TOPIC:

I allways wanted The Fox, and remember dreaming away looking at the Fox in the Tamiya RC Guide Book among other vehicles.

Two weeks ago I was on Facebook on just stumbled upon a Fox for sale in a Norwegian Tamiya page, not only was it for sale, but it was free!
My fingers could not type fast enough, and if it was bad it was at least cheap as I only had to pay for shipping.

Included in the package was also a spare chassis tub with some Thundershot suspension added and a Futaba Attack-R transmitter.
The latter got banged up during transport due bad wrapping of the items, or the lack of wrapping if you will.
Bubble wrap and plastic bags were all laying loose in the box.
Think I can take off the dented metal strip on the transmitter and straighten it up as I'm a bit found of the transmitters of that era.

What are a thread without pictures? A bad one, so here are some

It is a bit rougher state than the seller pictures would lead to, but at least it's in better shape than the Falcon I got last year, chassis bit anyway....

But the badly painted body have seen better days, don't think I bother to fix this one up.

And I mean really badly painted..

Cracks everywhere

The best part of the body is actually the wing..

And the yellow paint is painted on the outside.
Seems like the orginal color of this body were black.

Chassis pics.
The chassis seems to be a bit crooked for some reason.
Shocks are actually not sticking, rare case for me.

After the spare chassis were taken apart and dumped in a soapbath, I took off the upper chassis.
Both upper chassis bits were chopped in half right before the driver location, and both upper parts were glued to the bottom chassis over the battery area like you see here.
So at least I need one upper chassis bit.
Both bottom halfes are actually allright with no cracks if the glued area got fixed.

Clean this glue mess up I have a perfectly good chassis to work on...

And as I said both upper half bits were glued and chopped.
I see the reason behind the chopping, but not the glue bit...

Next up I will present the transmitter and spare chassis and the the task of cleaning and inspecting parts begins.
But for less than £20 it was worth it so far

And here is the spare chassis with some Thundershot suspension parts.

And the Futaba Attack-R transmitter. I have several of these in my collection

Dents after shipping

And there was several spare parts included.
The 540 motors went straight to the skip as these were worn out.
The houshold screws were also binned.
One detail, I have never owned a rubber boot for those on/off switches before, may come handy in the future

Hope there is not to much damaged parts on these vehicles. but time will tell.
If anyone has a upper chassis that are intact and willing to part with it, I'm your man

I also think this is a mid production model as it has the oval damper tool in the included parts bin, The earliest wariant had a round tool, Tamiya changed that as customers had a habit to leave the tool inside the dampers so the cap would pop off due the cap only been threaded by a couple of threads.
At least that what I've found so far

Nice find Richard. I should have some spares I have to look in my mess.

stingray-63 wrote:

Nice find Richard. I should have some spares I have to look in my mess.

Thank you for looking

So far these parts are needed:

# 50211 Two terminal resistor.
# 1x resistor mounting plate.
# 1x resistor heat shield.
# Top half of chassis (may try to epoxy my two halfes together if not obtained-or buy a new chassis)

Seems some of my screw holes have no grip in them anymore.
Any tips to add meaterial while using the stock screw?

That's a really nice project, Caprinut. I also have an affection for those period transmitters; the Attack R holds particularly fond memories. Great haul with only shipping to pay.

Sam wrote:

That's a really nice project, Caprinut. I also have an affection for those period transmitters; the Attack R holds particularly fond memories. Great haul with only shipping to pay.

Yeah I think I was lucky on that deal

Majority of the parts are now cleaned.

Got real lucky on the main car, nothing broken or cracks in the main chassis. Just the glue mess area and some sort of paint splashes on the tub here and there.
Ditto on the suspension arms, not a crack, and that's rare after reading several threads online.
The front suspension bulkhead mounts are also good.
The complete steering assembly is still present.
Complete radio gear incl MSC - not tested yet.
There is also included the BigWig type steel antenna pole.

The bad:
# The front bumper is drilled for some sort of mount on both sides.
# Rear bumper has the mounting ear to the gearbox rear end broken off.
# Some of the screw holes in the chassis is stripped out.
# Upper chassis is cut in half - if using the exsisting chassis I think I will epoxy it together and fix the glue damage.
# The inner servo saver assembly screw to servo was loose. think the former owner used the wrong size for the S148 servo - Easy fix!
# Rims are flaked as per usual - nothing paint can fix
# Tires are stiff and half part worn - think I'm going to use them for now.
# Body is too far gone - Novafox or TBG body? - MCI decals it will be (I like the real sponsor decals better than Novafox version)


All in all I'm very happy with my free Fox

I will see next week for my least fox spares Richard.

Pictures at last

The left overs of the spare chassis.
One upper rear suspension arm and one of the bulkhead suspension mount had to go in the dump as these had cracks and bits broken off.
But otherwise the remaining parts are useable.
The Thundershot front suspension parts is put away for now..

Now all the parts is clean, I have starting point.
Dampers have just got a external bath, will pull them part for further cleaning and rebuild.

Metal parts are as clean as I can get them with household stuff.
Brackets and the suspension plates will receive a polish, just need to remember to buy some polish next time I'm out
Driveshafts is also as clean as I can get them without pulling them apart. Think I will fill them with CV grease for full size cars.

The tub needs most of the work as I need to repair the glue mess area and have a repaint as it has some splaches of paint of some sort at random places.
Also need to remove most of the scratches at the bottom, seen a lot worse.
Have ordered some M3 helicoils as some of the holes have no bite in them.

Gearbox was really grubby, but cleaned up well

I got a another spare chassis last weekend, this will replace this as you can see the holes.
Thanks mate, you know who you are

And all suspension arms came out ok, rare thing on these cars I belive

The new donor car has a better front skid as this is a bit worn..
Upper chassis cover have to be epoxy'd back the one unit and repaired.
As orginal vintage one is a bit thin on the ground.

Bulkhead suspension mount plates are also ok
Driver needs paint.
Rear shock tower needs a bit sanding and rear shock needs another go in the cleaning depertment and a rebuild.

Battery door wil be replace by a better one from one of the two spare chassis's I have.

Rear tires seems like they have rolled over fresh paint, so need to sand or paint them a bit.
But still useable for a runner/shelfer

3 flakey rims and one painted one..

Included in the purchase was also this battery.
Don't know it still works, bit thinging of recover it for a better look.

Todays task was to remove all the plating using a dremel with a stiff brush.
And every rim had damage to the outer lip.

One lip removed

Second one

Third
This has also a crack that needs some attention

Fourth...
This has a crack as well

The front rim to the left was the straigthest one of the bunch.
All the other ones wobbled badly, but after some bending they are useable ish.
They still need sanding, then primer and paint.
Thinking of going white like the Wild Ones.

So a start anyway

Richard, I didn't forgotten you. I hadn't time to search plastic parts but I have a pair of resistor for you.
PM me your address.

Nice progress, Isn't always the case we end up buying something shiny new for our builds, White wheels should look nice