ASK Cubby – Your Weekly Questions, My Notorious Responses

“Cub Report Question

Hey Cubby,

I love running my trucks around larger outdoor tracks but am not really into racing. What do you think would be a good basher type tuck to take to a larger track to have some serious fun? I like the new Arrma trucks and the new Losi Rock Rey could be a lot of fun. Any thoughts?

Thanks,

Tim N.”

Cubby- Whoa T-Dog, guess what? Yup, I proclaim yours as our “Letter of the Month”. What that means to you is that you are extra cool, and that you need to send us your snail mail and shirt size for a free BSRC t-shirt. Yes, you are welcome.

Oh ya, about that question of yours…

Large outdoor tracks tend to get really rough. Rain can cause lots of ruts, plus they typically have large jumps. For optimal ease of driving, plus the ability to turn really fast lap times, I would go with a 1/8th scale truggy like the ARRMA Talion or the Kraton. These will jump the best, plus their large tires will do a better job of ignoring stutter bumps and rain ruts.

However… if you are just going out for the fun of it, ya, the just announced Losi Rock Rey should be a blast. I have yet to pull trigger on one, but it should have way more power than you would need, plus it will have the scale appearance that is so in style right now.

As always, shoot me a picture of whatever you cut the check on and how it worked out for you down at your local track.

“Worst

Cubby, in your opinion and with your infinite wisdom, what is the worst rc car ever made? Why?

Daniel W.”

Cubby- Yo Danny Boy, what’s up? Thanks for the email, don’t forget to send us an email with your snail mail for an ultra-rad sticker pack.

What is the worst rc car that I can think of? Well… there are two that really stick out in my mind.

The first was some type of Ofna RTR nitro 1/8 buggy from around the year 2002. Wow, you wanna talk about a steaming pile of junk, I wish I could remember the exact model number, but I am an old fart after all so it currently escapes me. Anyways, a friend in the industry shipped me one because I was wanting an 8th scale nitro burner to run at an event over a particular weekend. I received it Friday night but didn’t get a chance to break it in until I hit the track on Saturday morning. The thing started dropping bolts while idling on my pit table, I could sit there and just watch them fall out and rattle around on my pit table. Yes, that was a bad way to begin our short lived relationship.

Also… the engine was simply un-tunable!!! And once you “sorta” had it tuned, it would change all over the place when actually being driven. Oh and, it didn’t drive for very long as it kept on dropping bolts all over the track leading me to DNF all three of my quals. I didn’t even attempt to race my “E” main, I walked over to the nearest 50 gallon trash barrel and simply dropped it in. Yes, I saw some kids scrambling to get their hands on it, but I sure didn’t want anything else to do with THAT buggy, and I felt VERY sorry for the poor guy that actually won the tug-o-war match after digging that buggy out of the trash.

The second vehicle was the original Losi XX-4 buggy. WOW, that buggy handled fantastic, but saying that it loved to break is an understatement. For example, I was racing in indoor track one winter, one that was heated. It wasn’t hot inside the building, but warm enough to keep parts from snapping all the time. Anyways, I got there early on day and walked over to the track to get some practice in. I leaned over and dropped my XX-4 from about a foot off the ground to put it on the track. Yup. It broke. I leaned back over, picked it up, and headed back to my pit spot to start wrenching. However… that’s when things really got ugly, it was such a P I T A to work on. Even the simplest of things could take 45 minutes to repair. My XX-4 was a car that broke by just looking at a pipe wrong and was a true pain to wrench on. I ran that thing an entire winter season before finally coming to my senses.

Oh and… we really take durability for granted now days. When a truck finally breaks after a half dozen roof jumps we seem to be disappointed. We really should appreciate just how good cars are today.

Wow, don’t ya feel better after getting your weekly dose of ASK Cubby? I know I sure do. Before you forget, shoot me an email- thecubreportrc at gmail dot com. If your letter doesn’t suck and makes our front page you’ll get a free BSRC sticker pack. If I make yours our “Letter of the Month” you get one of uber t-shirts!

YOUR Cub Reporter