ASK Cubby – Your Questions, My Question Dodging

“UDR VS SBR

I cannot find a solid answer, I read the review on both and saw that someone asked this already, but you were waiting to review UDR. Now that it’s been done can we finally get a clear answer?

Thanks,
Favian J.”

Cubby- Yo homeskillet, thanks for writing in. We will get ya out a sticker pack.

So what’s the final verdict? This one is easy- they just aren’t close enough in size to truly compare. The Losi Super Baja Rey has significantly larger tires, as well as a suitably larger overall form factor. The SBR is enough larger that it does get over ultra-rough ground easier than the Traxxas Unlimited Desert Racer.

The SBR is also set-up with bashing style suspension, meaning it is set up to drive warp 9, while the UDR is set-up for a perfectly scale driving appearance. At the end of the day, while both trucks are in the same neighborhood as each other, there are enough differences that it just isn’t fair to compare them side by side. Ya, I’ve seen tons of people already doing it on-line, but unless they are saying “they are too much difference in size to compare”, whatever they are saying is really gonna be stretching it.

So, which truck do you buy? Well, the Traxxas UDR offers up a driving experience like you’ve never had before. It does, it drives more scale than anything else we’ve ever tested. This unique new experience is VERY cool and VERY addicting.

On the other hand, if you are wanting to go fast and bash crazy hard over the roughest of terrain, then IMO your truck should be the SBR. It has the extra size, it is super tough, and it still packs an amazingly scale look.

You wanted it, there ya are…

“Hobbico sold to Horizon

Hey Cubby, Jimmy D here!

I thought I would write about the Horizon buying Hobbico situation. So it happened. I saw a lot of bloggers discussed this before we knew anything, and none them guessed that Horizon would buy out Hobbico. There was a lot of doomsday predictions, but none of that happened. You warned us about listening to random bloggers-and you were right.

I don’t have predictions, and I hope some the people that make decisions read this letter because I have some suggestions. A while ago you said the Vaterra brand should be selling better than it was. I agree- solid, good looking, well built products, packaging is nice, parts quality above average (in my opinon). Why aren’t they selling as well as they should be?

Lets discuss the Ascender. I recently built the Blazer kit. A great value for the price. That body rivals a Tamiya masterpice, and parts quality was well above another major scale competitor that starts with an A (not anymore, I guess they are all one now), and extremely well engineered – BUT- the directions were probably the worst directions I have ever dealt with. Leaving out a complete step for one of the links? Not showing how to fit the included masking for the body? Really? Ok, so I figured it out, and went online and saw many people discuss this issue, but alas, to my knowledge, the directions still lack this information.

Not the end of the world, but this one is. I have shorty lipo’s for my B6. Not many scaler folks own a shorty, and most bashers wouldn’t even think of getting one. I get the front suspension- weight over axle while flexing- it works really well. But even with the RTR’s, little Johnny cannot use an existing battery because he has to buy a shorty pack. Now my suggestion. Since now everyone is one big family- have the Hobbico people rewrite the directions and have them do something about the use of that shorty battery. Maybe a conversion kit? It may seem trivial, but you are already spending 4 bills, it would be nice to use a normal size battery and show how to use the included masking for the body. TRX-4 uses any battery anybody makes! (whoops- Ill keep this about Horizon.)

So Horizon announced before the Hobbico situation they would start carrying Team Associated products. I don’t think AE is affiliated with Hobbico, but since Horizon has TLR, why would they carry and promote the direct competition? Someone knew something before the official announcement. With the B6.1 just hitting shelves, and T6.1 and SC6.1 coming, I am still waiting the T6 and SC6??!! I guess ill hold off for the TLR SCT6.35 or the TLR 22.6-4×6.

Sorry to go on, but one more thing. I read a comment on the internet on the how the scaler shoot out was a mess. I read a lot of reviews and still subscribe to an actual paper magazine, and because I have or have had almost all the scalers in the review- I feel BigSquid was really accurate. Six different drivers, six opinions. Most reviews have one driver, one author and one opinion and if they do multiple drivers who are they? The authors neighbor or kid? At least we knew all the reviewers are hard core RC’ers. What was the feedback you got the scaler shootout?

Take care,
The Notorious Jimmy D.

P.S.-I know you get a lot of letters asking about how to upgrade this car or that car. Here is my suggestion. Slash 2wd- get the lcg chassis, Aluminum rear hubs, and front c-hubs, get every RPM part they make for it, get the RPM 3mm wider front arms, Pro-Line shocks (power strokes) all on 4 corners, fast steering servo, castle 3800 sct system, STRC hinge pins and front brace, and Pro-line Prime tires. 32 pitch gears (Slash 4×4 spur 58 tooth, 17 pinion) with no gear cover-it won’t fit and its the old school thing to do- Traxxas aluminum slipper pads (Revo spec?). Its almost bullet proof and really fast, runs cool-even at the track. The best part is if it breaks, you can get parts off the shelves and support the LHS or track.”

Cubby- Wow Jimmy, you are getting verbose in your old age! I kid, I kid, it’s always good to see a Jimmy D email.

First up, there are a LOT of things going on at Horizon Hobby right now. The picture on social media with the Horizon guys, ARRMA, Axial, etc, was pretty cool to see. While Horizon and Hobbico were basically at war for years, I think everybody realizes that we need to come together, we need to help each other, and that is the way it is going to be for the foreseeable future in our industry.

About the Ascender, ya, it was a risk mandating a shorty pack. In some applications that hurts it, you just can’t get the same capacity in a shorty that you can in a normal sized pack. However, I feel like the performance advantage of using a shorty pack is worth buying a new pack or two, and thankfully, shorty packs are fairly inexpensive.

Oh, so about Vaterra and Axial. Or ARRMA and Losi, ECX, etc. Horizon now has some competing product line-ups. This week they pretty much grabbed everyone and brought them in-house in Champaign to sit down, talk about things, get a good direction going forward, and to make future plans. We have zero idea what any of those plans are, but luckily for you guys, it looks like they are going above and beyond to put a smile on your face. For example, the latest Axial was announced yesterday. Obviously it was designed while Axial was still at Hobbico, but I think it shows consumers that Horizon wants to give you an early sign that they are 100% on-board with putting out new Axial products. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that Axial didn’t release many new trucks the last couple years. Money, or the lack thereof, was the reason behind that. Now, with Horizon, my pure guess is that Horizon will really support the Axial line, meaning they may very well go back to putting out plenty of new trucks to rock your world.

Lastly, about our scale shootout. Ya, most people have no idea the time, or work, involved with a legit shootout. Also, most totally wrote off our shootout because of their own Traxxas brand bias, but all you have to do is read the forums/FB groups now days to see we were not wrong, the results of our shootout stand clear. No, we won’t make anyone eat crow, but even the haters now have to realize we go by results here, not bias or $$$.

So there it is, another ASK Cubby has been uploaded to the web. This column doesn’t work without your questions, so feel free to send me an email – thecubreportrc at gmail dot com.

YOUR Cub Reporter