Losi Ten-MT Monster Truck Review
Losi, once a brand for racers only, is now a company known as much for great bash machines as it is for winning national championships. Over the last few months we’ve been driving, jumping, crashing, and generally abusing the Ten-MT Monster Truck, a truck that Losi has produced to help dominate the basher market. The Ten-MT is pure basher with big tires, 4wd, and AVC stability control. What did the BigSquidRC Bash Crew think of it? Can it take hit? How does jump? Does its brushless power plant put out big power? Keep on reading to find out our thoughts on the Losi Ten-MT bash machine from Horizon Hobby…
From: Losi
Direct Link: Ten-MT Monster Truck
Review By: Cubby
Photography By: Tim Mohr
Specs:
RTR or Kit: RTR
Age: 14+
2wd or 4wd: 4wd
Shaft or Belt: Shaft
Electric or Gas: Electric
Waterproof: Yes
Scale: 1/10th
Length: 18″
Width: 13.2″
Wheelbase: 12.4″
Weight: 5.3 lb
Motor: Dynamite Fuze 550 sized, 3800kV
Speed Controller: Dynamite Fuze 130A brushless
Low Voltage Cut-off: Yes
Radio: Spektrum DX2E 2.4GHz with AVC stability control
Differential: 3 gear style diffs
Slipper Clutch: No
Driveshafts: CVD style front & rear, bones in center
Final Drive Ratio: 11:1
Shocks: Oil filled, plastic bodies & caps
Servo Saver: In steering rack
Screws: Hex hardware
Spur/Pinion Pitch: 1.0 Module
Bearings: Yes
Tires: Losi, off-road tread
Battery: Not included
Part Number: #LOS03006T1
Warranty: “Horizon Hobby warranties the product to be free of defects at the date of purchase.”
Bashing Specs:
Front wheel travel: 2.4″
Rear wheel travel: 2.6″
Wheelie on demand: Sometimes
Backflip off ramps: Yes
Stability Control: Yes, Spectrum AVC
Sound Module: No
Self-Righting: No
FPV: No
Top Speed (measured by BSRC on 2S 5000): 40 mph
Runtime (measured by BSRC on 2S 5000): 10 minutes
Street Price: $399
Primary Competition: Oh yes, the Ten-MT faces some major competition like the Traxxas Stampede 4×4, the ECX Ruckus 4×4, the Helion Invictus 10MT, and the HPI Bullet Flux MT.
What’s Needed To Complete: You will need to supply a 2 or 3S LiPo battery and a charger.
Build Quality: We found no fault with the build quality of our review sample. The wheel nuts were tight and the tires were well glued. The gear mesh was spot on, the shocks were well built and not leaking, and we did not find any loose or stripped screws.
Test Drivers: Our typical crew of Iron Mikeee, Robbie G., Sam The Noobie, T-$$$, and myself were the people responsible for torturing on our test unit.
Test Venues: RC Outlaws 1/8th scale outdoor track, a Costco parking lot, and several local parks were used to put the Ten-MT through the wringer.
Set-up Notes: Per the norm during one of our reviews, we tested the Losi box stock. For juice we used both a Dynamite Reaction 30C 2S 5000mAh LiPo and a 3S Maxamps pack. Battery charging duties were handled by a Hitec X1 Pro.
Turning: Just like a real race machine, the Losi had a ton of steering. The stock tires didn’t have a huge amount of side bite, but the Ten-MT still tended to have its front wheels glued to terra-firma in corners. The rear was actually quite loose in turns, making it ultra-easy to “point and shoot” around tight corners. In one word the cornering of the Ten-MT could be described as “aggressive”, an attribute that is great for seasoned drivers but can make the truck hard to handle for first timers.
