RTRs? You want the list for electric and nitro, but I am gonna stamp out the nitro thing right now. You might be a big-time gear head, but at this point I would never recommend nitro to anyone. Why? Yes, they have the sound and smell of the real deal, but with current technology they are a PITA to keep tuned and running.

With that said… several of our staffers are big fans of the Traxxas Slash 4×4, while we have others that are big fans of the Losi SCTE platform. I have only bought 3 cars in the last year, one of which was a Losi SCTE (then I added the MIP conversion and some STRC and RPM parts). To give you a feel for how much I like the SCTE, I can pretty much shoot a text to whoever I want and get a free car, however I actually cut the check to buy an SCTE. The SCTE rails on the track and you can torture the heck out of it when bashing. The SCTE is one of those rare vehicles that can do it all, and it comes in at a reasonably affordable price point.

But then… if you talk to other members of our Bash Crew they will emphatically recommend the Traxxas. It certainly has some upsides, with parts availability being at the top of the list.

Thanks for the props and whatever you end up buying shoot us an email and let us know how it turned out.

That’s it for this week ya freaks. Shoot me an email to Cubby at BigSquidRC.com. If your letter hits the front page you’ll win a free sticker pack, if I proclaim yours as letter of the month you’ll win an uber new BSRC t-shirt.

YOUR Cub Reporter