Tamiya TRF buggies in Australia
 

Can you actually buy Tamiya TRF buggies in Australia like the TRF503 or 201?
Can only seem to find the standard Tamiya buggies around.

Anyone race them or know what they are like, or even why they are so hard to find here?

Short answer, No.

Can't get TRF gear in aus as the importer isnt interested in bringing them in.

Yet amazingly they are still referred to as the importer.

I've seen the trf201x sold locally before, so I don't know how that happened...

Yeah heard a few things on the importer before.

I have a 503 and i worked out a shorty conversion and after that it weighed in at 1510grams fully set up. Fast....like a bullet with the belt drives. Just waiting for the carbon diff covers as sometimes our gravelly tracks are not overly belt friendly.

You can't buy a thing for Tamiya in AUS and the 503 isn't made anymore from what I read. I recently sold the other 503 I had, lucky I have lots of spares and these 503's are pretty robust compared to previous Tamiya's.

As said, zero offical supply or support for anything with a TRF part number.

Tamiya/TRF have decided to completely scale back off-road - none of their international drivers compete in the class anymore and the best of the lot - Lee Martin - was let go shortly after the release of the 503. Development would appear to have stopped and with that, probably production too 503's/201's are thin on the ground.

Wouldn't be shocked if they lose interest in on-road soon too if the Naoto experiment doesn't work - making the B main isn't going to impress anyone.

I race 201s and a 502. All the kits I have had from new I brought in from Hong Kong and Japanese sellers. I have recently been offered some used 201s with lots spares and rebuilt those for the kids. I did notice a 201 in Hobby Co, MacCurthur once.

Good thing is the 201s re pretty tough so they'll be used to their end with kids to learn on. The best places to get TRF cars and parts:

RC Mart, Stella Models, RC Champ and Ebay.

Not too long ago i was thinking of converting over to Associated, for ease of parts and performance. However, the offer of the used kits and bank of spare parts I now have (was the cheaper option instead of new kits) will keep me going for while longer.

A couple of things to note: 1 due to the tanking AUS $$ the kits and parts are getting expensive. When we were level with US $ buying the kits from OS wasn't very painful; 2 as others have said Tamiya is scaling back off road so they are not developing the cars so if you want to do things like run hex wheels, you need to do your own conversions.

All that said, the kits are very high quality and I never had an issue with a build. They also perform on the track if you are willing to spend the time to set them up and experiment and research what others are doing online, as you can't readly get a set up for AUS tracks like say for a B5M - ask Ray Munday etc.

I recently put my 502 in the 4wd Stock A-Main at the Casso Club Series round and finished up 8th. Next Friday I'll be at RC Arena Running a TRF 201XM in 2wd Stock. if you are in Sydney and are still interested in TRF drop by for chat and a look at the cars.

Thanks for the info. Unfortunately I'm not in Sydney.
I think if they wasn't the talk about them Tamiya scaling back their development and they were easily supported like their other cars in hobby shops I'm be more keen to look into them. Bit of shame really.

Probably for me it's the romance of having owned Tamiya cars as a kid and wanting to continue since they were great when I owned them and just wanted to race with the TRF models. Hopefully things change again in time.

tamyia make a pretty cool t-shirt:tire::tire:
continue the romance with one of them kiwiabro, good buggies but parts are a hassel

Banzai are far cheaper than most of those guys.

RC Mushroom are also well priced and shipping is cheaper than, say, Rcmart.

A bit worried of this as well, I'm hoping the whole TRF team can pull it together soon

Both he and Rheinard can steer - no doubt about it. You don't win 12th scale titles otherwise.

Their ability to setup the car - or communicate the issues to a mechanic - is still questionable though. This is where Jilles in particular was a real asset to the team.