Well, I've only owned one buggy, so my opinion may be a little biased, but the Kyosho Inferno is a very good buggy. They have at least 3 kits available....
Inferno MP 7.5 Sport (more of a beginers kit, which is what I have) - comes with a GS .21 Sport engine, which pretty much blows. And to top it off the engine doesn't have the standard mounting holes so you can't really use it in anything else, at least not that I've seen. And the chassis won't accept an engine with standard mounting holes. So if you ever want to replace the engine you are going to have to buy the new chassis which isn't cheap ($100+ for the hardened chassis)
Inferno MP 7.5 - their standard kit, no engine, no radio
Inferno MP 7.5 Kanai II - I think its got just about every available upgrade. A world championship quality ride....with a very worldly price tag, but worth it if you are serious about it.
So make sure NOT to get the sport kit. But other than the engine/chasis issue, I'm 110% happy with this buggy. Its tough, I've been through some pretty nasty high speed crashes, and nothing breaks. In the 3+ months I've had it I've only had to replace 1 a-arm and a shock cap (and kyosho sells individual shock parts so I didn't get stuck having to buy a set of shocks to fix a busted cap).
Radio setup: Well I see a lot of guys braging about their expensive radios and all the neat stuff you can do with them. But I've just got a basic Futaba with a high-torque steering servo, it works fine.
Where abouts in Texas are you?
Thanx X for taking the work out of it for me 
. I'm jealous, he's basically going to get a Kanai now. For me this was a totally unexpected problem, but I plan on giving him less than brotherly setup advice to maintain a level playing field. :trout:
