TOPIC:

I’m a sucker for eBay promotions, whether it’s a 10% off voucher, or one of the more nebulous “earn some multiple of nectar points”, e.g. 1 point per 1 GBP spent, say multiplied by 5, so 5x 150 = 750 points. 500 points = 2.50 GBP voucher later on so save 3.75 GBP… right). Anyway, at some point I bought the cheapest new CC-01 kit I could find, knowing it was sure to come in handy at some point – a Unimog 425.

I was never going to build it with that body, having already scratchbuilt one (mostly) just before Tamiya announced it – However I did buy a Unimog 406 body on a whim when that came up a while later, thinking that I might want to use that instead. 

TBH, an OOB CC-01 doesn’t really appeal, not even a hard bodied one, let alone a Lexan body, so that has just sat around for a long time too.      



Move on to December last year &  I spotted another “bargain” … If I didn’t want to “waste” an expensive CC-01 chassis in a quick build by putting a Lexan body on it, how about using more “toy” grade chassis instead?  

I was already aware of TT-RCs’ 1:12 RWD RTR RC version of the buggy featured in PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds (PUBG) but had rather missed these two - the “American Pickup Truck” (which I guess is based on a Bronco?) and the “Military Vehicle”, based on the UAZ (Ulyanovsky Avtomobilny Zavod) 469 (a variant of which was also seen in Spin Tires). The Dacia 1300 (a Romanian built version of Renault 12) apparently also appears in PUBG, if they made that I’d have bought several …  

Despite the claimed 1:12 scale, lightweight chassis, steerwheel radio, 380 motor,  etc, there are some points that appeal. As well as claiming to have full metal bearings, metal driveshafts, full size steering servo, ESC & RX, they also have the same wheelbase/dimensions as the Tamiya CC-01 chassis, and 12mm hex hub.  I wouldn’t have been interested in these at the full retail price – initially around 170 GBP, falling to 100 GBP or so (each), but at less than 75 GBP each for “slightly damaged” units they made a lot more sense.

The pickup had a damaged box, and the factory installed anti-body clip scratch discs on the UAZ had reacted with the paint on the shell. TBH I would imagine that would be the case with all UAZs – even the 100 or 170 GBP ones – unless the factory stopped using those shipping discs on later versions? That wasn’t the cheapest way of buying them either – I also spotted options with no body, and as just a rolling chassis (no body or RC gear) – but those really looked bottom of the barrel, and I didn’t really need to scrape that far. 


I’d intended for these to be my Christmas 2022 build(s), but they got pushed back by the arrival of an M-06 Beetle, which in turn got delayed by a dose of the lurgy.    On first inspection, the chassis are smaller than 1:10 scale, but not as much as other 1:12 cars I’ve had in the past. There’s an awful lot of space between the components, which will reduce weight – so the small battery and motor aren’t so much of a problem – but it also makes them cheaper and less robust. The full-size servo & ESC are a pleasant surprise for a sub 75 GBP car – but at the full retail price (170 GBP) you’d really expect that, and quite a lot more material under there, I think.   

The batteries are small, 2S Li-Ion packs with a T type (aka Deans) connector and 850mAH capacity, there’s a USB balance charger in each box but in the interests of speed & curiosity about how flat they were, I tried them on a 4-button charger, 2S Li-Io charge mode at 0.8A. The first battery took 32 minutes and 387 mAH, the second (from the Pickup IIRC) a bit longer, 41 minutes and 451 mAH. IDK what the run time of these would be, but there’s plenty of room for a more conventionally sized pack on both chassis.   


I didn’t think a lot of the prepainted/prebuilt bodies. The “topper” on the back of the pickup really limits access to the rear body clips, despite the side windows being omitted in a very unrealistic manner … it can be removed, but the biggest issue for me is the paint. It’s just too much, and despite the shape of the truck, it seems more like the sort of flat, cardboard panels found in the disappointing Star Wars playsets of the 70’s, such as the Palitoy Death Star  and the Creature Cantina) than vacformed plastic. 

The paint of the UAZ is too little by comparison, even a light wash would take away some of the jelly mould, toy like appearance. Door hinge and sidelight decals with oversize areas around them really don’t help either. As already mentioned, the anti-scratch panels around the body mount holes are a real problem. On the front, they’re loose enough that peeling them looks to be the right thing to do – but isn’t – and on the back, it really look like you’re stuck with them. The overall shape feels like is missing something too, compared to the 1:1 versions. 

Both vehicle bodies have holes (and sometimes clips) to suit small LEDs, if you wanted to wire some in via the vacant pins on the RX.   The pickup wheels and tyres are quite small, but are probably useable in a “street” version of something. The UAZ version has bigger, better looking tyres, and a spare wheel/tyre is fitted to the back of the body. I’ll have to look into whether there are any differences in gearing, and what impact this is likely to have on fitting larger CC-01 wheels. 

