Originally Posted by cwb124

Hey folks,

New to the forum but like many of you, I was huge into RC cars back in the late 80s during the heyday of Tamiya. I started out with a Blackfoot, then over the next 8 years or so owned the Fire Dragon, Monster Beetle, Astute, Fox, Hotshot, and inherited my brother's Hornet and Kyosho Turbo Optima Mid. Sold everything I had back around 1996 to my dismay. Now that my son is 9 he has an interest in the RC cars he sees in the toy aisle at wal-mart/target. So I bought him a Tamiya Racing Fighter for his birthday. We just finished building it. I built most of it but he helped where he could. Now I'm itching to get back into things. Just wondering what the "state of the union" looks like out there. From a purely experience/nostalgic aspect I lean heavily toward Tamiya. I have been in two hobby shops that say they don't stock Tamiya because there just isn't much demand. So where does Tamiya sit in the pecking order of off-road RC car/truck kits? Have they fallen from the top of the mountain? Who's the big dog out there? Looking at other brands, they are really damn expensive ($350 plus for any Kyosho kit) while most of the Tamiya kits I see are priced exactly the same as they were back when I was into the hobby, low to mid $100s. Very affordable. But is Tamiya on the way down or are they still a solid operation for a pure hobbyist/basher who has no interest in competitive racing? Thanks folks, looking forward to contributing here. -CB