signa

Hellfire RTR vs. Kyosho ST-S

I own a Hellfire RTR and run in a large parking lot, and on grass (former golf course, yeah!).

I want a 1/8 something that will "own" Monster Trucks in the lot, and do really well on grass.

A buggy smoked my Hellfire, so I starting checking stats.

Hellfire - 9.2 pounds, .28 engine

Kyosho ST-S Truggy - 7.6 pounds, .28 engine

Q1. What makes the Kyosho SO DAMN LIGHT? Is it cheap plastic parts?

Q2. Should I sell my HF and buy a Kyosho ST-S? I could prob sell the Hellfire on ebay and buy a brand new Kyosho!

Q3. Should I do some work on the Hellfire to make it more competitive? I just can't see dropping 1.6 pounds on the HF, can you?

BAMF90

My Feedback: (1)

If you mean the Kyosho STR, it is light because it comes with no tires, no engine, and no pipe. I think they take the weight of it without all the parts on it. I say definitely get the Kyosho STR if you have the money. My dad's friend has one and its AWESOME. You'll just have to buy tires, an engine, and a pipe for it though. I believe the electronics too.

mattster72

he said st-s not the str i belive and i will tell you this

kyosho plastic is no cheapy plactic it is really durable

Toycar

The Kyosho is a no-option racer. The Hellfire is a tank. The Kyosho is much more durable than the hellfire. It will take more puishment before it breaks. Take less maitenance. Hoped-up or not the Kyosho is a better platform.

After owning a savage and seeing others with hellfires. I'm no HPI fan.

wide_open247

The ST-R weighs about 8.4 pounds with everything. They are no weakling, never broke a thing on my SP2 or ST-R.

The ST S is built off the buggy platform and those are made to be light, so it is pretty much a given that the ST S will also be light.

signa

Toycar,

Are you referring to the ST-S RTR? I'm a little concerned at its low price. Generally you get what you pay for. Granted the Hellfire is a little expensive, but the Kyosho is US$400. How is the engine? I'm worried all the weight saving is coming from a super light engine, and if I go to an OS 30 I'll be adding 1.5 pounds or something.

My only experience with Kyosho is the Mini-Z and it was a pretty good quality little car...

How about the diffs on the ST-S? Are they strong?

Thanks,

Tazer_version_A

As compared to the Hellfire ...

COnsider the following

Chassis pan sizes
Wheel Hex Sizes
HPI Tires are heavy
Engine Cooling Heads
Shocks
Center Spur
Driveline

signa

Thanks for the reply. The top plate that holds servos etc is really thick on the Hellfire, looks like a half a pound or more there. And you're right, the cooling head is pretty big and heavy on the HF.

It's probably going to be cheap to sell the HF and buy an ST-S and upgrade it a bit than try and lighten up the HPI...

signa

The STR is nice, but I'm considering the ST-S...

Toycar

Engine weight is pretty minor between .28 and a .21. It not a significant amount less than .5lbs at most. You want to be bad get the Novarossi 528XR with a starter box. This is to elimate the drag of the oneway bearing. Too much power! you'll wear things out faster.

Belgium1973

Hi,

I have the chance to own both STS en HF .

You cannot compare. I preffer the HF because he's build just for being a truggy. He has lots of goodies like CVD's all around, battery pack, a very, very strong engine with lots of bottom end power ( I run a 15t clutchbell and it flies !!), very good shocks, tuned pipe,...
A little heavy is indeed the right word. But with some changes, you can reduce the weight significantly.

cheers

The Menace

signa

Wow, this is a suprise! You don't work for HPI do you?

The Kyosho is a truggy too though. You're saying the HF is stronger? Yeah, it is geared too low for sure. I dropped in a 17T and it's amazing. Clocked it at 43MPH running pretty rich.

How can I reduce the weight? I was thinking tires/engine head etc, but could you please be more specific about dropping weight on it?

Thanks!

72dolphins

the difference in weight between a .28 and .21 is very slight. a 528xr is 380 grams, a '04 p5 w/ onroad crank is 341 grams. less than 1.5 oz difference...

Belgium1973

right, the STS is a truggy, but based on the buggy, that's what I mean. I love the originality of the HF. Maybe they will bring us a buggy based on the truggy...hehehe


Reducing weight = like said above, change the tires, put a lightweight chassis, choose a carbon upperdeck and lightweight screw set + lunsford turnbuckles. Changing the head will not reduce the weight as you will expect. Out of the box I measured 4,263 kg. With the changes 3,879 kg. That's about 400gr, not too bad.

+ if you still want more power from the K4.6HO, there is a way to increase its performance by 15%....

btw, I 'm not working for HPI


I think the HF is very good right out the box

signa

I got a chance to pull a new ST-S / US Sport etc out of the box and I'm not sure if I like this Kyosho. It's damn light for sure, but it doesn't appear that it can take any bashing at all. It just doesn't seem very strong as compared with my Hellfire. It seems like a bargain for the asking price, but I don't know if it'll take the abuse I'll put it through...

Not crazy about the screws. What's with all the philips heads??? And E-clips, I though we were done with those and had gone to "captured pins" etc.

