niznai

You don't say what the budget is, nor how many cars you need, so that makes it a bit difficult to give suggestions.

For the budget you mention above, and assuming you only want gear for one driver, I would suggest you look for the Tamiya RTR kits, especially if you're doing it for fun with young kids. My son started racing with a Tamiya TA02 kit stock and that was just fine for him. Being competitive is not the main point, but being fun is. And if the kids want to take it further, you can upgrade later, but for now, on a shoestring budget, I think those kits (or similar) are good value.

You will need batteries and chargers, and those things are not going to be cheap no matter what. Budget about 200$ for one mediocre battery and a mediocre/crap charger, and that is absolutely minimal. It may even not be sufficient, if the time between races doesn't allow the battery to fully charge - something that can kill batteries quickly. One way to avoid this is to get the smallest battery capacity that will last the race, so it will charge quicker, rather than push it at unrealistic rates of charge.

The radio gear can be an endless source of frustration, and can ruin your day. I know because I have been there, done that. You are much better off buying a good, old, tried and tested s/h radio and servo for your 25$ from say ten years ago, than a new one. My own radio was top of the cream ten years ago when I bought it, and if I sold it today, it would be a miracle if I got 50$ for it. It works perfectly, and has absolutely no missing function compared to current top radios (it actually has more functions than I care to remember or know how to use - you can probably tell these functions don't matter very much, especially for your kids).

Servos are in the same boat. Buy a crap one, and you'll never know where your car will go and there is nothing you can do about it but buy a better one. It is that bad. A bad servo can kill the car no matter how good the car is, so this is not a good place to skimp on quality. To give you a starting point, an old Futaba low profile 9551 is a good benchmark. I am not sure they make that one anymore, but even if you find one from 10 years ago that works fine, it will be on par with any new servo at any level. Many top racers still use it, I have about 10 of them in all my cars, they all work perfectly after many seasons of racing. Again, they're no longer top of the cream, but they are not going to be left behind by many, and have more than decent speed and torque.

Like I said. Tamiya has some very good value kits that come ready to run indeed (with radio, ESC, BL motor, servo, battery - not sure if they have chargers). Not sure what they cost where you are, but you can get them from HK for peanuts and you have very good spares support in the US (unlike other places).

I would seriously look at a TT01 chassis which is not that competitive, but is competitive enough for a young kid, tuneable, and low maintenance. We had lots of kids give us a hard time with these cars.

For your budget you can't be competitive by buying the top of the range tech, but you can by following some simple rules. Buy a simple car, sturdy, easy to maintain, and most importantly light. These things don't cost more, on the contrary, tend to be cheaper, because they are easier to manufacture. That is where you can find your strength.

The TA07 is a good benchmark for what you should avoid like the plague. Doesn't matter people swear by them. They are complicated, heavy and inefficient and for people with money.

The TT01 I recommend is not a silver bullet by any means, but it does embody what you should be looking for. Cheap, light, efficient drivetrain, easy maintenance, tank-like resilience, cheap as chips parts. There's many others you can find (Tamiya has a lot of shaft drive cars, not sure what is still in production, but I still see them on the shelves, so they're probably still churning them out - look into the TB range on Tamiya's US site to learn and then buy from HK at a fraction of the price).

I mentioned Tamiya because they have relatively good quality in the cheap kits. I am not familiar with other companies, but I have seen in the shops some things I wouldn't touch. There is too much temptation to skimp on cheap kits for companies who only want to turn a quick buck and then you're on your own when the first thing breaks. Tamiya has volumes that earn its profit so their quality doesn't need to suffer (too much). They also offer the choice to upgrade to any level you want all the way to the top at a rate commensurate with your budget.

Look at other companies by all means, the examples I gave you I know personally, and are my benchmark. There are plenty others, but before you buy check the parts situation in your neck of the woods. Where I am there is no support for anything, so that makes my choice a bit easier but my work to get parts harder.

And no, I am not a Tamiya fanboy.

Yokomo has put out in the recent past and I think still has on the market some brilliant budget TC cars, but they are a bit more expensive than your 300$ might allow. I have scored some good deals from Hk shops when they get rid of their old stock. Again, you can start small and build your car to a top of the range world class winner if thats what you want. I think this is brilliant and offers you the option to buy what you think you need, rather than pay for things that are in the kit, but may be irrelevant for you.

There is also Xray with budget kits, but again a notch up in price and am not sure they land in the US very often. Parts compatibility with their current top TC cars is 100% though, so that's a huge bonus (same for Yokomo).

Don't know for sure, but you might want to check HB, Associated and Schumacher in your area, see what they've got in the budget range.

Problem with all these (apart from Yok and Tamiya) is you can't get them from HK that cheaply (or at all).

Good luck and have fun.