F201 rubber on F104 wheels

Tamiya recently released rubber tires for the F104. They have been in limited supply so far. And even slower to become available were the wheels. I finally got a set from tamiyausa.com last week. But my tires are still in the mail from Hong Kong… So while I waited I wanted to try some Type-A F201 wheels (as I have tons of them from an ebay auction that I lucked out on) .

First off I wanted to do some size comparison.

Item	Front Width	Rear Width	Diameter F/R
F201 #50936	32mm	36.8mm	39.85mm
F104 #51398	30mm	34.95mm	44.85mm

The F201 wheels are smaller but wider than the F104 wheels. The groves that the rubber tires slide over are beefier on the F104 as well.

Some comparisons to the Foam tires.

If you look closely you can see the tire taking on a concave shape. I haven’t driven this yet so I have no idea on how the handling and grip is going to be affected by this. The front tire will have a lot more grip than the foam one, it always puzzled me why the front foams aren’t as wide as the rim.

So there you have it, a F201 tire will fit a F104 rim. Time will tell if it’s a good idea or not :) When I get my F104 tires I’ll take some more pics for comparison.

F104 Softening the rear

Going to put the Soft T-Bar on the F104 soon.

Also, I got my hands on some hard friction damper grease. Last time I was at the track it was a fail of epic proportions, my F104 was un-drivable. The weather was cool for southern California (60’s F), not sure what conditions they recommend this for but I bet it’s hot. Tamiya makes a medium and a soft version as well. I’m interested in getting the soft one to see what the difference is.

Tamiya Formula Tuned Motor

When I first got my F014 I used the silver can motor with a gear ratio of 4.16:1 and it felt pretty good to me. But when Tamiya announced their Formula Tuned motor I had to try it out. At the time the only place I could get it from RCMart and on their product details section it said that the recommended gear ratio for this motor is 3.7-3.75. I’ve only used this at the Tamiya track in Aliso Viejo, CA with a gear ratio of 3.72:1 a couple of times and it made for a lot of torque that didn’t fit my driving style (I’m still a Novice don’t forget :)). Had to be super careful on the throttle coming off the corners or I would spin.

The last time I went, my car suddenly stopped. I thought it was a receiver or battery problem at first, but when I popped the body off I found that the end bell had popped off and that one of the brushes had broke! So now I’ll have to find a different motor to use in my F104. Any recommendations?

Classic Tamiya gone?

www.classictamiyarc.com was one of my favorite sites, now it's gone? Anyone know what happened to it?

GoPro HD Hero arrived

Yesterday I picked up my GoPro HD Hero from my local REI store, I know it might seem like a weird place for an RC enthusiast to pick up a camera. But Since everyone is selling this for $299.99 the smartest thing for me was the free in store pickup shipping option and the 10% dividend :)

I already have the GoPro Hero Wide and the first thing I noticed when getting the HD version was that it was heavier. I quick check on my cheap spring loaded kitchen scale confirmed this. Fully loaded the HD camera weighs ~185g/6.5oz and the wide weighs ~150g/5.25oz. About half of that weight gain comes from the camera itself the other half is the difference between the new battery and a couple of AAA lithium batteries. Adding more weight up high on an RC car is not good news, but this camera more than makes up for that with it’s phenomenal quality.

The HD version is also slightly bigger than the Wide version, but not by much. See pictures below.

From left to right the (crappy) epic stealthcam, gopro hero wide and gopro HD hero.

The HD hero comes with two rear plates, the one that comes mounted is waterproof and the optional one is not waterproof but is great for anything moving less than 100mph (according to the manual). I instantly switched the plates and the sound quality is much improved.

The HD version still takes SD card slots, but supports higher capacity SDHC cards. I picked up a 8GB Sandisk Ultra II card.

I did a couple of very quick runs outside my house with the two settings I’ll use the most.

1920x1080p @ 30fps (Angle of View: 127º)

1280x720p @ 60 fps (Angle of View: 170º)

The results are just AMAZING, what a great camera! I’m really really impressed by this and can’t wait to take it to the Tamiya track in Aliso Viejo, CA. Another great thing about this camera is that it now records MP4 files that you can just pop right into your PS3 and play (the hero wide had a less common avi codec).

Full specs for the HD Helmet Hero

Full specs for the Motorsports Hero Wide

If there’s one thing I would improve upon it would be to offer a cheaper version of this camera without TV out capability. I can honestly say I will always play the videos/pictures from SD card and never ever connect the video cables that come with the kit. Other than that, another great product from GoPro!

Honda S2000 Conversion

I bought an Alfa Romeo a while back, but I really don't like driving it. A couple of guys at my work have S2000’s so I wanted to show them how good the Tamiya kits are. (and if I got someone else bitten by the RC bug, that would be an added bonus).

The Alfa uses the 60D wheels, but the S2000 uses GT sized wheels, I found someone in the UK that had the S2000 wheels (but realized later that Tamiya has them #0445588 doh!)... I had some spare Racing Semi-Slicks (50810) so I put those on.

The Alfa is M04M and the S2000 is M04L, so I needed the little piece that goes between the gearbox and the main body, this comes with the M04 F Parts (50851).

So, do I like driving the M04L in S2000 form better than the Alfa? No, not really, I think I need to spend some time on the setup, it still wants to swap ends all the time…

53884 TA05 Carbon Battery Plate Set

The Porsche Turbo RSR 49400 kit was pretty carbon fibred out, except for the battery plate cover. Which is plastic. So the idea is/was to tape a TLU01 and TLU02 unit to either of the two covers and be able to more quickly swap that way. But there’s a snag. The carbon battery plate fits rather poorly, at least it does on the 49400. Some dimensions for comparison below.

Battery Cover	plate thickness	Post hole diameter
Plastic	4.9mm	6.2mm
Carbon	2mm	6.5mm

you can click on the images below to see a larger view, notice the much tighter fit of the plastic part on the left.

The thing that puzzles me the most is that there’s a 3mm difference in plate thickness, but the blue aluminum mount screws that come with the plate (goes nice with the rest of the 49400) have the snap pin holes in the exact same place as the mount screws for the plastic plate!? As a matter of fact, since the pin hole is slightly smaller, it’s a bit higher. The remedy for this (according to the instructions that accompany part 53884) is: “Cut screw-thread in advance using kit-supplied mount screw” I’m not sure what that means exactly… My guess is that they want me to cut the plastic posts that he mount screws are supposed to go into? Which maces it impossible for me to switch back to the plastic one (remember what I wrote earlier about being able to trying to have LED units taped on one of these).

 

Instead of cutting the plastic posts I put some sponge tape on the back of my carbon plate, unfortunately the kind I have isn’t thick enough to prevent the plate from being loose.

The part comes with a different snap pin, which is much harder to remove, I decided not to use it. Below, the plastic plate on the left, notice the gap still present on the right and imagine the slop without the sponge tape!

Finally a couple of shots of the two different plates from further back.

So in conclusion, the carbon plate and the blue aluminum mount screws improve the look of the kit but it fits very poorly out of the bag. Had Tamiya drilled their snap pin holes 3mm further down on the mount screws and made the holes on the carbon plate the same as their plastic plate this would only have been a one picture post about how sweet it looked!