RE: Tamiya or HL??
Thanks this is the kind of info that I am looking for. For me I wanted a tank that I could model, but would also like to try the battle side. There are a great many guys into RC in the area, 3 very nice flying fields that are heli friendly within 1hr of my door, one of the best out door dirt tracks in the nation 15min from my house, a great indoor carpet/indoor off road place 30min away. LOTS of RC in the area but no one that I know of is into tanks, or tank battles.
In trying to float an idea past it is a pretty easy pill to swallow at $220 (about the price of a ESC and motor) vs. $500-$1000 on something that just might not take. Add to that most people in the surface RC world only have 2-3channel radios, for tanks I am thinking you are going to need a suface 4ch radio, (and please for the love of doG don't use your old FM air radio some of us still fly FM) I would think that one would have to have a stick radio to run a tank, I think it would be very difficult with a "car style" radio.
I would love to see tanks catch on here, but at north of $500 easy is a hard sell when people already have short course trucks, buggies, 1/8 buggies, trucks, gas cars, and some people have all that and are now into 1/5 buggies, not to even start talking about sprint cars, carpet cars...crap I have all this stuff as well a one heli and a room full of fixed wing, (I) did not want another big expensive RC and I know my wife would not be too keen on it. All of that stuff is expensive, but racing is very well setup here, tanks are not, and to drop a grand on something that might or might not take off is pretty hard for people to do.