TOPIC:

Im not sure how far this is going to go yet!
I cannot decide if I want to just clean it all up and keep it original, or buy new bits where needed.
No doubt time will tell, and also when I start taking it apart!

So far, I can see the following:

Incorrect front drive shafts
Dented roof
Steering servo horn missing
Aerial mounting point broken
Atleast one drive shaft bent
One black wheel mount
One side of the front suspension hangs a lot lower than the other (any ideas?)
Dirt, dust and grease... lots of it!

Feel free to spot any other incorrect parts, Im sure you lot are more knowledgeable than me

So, onto the bit you all want to see, photos!

Wow! I believe that one needs a cleanup
Great photos!

Great photos indeed!

Your car definitely needs TLC (something the previous owner forgot a bit) but a Hotshot is certainly worth the trouble.

One side is sitting lower due to having screws right through instead of the ball joints,
looks like the previous owner tryed to preserve it in grease.
Good luck with the clean up.

munta08s wrote:

One side is sitting lower due to having screws right through instead of the ball joints.

Well spotted! I think the previous owner used an upright from another model...

Excellent! One black and one red, I can't believe I hadn't spotted that!

Love that transmitter, "Bionic Gold" is great Engrish

Today I started the strip down, the list of parts to replace is growing, but thankfully not by many.

The plastic wheel bearings were so worn they just fell out. As its not going to be a runner, I will replace them with the plastic ones I didnt use on my rere Hotshot.
One side on the rear had so much play you could move the wheel nearly 1cm side to side!

There is so much grease it has actually preserved the joints very well, obviously the trade off being all the muck it attracted, but atleast that can just be washed off!

Onto some pics....

The offending alien upright



There's a pin in there somewhere! LOL







Muck



More muck!



I wonder when these last saw light?



Im not going to even try to clean this up, especially with the melted rubber bag stuck all over it.
It can be replaced with my hardly used rere one.



Thats all for now, next job will be to strip the suspension and gearboxes



Still trying to decide if I should get a new body for it as the hole for the missing foglight is too big for a replacement, unless you use a big washer, which will still make it look messy.
Front uprights and suspension needs replacing, even on the complete side it has loads of play on the ball joints.
So far, that is all that needs to be bought, so Im pretty happy with that!

This is my first restoration, so any feedback good or bad would be very welcome!

I stripped the rear suspension and gearbox today, then cleaned and rebuilt the gearbox.
Ive used new plastic bearings to replace the worn ones and reassembled it all dry as its not going to be a runner.
The gears were all in good shape with no uneven wear.

Rear suspension stripped.
Does anyone have a tip for removing the C/E clips without bending them?



One very dirty rear box!



Cracked open for the first time in years no doubt



Thats better!



A back together with new motor from my rere Hotshot.

Rear suspension clean and rebuild next

dest wrote:

Does anyone have a tip for removing the C/E clips without bending them?

If they only were E-clips, right? Removing e-clips is fairly easy if you have a very small screw driver to use to wedge out the E-clip.

The C-clip, on the other hand, has given me hours and hours of frustration! Sometimes I have actually given up on them, like on my ongoing 959 resto. But some times they come off after a lot of struggling using two small screwdrivers, one under, and one "inside" at the same time. If they come off, they usually pop away onto my light grey carpet making me spend another hour looking for it....

So, if anyone has good ideas to remove C-clips, I am all ears!

-Lars