At last, Completion!!!

I must apologize to all my anxious readers out there for my recent lack of blog posts. This post, however, will make up for the dry spell.

At last the RC18T lives! Complete with digital computer transmitter and state of the art brushless motor technology, the machine is now ready for its debut race at the local track. Hopefully tomorrow I'll be able take this thing out and really let it rip. Somehow it seems that I'm not really getting the most out of the fancy electronics by doing figure eights in my living room.

Behold the photo diary!!


This is the pile of parts that started out as my first high end RC car. This is one of those little things I've wanted since I was a teenager. During the construction, which basically consumed the last week of my semester break, I didn't take many pictures but here is one at an early stage of construction:
Here you can see that the shock towers are in place as well as the differentials and main driveshaft.

Ater I got it painted I had something a little more flashy to look at:
See, snazzy. I don't think this picture does justice to the paint job. The red has a texture that I love. I got the idea from a website about painting RC cars of all places. It was also my first experience with liquid masking agent. I probably won't be my last, the stuff was quite useful. There will probably be some more stickers added later. I got some stickers with my Mamba and that's definitely the sort of thing you want to brag about. Also, this particular kit was a factory team edition of the model so I got some factory team decals. The only trouble is I can't decide where to put them.

Here's a cool picture of the back of the car. You can see some of the Factory Team upgrades such as the blue aluminum drive shafts, springs and shock bodies. On the other kits you have to pay extra to get these.
Finally, here's the whole setup, complete with radio and battery:
And here's a closer look at the electronics:
This view also allows you to see the factory team components very well. Essentially everything that is blue aluminum is an upgrade part. I ordered the battery lead as 14 gauge with a deans connector. It was overkill. The speed control only has 16 gauge inputs anyway. Also, they turned out to be a little tough to deal with in terms of getting them in the package, but it all worked out.

In the end, it's all thanks to my wife for sometimes letting me act more like a son than a husband.