Jumping: Unfortunately, we were not able to test the Ten-MT back-to-back against it competitors. We sure wish we could have because we felt it was an incredibly good jumper, perhaps the best in its class, but we could not confirm without have a few of its competitors to go back-to-back with. Anyways, because the Ten-MT runs a center diff, we felt it was substantially easier to jump than some of the other trucks in its class. Yes, the tires on the Ten-MT have a lot rotating mass so it does respond with authority when giving trigger inputs in the air, but they were not as abrupt as a truck with no center diff. The suspension did a great job on landings, even huge ones, and the general geometry of the suspension seemed to do a great job of launching the truck straight off of jump faces. The Losi really is a pleasure to jump and is generally easy to keep level while airborne. Furthermore, the Ten-MT also has its extreme side- it has a bunch of RPM on tap should you want to keep in the throttle and go for backflips.
Bumps/Whoops: We thought the Ten-MT was arguably the best handling truck in its class over rough terrain. We have a standard stretch of gnarly terrain that we run pretty much every one of test trucks over during reviews and the Ten-MT was able to pound through it amazingly well. And not just amazingly well for a 1/10th scale monster truck, but even better than some trucks that are much larger. The guys at Losi really got the suspension geometry and settings dialed for gnarly terrain.
On-Road: So far you’ve learned that the Losi is outstanding off-road so perhaps you’ll be surprised to find out it also did a great job on-road. The truck has a low center of gravity for a monster truck, thus allowing it to be a bunch of fun when driven on pavement. Sure, it can and does traction roll when cornered hard at speed, but once you learn to ease into corners it can be driven quite aggressively without flipping. Better still, the AVC works amazingly well on the Ten-MT, especially on pavement. We turned up the AVC when on pavement and the truck handled even better. If your normal bash routine involves a lot of pavement, the Losi will impress you with what a monster truck can actually do when set-up correctly.
Grass: And… the gushing doesn’t stop quite yet, the Losi is a freak’n animal in grass. The tires are well suited for grass running, while its 4wd and gnarly power system make it rocket over/through normal height grass. However, one of its downsides does start to show itself in grass, motor temp. Running in grass will get the motor hot in a hurry with stock gearing.
Tires: While not the best all around tires on the market, the stockers did a well above average job for RTR tires. Soft, open cell foam comes inside and we found that they were best suited for running in loam, but still had decent grip on pavement. Also, like previously mentioned, we absolutely loved how they worked in grass.
Power: No worries here, the Losi Ten-MT has a LOT of power out of the box, even on 2S. The truck is geared very tall, yielding a 40 mph top end on 2S with tons of rip through the mid-range. The speedo isn’t the smoothest, in fact it feels extremely soft right off the bottom (and can cog or delay on occasion), but rips through the mid-range and has tremendous power on top. Even on 2S the truck is extremely fast, 3S turns it truly psycho. Yes, you can bolt in more power with an aftermarket system, but the stock system has more pull than 99% of user will ever need.
Radio: The Losi comes with the Spektrum DX2E which we found to be a solid RTR unit. We didn’t experience any glitching and it had more range than we needed during our testing. The reason the Ten-MT comes with the DX2E is to help run AVC electronic stability control, which we rarely use in 4wd vehicles, but found it extremely handy on the Ten-MT. With the loose rear end on the Losi, the AVC was able to immediately calm down its handling, thus making it easy for even noobs to drive. Also of note, back in the early days of AVC, the stability control would limit turning radius, but we didn’t feel that was the case on this truck. Even with the AVC turned way up it could still make tight corners.
Broken Parts: If you are going to be one of the best trucks in this product category, you had better be exceptionally tough. Early in testing we somehow managed to break one of the plastic shock caps, but went on to abuse the truck for weeks without any more breakage. In the end we had to resort to extreme bashing to break parts, but even then the truck took some impressive beatings without breaking anything. Yes, we did break a few parts here and there, but less than we expected from how hard we were beating on it.
Misc Notes:
The Ten-MT comes with a paper manual with a fully exploded parts layout. This makes it easy to get part numbers when you break or wear something out.
The Ten-MT comes with a bottom loading battery tray. It doesn’t need one and none of the other Ten based trucks have one. We found it to be a pain. Why? Because the first time you can open it with your fingers, after that it takes an extra wide flat blade screwdriver (or use just use a quarter) to get it open.
