When is a truck too old?

[sfmike]

I have a 10 year old ECX Circuit Stadium truck (ECX1100) with a brushed 15T motor upgrade. I was thinking of giving it away, but then my 11 year old my son showed interest so we started running it around for fun. Pretty soon we soon we stripped the plastic gears so we upgraded to metal and replaced the spur gear and clutch. Then we changed the 10 year old shock oil, bought a couple of new batteries, and now it runs 'great' (at least to us newbies), except for being too rear heavy on jumps. So far I've spent about $75 in parts. I really enjoyed working with him to tune it up.

However the 10 year old plastic body is starting to crumble, and I see that many stock and upgrade parts are no longer available. Is it worth investing anything more in this, or should we just run it into the ground and start over?

The most fun I've had racing is when a friend and I had evenly matched cars - any recommendations for a comparable current model ($150 +/-) with fun upgrade options? We like sliding the tail, should we go to 4WD?

Thanks!

 

[jonling]

Mine is only 5 years old but, I'm keeping it. Still fun to run around and enjoy until it is totally a lost cause.

 

[nemethp13]

I'm running an RC10T3 that has to be about 18 years old now. Associated has a good rep for making parts for a long time and ebay keeps me going. As for the 1:10 ecx cars, it seems that they did a good job making all 1:10 parts common so I keep finding parts for my older Ruckus.

 

[nwmlarge]

you have a 10 year old, run that one into the ground before you give him a new one to wreck.

 

[i_r_beej]

As far as I know not much has changed to the ECX 2WD cars. You should still be able to install ANY part for the 2WD Circuit. You can still buy bodies for the 2WD Circuit and a host of other parts from HorizonHobby.com. RPM makes some great replacement suspension "A-arms."

Keep driving the truck and upgrading it. I started with an ECX Boost and modified that thing as much as I could. I learned far more from making stuff work and all the research I had to do than if I had started with a much more expensive kit buggy. (I later got a TLR 22 3.0 buggy and loved it-- completely outclassed the ECX Boost but I learned more from working on the Boost.)

 

[S_smith1984]

Scrounge Ebay for another Circuit. Be patient. Something will pop up. You can still get everything you need for that truck. You can buy ECX trucks dirt cheap on ebay sometimes. Maybe you'll find one as a parts truck or you'll end up with a second complete car.