Can't wait for the Losi 8ight. I wonder if it'll be a ready to run?

wide_open247

Kyosho has a reason for the wood screws and E clips. They are for racing. You can remove a wood screw in half of the rotations as a machine screw. and the E clips can come off much faster then captured hinge pins. Helps a lot when having to replace parts. That is the explenation straight from Kania. They are not on there just to save money, that is how they were designed for racing.

signa

good points, thanks a lot

72dolphins

if they were there 100% not to save money, they wouldn't be phillips head screws

MBX5T Maniac

My Feedback: (-1)

They did it solely for racing purposes. For the amount they charge, they either are really cheap, or have a good reason

Tazer_version_A

After conversing with Kyosho fanatics on this site - I think I have come to a new conclusion for this answer ....

1. Dookie is lighter than steel and quality nylon.

ThunderbirdJunkie

My Feedback: (3)

Kyosho's RTR's are crap, end of story. You can't swap an engine into the ST-S RTR without buying a pile of parts (Kyosho still does the "we're going to bolt the engine directly to the chassis, real engine mounts and adjustable gear mesh be damned!" thing), and once you have a "real" engine in there it'll frag diffs like my Savage.

if you want a Kyosho, get one of their brutally overpriced kits. otherwise, keep the Hellfire.

Unbreakable207

My Feedback: (1)

They are considerably very much overpriced. Even the MBX5t is $100 cheaper!, and If you know mugen their quality is even higher than kyosho. I believe kyosho's suspension geometry and just how the car is designed in general is what makes it a winner on the track, but it comes at a price. I myself will be picking up a st-r around dec/jan time, considering a relative of mine just buys kits, builds them, and gives them to me.

signa

TBJ,

I had this sneaking suspicion this is how things were but I guess I needed someone to spell it out for me. I've always known you "get what you pay for." The HF was
expensive and there are times that I though the whole get what you pay for rule didn't apply, but it is a fairly solid truck, and the engine is amazing. Thanks for your insightful comments!

Belgium1973

indeed...
just a few things : no cvd's, poor radio, no battery, cheap shocks,..[&o]

BUT ! i'm still loving the STS too[8D], especially when my daughter is coming bashing with us ( she's 11...and a great driver, no fear[:'(], it's dad's car... )

Catalinaflyer

I like the way the majority of people who actually have the Kyosho Inferno ST RTR seem to absolutely love it and can't find anything major wrong with it or it's design then one or two people who don't even own one call it a piece of #### and that's the so called experts that the person who asked the original question jumps on the band-wagon with.

I in fact own one of the Inferno ST US Sports (long name for RTR) as well as a Mayhem ST, Lightning PRO ST, Revo, MGT, T-Maxx, Jato, RC10GT, Klein Nitro Sprint and a Sportwerks Chaos as well as enough electrics to fill an entire paragraph. So to answer the original question, what makes the Kyosho so light? For starters it was designed to be a race truck and doesn't have any of the "extras" for bashing so the chassis, upper plate, shock towers, shocks, A-arms and everything else was designed and engineered to withstand racing. True the diffs are designed for 4 bevel gears but only come with 2 and the motor is attached directly to the chassis but to the person who complained about the lack of mesh adjustablity, since you don't have one I would assume that your speaking from your ### because there is no problem at all adjusting the mesh. Not to mention the heat transfer from the motor to the insanely huge heat-sink (the chassis) helps in the cooling of the motor. As for the reason Kyosho felt there was no need for the extra two bevel gears in the diffs, I don't know but it can't be in the name of weight savings or cost because the weight of three pins and 6 gears is negligible and the cost to Kyosho couldn't be more than US$2.00.

I have raced all of the RC vehicles I own and have raced against just about every vehicle built. The Kyosho Inferno IMHO is probably as close to being a "race ready" truggy RTR a person can get. The quality of the parts (with the exception of the throttle/brake/steering linkages) is first class and to date i have no broken or lost anything from the truck. I recently purchased the Mayhem ST for my wife and the Chaos for my son because i wanted to give Horizon a shot. The Mayhem has a better radio system and an awesome linkage setup but outside of that I haven't found the $150 difference in anything. The Kyosho comes with an awesome radio and for an RTR it's as close to a race system as you can get. True it's 27Mhz which limits the available frequencies but it is a computer radio with 12 model memory and every single adjustment parameter that the !QUOT!pro's!QUOT! look for. The Mayhem has a great Spektrum radio but it lacks some of the adjutability of the Airtronics that comes with the Inferno. We lost several parts the first couple of tanks of fuel in the Mayhem but Horizon didn't bat an eye and sent replacements via overnight freight. I have yet to loose a damn thing from the Inferno so I can't comment on Kyosho's customer service.

As for racing, the stock tires that come on the Inferno (and Mayhem, Lightning, Revo, Jato RC10GT) suck. They will work fine for breaking in the engine but if your going to throw down at a track then you'll need to throw out the tires.

I was very suspect when I first looked into the Inferno but I had not read one bad review by any of the leading print publications so I figured I would pony up the $400 and give it a shot. I have TQ'd and stood on the podium more times with it in stock form (sans tires and linkages) than with any other truck of any form that I have owned.

If your looking to bash around a parking lot and hit inanimate objects at high speeds or see how much air you can get then in my opinion you need to stick to the monster trucks and stay away from the truggies no matter what color the box. If your wanting to do some club level racing against other folks who don't "race with their wallet" then IMHO you can't go wrong with the Inferno. If your going pro level racing then looking at RTR's is a waist of time (and by now you would have been through most of the RTR's on the market working your way to pro level and would have never asked the question in the first place).