For a truck at a $399 price point we were disappointed that it didn’t come with adjustable turnbuckles. Sure, the stock non-adjustable units make it easy to not to screw up camber or toe, but more serious drivers will want to adjust those for better handling.
We touched on this a bit earlier under the “Power” category, but the slight delay in throttle right off the bottom became quite irritating. Once again, for a truck at a $399 price point it should have a seamlessly smooth throttle response.
Part of the throttle issue might be that the truck is over geared out of the box. Sure, 40 mph on 2S is a lot of fun, but we were seeing motor temps over 170 degrees Fahrenheit during ambient temps of only 50 degrees. A motor can temp of 170 is starting to really push it and when driven on a warmer day that number would have been much higher. Also of note, we did do some testing on 3S and motor temps rocketed even higher. We would not recommend that you run the truck on 3S without installing lower gearing (if you want the stock motor to actually live).
14mm wheel hexes? We thought that was a typo but found out differently, they are indeed 14mm. What does that mean? 14mm hexes can take more power than industry standard 12mm units, but it also means that the vast majority of wheels on the market simply will not fit.
Oh, and about those wheels… they sure look good, but are a pain to work with. How is that? They come with a scale wheel nut cover that takes three screws to get off. Actually, there are 6 “screws” on each wheel nut cover, but three of them are fake. Once you get the wheel nut cover off, then you find a wheel nut that is sized where none of the tools that come with the truck will take it off.
Is the Ten-MT a “real” Ten series truck? “Sort of” would be our answer. It doesn’t come with the nice aluminum chassis and uber motor mount that comes standard on the Ten-SCTE or Ten-SCBE, it comes with a plastic chassis, a bottom load battery, and a much cheaper motor mount. The geometry and driving performance seems to be in the same league, but the Ten-MT isn’t on par, design wise, as the other Losi Ten series vehicles.
Best Mod: A smaller pinion. Give Robinson Racing some cash and order up a smaller pinion so you can run 3S power on an extended basis.
Summary:
A = Outstanding/Best in Class, B = Above Average, C = Average, D = Below Average, F = Horrific
Time To Bash: B It takes very little time to take the Ten-MT from the box to the bash spot. Pop in the included AA batteries for the transmitter, than slide in a fully charged 2S LiPo, and you are ready to do some extreme bashing.
Workability: B The Ten-MT uses a relatively open layout with hex hardware that we found easy to work on.
Car Show Rating: B Our review drivers all found the Ten-MT to be an attractive truck. The wheel/tire combo was stellar looking and we thought the body & wing also had a sharp look.
Bash-A-Bility: B Our test truck was quite tough. The BigSquidRC Bash Crew pounded on the truck for weeks with only a handful of broken parts to show for it.
Fun Factor: A For pure driving fun factor, we put the Ten-MT at the top of this category. It has gnarly power and stellar overall handling. Its “grin factor” was one of the best we’ve experienced, regardless of scale or price. It can be gently bashed around a cul-de-sac, or extreme bashed off of 4 foot tall ramps, it doesn’t seem to care, it just keeps putting a smile on your face.
Handling: A Like we often say, only a shootout can tell if the Losi is truly the best handling truck in its class. We do know that it handles exceptionally well on an extremely wide variety of surfaces. In fact, it just might be one of the best overall handling vehicles we’ve ever tested, regardless of scale or type.
Value: A While the Losi is more expensive than some of its competition, it is cheaper than others. At the end of the day we felt it has the best “bang for the buck” in its class.
Parts Availability: C Parts for the Ten-MT are easily available on-line but you won’t find them on the pegs at every local hobby shop.
BigSquid Rating: B+ We aren’t even going to beat around the bush here, the Losi Ten-MT is a fantastic bash truck. It has category leading handling and the type of power that “extreme” bashers will appreciate. No, it isn’t the perfect monster truck, but it gave us hours upon hours of fun, exactly what a great monster truck should do.
