ASK Cubby- More Of Your Questions, Less Of My Answers

“Towerhobbies in the EU!!!!!!!!!!!

Hello and thanks to everyone at BigSquidRC, you guys really puts down a ton of work for us hobbyists. MUCH appreciated!

I´m on your website a few times every day, and have been for a couple of years to keep myself “up to date” in the rc world.

Back in the day (early 2000) I used to do alot of my shopping at Towerhobbies since the Swedish currency was strong and the tax was pretty low for importing stuff. Now days not so much.

The EU distributor for Arrma, Traxxas and many other big names uptil this year was a Swedish company called “Minicars” who had their main stock here in Sweden but not now after the Hobbico feud.

After the Searching the interwebs for a while I stumbled across that Horizonhobby (Who bought Arrma/pieces of Hobbico?) Now has a centralized EU stock in Germany. Went to the German Horizon website and in the upper right corner I immediately saw “Towerhobbies – Now in EU!”

Maybe I´m a late bloomer, but we need to get this info out there, maybe you guys already posted it on bigsquid but I missed it?

Thanks for everything you guys and gals do! Best regards from Sweden!

Manuel M.”

Cubby- Well hello there Manuel, thanks for the email. As always, shoot me your snail mail for a sticker pack.

Yes indeed, now all you European types can order from good old Tower Hobbies! That is some pretty awesome news for consumers, as well as for the crew at Tower. Right Here Is The Link for the Tower Hobbies German website, a link that should come in quite handy for some of our readers. 🙂

Also, thanks for the props, we will take all of them we can get. 🙂

“Any Tips on Saving Some Dough?

Hey Cubby!

I want to share some tips with the fellow readers on how to save some dough on upgrades! For example, check out my Gen 8 in the attached pic. The front grill isn’t really aluminum, it’s painted metallic silver from Testors paint in a tiny bottle. However this one tiny 5 dollar bottle seems to be enough to paint the tires and whatever else I want to look like aluminum for all of my vehicles! Like the front lower A arms of my Losi Baja Rey and more. I guess this might not be news to some or those with lots of money… But also check out my FPV cam! I use Eachine TX05 and ROTG02 receiver for Android and PC and they are a lot cheaper than buying an FPV goggle set. Lastly, ignore the Traxxas sticker on the hood, it’s just for looks, LOL! Do you guys have some other cheap hop-up ideas?

Thanks,

Tai Ming”

Cubby- Yo, nice rig Tai, and nice to see yet another FPV set-up on a crawler. IMO that is the segment where it is going to take off the fastest.

Cheap mods eh? Oh, thankfully this is rc where there are plenty of those. And while some bigger money mods definitely make a huge difference (like new tires, a new power system, etc), there are plenty of cheap (or free) mods that can also really enhance your driving experience.

For me, my favorite “cheap mod” is gearing. Some vehicles come geared about right, but most are slightly over, or under, geared. Pinions are a cheap way to gain more power, gain runtime, to lower motor temps, etc.

A free mod that first time crawler buyers may not know is to simply adjust the pre-load on their stock shocks. Most RTR rigs come with a gross amount of pre-load. After lowering/softening the pre-load on the shocks, a whole bunch of RTR crawlers instantly crawl a whole lot better. Zero dollars, takes about a minute, but makes a HUGE affect on the rock crawling capability of a truck.

The list is miles and miles long, readers should feel free to leave their best low, or no cost rc mods in the comment section below. 🙂

Have some crazy rc question? Need an even crazier answer? Have a rant that has been burning in the deepest parts of your soul since the last time you went bashing? Email me- thecubreportrc at gmail dot com.