Tribute to my TA05

Its been 2 years and after 8 competitions, a few demos and a hell of a lot of sessions, it's time to retire my TA05. I really hate to do this to a car that has treated me well for so long. Never had any serious problems with it...never broke a part...went from box stock to full option. Heh, I've even done countersteer on it. Its the car that got me out of the low end chassis game. I used a TT01 and a Traxxas 4 Tec before the 05 and there is a reason I kept it for so long. Sometimes I feel like this car was made exactly for me.


Since there are too many sessions to count and I don't remember all the demos, here is a list of the comps that my 05 was entered in.

Team Tengu Hobby Town comp (won novice class)
Great Mall Drift
D1GP Anahiem
DriftCon1
Alpha 1 Point Series 4 rounds (best result ever in round 2)


Here's a look through pictures of my 05:

Here is a picture of the chassis when it was fresh built. I'm actually surprised I had a picture of this stage!



The good ole silvercan days...



Here was a picture I took before the comp in Anahiem. This was also the first brushless motor I used in drifting.




Here is the start of the graphite period. It looks weird with plastic bulkheads and a graphite chassis.



And finally, the final full option form.



While this car has treated me well, but it wasn't always like that. If you remember in a previous post, I mentioned the lightweight suspension screw up. Allow me to explain. The stock 05 comes with suspension from the TA04. Beefy thick arms with large uprights and steering knuckles. The lightweight suspension changes all of it to a more lighter parts that are made of graphite plastic. After I put the new suspension on, I noticed lots of play in the parts and what I didn't notice which was more dire, it competely changed the suspension on the car. (duh I know) But at the time I didn't and at the sunday session... oh.. the pain of remembering it. The easiest way to put it is: I had to completely re do my set up. It was not fun at the time.

Also the Square converion. I already mentioned it was a impulse buy and I didn't have plans for it but (when I post the pictures) you have to admit it looked damn good.

So what does the future of the 05 hold? It will most likly be a display car or back up in case my new main car breaks down (which it already has once...)

Speaking of new car...any guesses on what I'm using for the new car? Take a look at the previous posts to find out...

The chassis may be retired but there is no way I can sell this car. I'll keep it on a shelf to look over to remember the car that let me get to this point in driving skill.

New Mini Z body

Thanks to the generosity of Scotty Ducati, I have a new Lamborghini Diablo body for my Mini Z! It was unpainted when I got it and decided to make it look like one of my childhood favorite cars: the Diablo SV

While it's not done, I couldn't help but race it. I got third on the first night I used it. Not bad at all considering the competition at FPR.

Only bad thing about my paint choice, Peter at FPR says its the same color as the prepainted AutoScale body... Oh well I guess.

New Steering

My TA05 has always has limited steering. I never could do much about it except learn to drive with it. Since I've been driving the Yokomo, I forgot how to drive a car with limited steering. But thanks to Scotty Ducati, My TA05 now has the amount of steering throw it should have always had.

He came up with the idea to flip the steering parts and use a shorter arm connected to the servo. All I can say, it works very well.