Father son hobby

[Bisesto54]

I'm looking to purchase a RC truck for my son and I to enjoy. I work in construction so there is plenty of land for us to tare up! I was looking at the Traxxas stampede because of the speed control and being able to upgrade. Trying to stay under $350 and trying to find something we can put together or modify. Please point us in the right direction.

 

[wannarunem]

Welcome to the site! I'm just getting back into the hobby with about a 10 year break from RC. Not all that familiar with the new stuff yet. Hopefully someone will chime in and give you some input soon.
Sure loved my HPI Savage back in the day. It was one tough truck! Still have it but hasn't been ran in a very long time.

 

[Bisesto54]

Thank you for the reply. I hope to find some good suggestions. The worst is thinking you have a good deal from the "reviews" and end up wasting your $.

 

[WoodiE]

@Bisesto54 welcome to RCTalk! You've picked a great hobby to share with your son and I'm sure you're both gonna get a kick out of RC's.

The two models that I would recommend checking out for you and your son would be either the Arrma Granite 4x4 Mega or the Traxxas Stampede 4x4 (I actually have two, one for me and one for my son as well). Both are great trucks and are pretty durable.

The Stampede does have more hop-up choices at the moment but the Granite 4x4 is fairly new so I wouldn't be surprised to see that change soon.

 

[wannarunem]

Arrma Granite 4x4

Wow! What a good looking truck!!! I may just have to put this on my wish list. Thanks for mentioning that one.

 

[olds97_lss]

The stampede 4x4 is very reliable and there are a plethora of upgrades available. Spending the money on the vxl version would be best, but you can stay a bit cheaper and get the brushed version. It's geared lower in the diffs and has a plastic center shaft, but is a good starting point to later upgrade if you see fit. I would suggest you go with a 2S lipo in it though vs the NiMH packs it comes with. You get better run times and a more stable voltage which means speed won't drop off much from beginning to end of the pack. However, brushed just doesn't do as well as brushless.

I have a stampede 4x4 vxl and really enjoy it. I only run 2S in it, but that's enough for what I do at skate parks and whatnot. It's pretty good in stock form, but if you run it much, at least upgrading the outer axles with MIP X-Duty cvd's is your best first upgrade as well as alloy shock caps. Other than that, it will take a lot of abuse out of the box.

 

[bobthebob]

It was a really huge mega amazing deal to me when my parents got me a Grasshopper, Futaba Magnum Jr, two 5 cell nicads and a charger for my 10th birthday. Was SUPPOSED to be a father son thing, to build it together, but every time I asked my Dad to build it with me he was busy (my boy turned out just like meeeeeee). No actually I never had kids. Anyway I ended up building the Ghopper myself and my Dad was like impressed it worked at all. I was like gee Dad, real big faith in me, thanks a lot, it wasn't actually that hard to build for a 10 year old who grew up on legos and lincoln logs and plastic models.