Kyosho Spider TF aka Optima Mid Touring Car

[alcyon]

Back in 1995 I was reading RC car action magazine doing a shootout between the hot touring cars of the time. And what really caught my interest was the kyosho spider EP, which was basically an Optima Mid with short arms, short shocks and short shock towers.
The following year, I saw a NIB kit being sold in my LHS. Being only 18 at the time, I couldn't afford to buy it. It had a 1994 round lights celica body painted silver on the box, and a small naked pic of the chassis, which was obviously an Optima Mid SWB.

Does anyone have this car and the original Box? I would love to see it again.

[timmy]

You've just missed one, it was sold on ebay uk last week, new built with box.

[Robbiejuk]

I do. Mine has a load of carbon upgrades and I am prety sure I still have the original celica shell for it to.

Still have the original chassis parts to.

[oli4ke]

Do you mean this one? ==> http://www.2dehands.be/verzamelen/mo...ho+&pc_id=&afd=

[alcyon]

Originally Posted by oli4ke

Do you mean this one? ==> http://www.2dehands.be/verzamelen/mo...ho+&pc_id=&afd=

No oli, that one is based on the lazer ZX sport and its not with short arms.

[alcyon]

Originally Posted by Robbiejuk

I do. Mine has a load of carbon upgrades and I am prety sure I still have the original celica shell for it to.

Still have the original chassis parts to.

Any pics my friend ?

[Crashtest33]

Originally Posted by alcyon

No oli, that one is based on the lazer ZX sport and its not with short arms.

It's an Alpha actually!!! Don't you dare tarnish my precious ZX-Sport with these lies!

[timmy]

I think its this one....

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Kyosho-Cel...#ht_263wt_1170

I was out and missed out on it...

[alcyon]

Originally Posted by timmy

I think its this one....

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Kyosho-Cel...#ht_263wt_1170

I was out and missed out on it...

Yes exactly this is what I am talking about ! I think I have enough parts to build an optima mid touring car. probably have to make some shock towers of my own and retro fit modern Tc shocks, and some modern A -arms..

[DerbyDan]

Wow - i've never seen that chassis before, they must have been trying to use up old Optima parts? The wide body touring cars cars & the nostalgic series appear to be more Lazer/ish based, which would be more in keeping with the era when these cars were released, but judging by the Celica shell the ebay car would have been about the same period, if not later?

[timmy]

Not sure how many different body styles it was available in. I know there was a Ferrari F40. Check out JOPP's thread on his Citroen Optima Mid Rally project, he's using an F40 chassis as a donor for his build.

[j0pp3]

Originally Posted by timmy

Not sure how many different body styles it was available in. I know there was a Ferrari F40. Check out JOPP's thread on his Citroen Optima Mid Rally project, he's using an F40 chassis as a donor for his build.

Thats' meeeee

I think neither of those bodies I have would be an option as they are direct fit on a LWB mid. Kyosho must have made a special onroad body for this SWB mid?

Kyosho mentions the Celica GT-Four WRC here and it looks like it was aimed as a touring car in 1994/1995.
http://www.kyosho.com/eng/company/rccar_history03.html

[alcyon]

Originally Posted by timmy

Not sure how many different body styles it was available in. I know there was a Ferrari F40. Check out JOPP's thread on his Citroen Optima Mid Rally project, he's using an F40 chassis as a donor for his build.

you are wrong about that. That series with the F40 and the skyline bodyshell was from 1990, and it used the optima mids original buggy arms, with lower shock towers. So the car was as big as a 1/8 scale.
This Spider EP car used short arms, if I am not mistaken the same arms as the TF-2. Short universals too. The body width is wider than 190mm, it was wider than the standard of 190mm. That means it also used standard touring car sized wheels and tyres, not the buggy on road tyres.

[mr. ed]

I ran that car for a while. It was given to me when the original owner went on with a TF-2.
At that time I was doing my final project for school and I used the car as a testing platform for my ideas. It ended up as a FWD with the rear transmission up front.
It was kyosho's first 'scale' touring car and was 200mm wide with the stock axles. The arms did have extra holes inward so you could narrow it down to Tamiya's 190mm standard, but you needed shorter axles then.

Yokomo did the exact same thing: their first narrow tourer YR-4 was based on the works 91 to 93 buggies and not the latest models already out at that time.

[alcyon]

Originally Posted by mr. ed

I ran that car for a while. It was given to me when the original owner went on with a TF-2.
At that time I was doing my final project for school and I used the car as a testing platform for my ideas. It ended up as a FWD with the rear transmission up front.
It was kyosho's first 'scale' touring car and was 200mm wide with the stock axles. The arms did have extra holes inward so you could narrow it down to Tamiya's 190mm standard, but you needed shorter axles then.

Yokomo did the exact same thing: their first narrow tourer YR-4 was based on the works 91 to 93 buggies and not the latest models already out at that time.

how did it drive ? was it stable with understeer ?

[mr. ed]

I don't recall how it drove in the original configuration. Sorry.
One thing I remember is: I used a spur adapter from PSE to run imperial 48pitch spurs of a much smaller diameter than the included metric spur (which was the optima mid one still).
Especially for stock motors this was a must.

The FWD was fun, bit of tire spin due to the lack of a good slipper but nothing too bad: those were the days we could still run foam tires
The suspension modification I did, made it a little too fragile and didn't provide enough damping for rougher asphalt.