At one time there was only really one type of 380 motor, as found in the Sand Rover / Holiday Buggy and Grasshopper, but even Tamiya make a “Sport Tuned” hopup now. It’s not really suitable in this case – I’d want much higher turns for more torque for bigger wheels, a cursory look suggested there is a 37T 380 (not much higher than a 380 silvercan IIRC, I think they’re 33 or 35T?). There are any number of brushless 380s, but that’s a whole ‘nother can of worms I really don’t want to open yet.  



The boxes as arrived, note huge discount inspiring damage on the rear of the Pickup box … they’re kind of fork lift prong tip distance apart:






Unboxing the trucks – they both give a good first impression: 



 



One of the TXes – perhaps these will be slow enough that I can finally get my head around the steerwheel function: 

UAZ paint fail – front is irregularly stuck so I really had to peel, rears are a least on flat:






Chassis:

Tamiya CC-01 Unimog 425 kit – and the body I just snaffled from it. I will probably be going back for the tyres too…




Tamiya Unimog 406 Body kit – appears to be from a CR-01 kit, or are they all like that regardless of whether they came from a CR-01, CC-01 or CC-02 kit?




My collection of 12mm hex, crawler/scaler ish wheels & tyres … Probably, the unnamed black plastic wheels/off road tyre set of 4 (top left) will go on one ‘Mog, Tamiya Hummer wheels (black plastic, bottom right) will on the other, along with the off road tyres from the CC-01 kit. Used Tamiya all surface with the 5 spoke wheels will go back in the CC-01 box.




Tamiya bodies just sat on the TT-EC/PUBG chassis. None of the cutting or body post jiggling that will be needed, but you can see it’s basically going to work, and how even the larger wheels are probably not going to be big enough.






Colours – very likely orange for the (square) 425 & RAL 6277 Lorry Green of my own devising for the older 406. 

 

I love the unimog especially the 406. A friend of mine found one in double cab. I still have my orange 406 cr01 like I saw in mountain in the 80's.

The pickup is Blazer K5 with a different grill.

A 79' for example
www.oldcarsweek...g_2315.jpg


That's cheap kits for sure.
Suspension links are easy to make if you want to alter the wheelbase later.
I'm fond of the Traxxas 1942 for M3 all thread or threaded pipes. Those give more articulaation than any Tamiya ball end.
For 4mm ball ends I use short Revo rod ends.

The Tx looks to be a Flysky (FS-GT2E).  I have a FS-GT2B, which is very similar design, and has the exact same wheel.

I've been trying to approve my colour match to RAL 6277 Meergrun - literal translation Sea Green, but usually into English as Lorry Green, or even Standard Unimog Green.

This has been somewhat hampered by:

1  My RAL K7 Classic shade card book not having that number in it;
2  none of the online examples look the same colour, and comparing light on a on monitor to pigments in paint is not very reliable;
3  I've never been that good at telling blue from green and, increasingly, some shades of lavender/grey/green can give me problems...

My process was firstly thinking I could add white to one or both of the shades of (Pro-Line R/C Body Paint) green I have, and TBH I could/should have left it there ...

... then I thought it might be more of a grey green, so tried a touch of black & lot more white. This was a dead end, the samples I mixed aren't shown in the photo - in general they were no better than the first set of samples, just a lot more complicated.

I tried a bit of blue instead, and after several mixes, and several more "final" mixes, I went back a couple of steps an called my third "final" mix the one. More so I don't lose it than encouraging anyone to do the same, the recipe was 6 parts 00 White, 5 parts 08 Mil Spec Green, 1 part 06 Blue. 



I can see why Tamiya used Orange, then Grey for the CR-01 and Orange for the CC-02 box art. I'm not sure what the green was on the CW-01 Green edition, but it's nothing like Meergrun, and I don't think there's anything like that in the Tamiya PS range anyway.

With all this procrastination, this build is taking as long as a Tamiya chassis with a hard body

 

I did my cr01 in orange because when I was in alpen when I was a child,  all the multipurpose unimog were this orange. I was impressed and frightened by them.

Former pickup chassis has a longer wheelbase (237mm) than the UAZ (220mm) so that got the 425 (angular) body as the rear wheelarch on that is very much fixed, whereas the 406 (curvier) body has separate panels for the lower sides and wheelarches, so the wheelbase could be fudged with a bit of judicious cutting.


Wheel/tyre changes went as anticipated. 


The UAZ chassis had body posts on the front and a taller frame on the rear, the easiest way to fit the 406 body was to swap the parts around, and use body post extensions to gain the extra height needed for the taller body & greater wheelarch clearance for the bigger wheels. I may have to darken the windows in some manner to hide the posts.

The pickup chassis had short body posts all round, so I bought another frame for the 425. That has the slightly smaller wheels (and the roof is a bit lower, being flat), so I just made the body post extensions a smidge shorter to accommodate the differences.  


I definitely want to fit some sort of bumper to the front of the chassis (plural), and probably the rear, so will need to think more on that.

They are too nice jonny.