herrokero

I had a 3racing carbon fibre conversion and if I recall, it dropped about 100g plus a 4800mah lipo making it about 50g heavier than my ARC R11F. I'll check later to make sure. Also consider a lighter motor

MikeTKD

Hey Alex - what did you end up with in your gear diff? I have the same feeling. I loved the ball diff for entering a corner and exiting. I feel like I could enter a corner hard and exit with so much more speed. I have 100,000 Team Associated - maybe go down to 50,000?

Rijkvv

Hi all. I'm pretty inexperienced. I've read all these pages and since I consider getting an FF-03 I tried to get an idea what hopups I should get. I don't expect to race on a high level anytime soon, but I might practice for the future. However, some of the recommended hopups seem to be impossible to find at least in Europe. I wonder what is really essential, and if that means essential parts are sold out, is it even worth to get an FF-03?

sosidge

Tamiya stopped releasing new cars on the FF-03 platform many years ago, the parts support isn't there any more. I would not recommend an FF-03 for anything other than putting on a shelf or driving gently in the street. I would not recommend the FF-04 either.

If you want an inexpensive FWD chassis, the Xpress is more up to date and quite widely available, Or you might be able to pick up a second-hand high-end race chassis from the likes of XRAY.

wtcc

iTrader: (2)

In Germany getting kits and parts is no problem right now. Depending on the price you pay for a kit (in Germany between 100-190€), your choice could be between an FF03 or an modern FF.
Hop Ups should be TRF Shocks, geardiff (needs FF03r housing) and double joint cardan. If you drive on higher grip surfaces, harder suspension parts are recomended (reinforced arms or TRF420 arms and hubs).

The car is fun and fast (with the right setup), but nothing for competition. And parts will get harder to come by in the coming years.

MikeTKD

To reiterate what they said they FF03 chassis while I loved running it while it worked, as you found out parts are getting more and more scarce.
I ran my FF03 with a Sport Tuned motor in our FWD class and definitely turned some heads. Racers at the track kept asking me what it was.
That was until I clipped a pipe and launched my FF03 into the air about 4' off the ground into the wall. Shattered my double cardans, front suspension, and a few more things.
I shelved it until a month ago where I had ordered a carbon fiber deck and other Tamiya pieces. I got it all back together and it sits on my shelf with a Bittydesign FWD body on it.
I would recommend the Schumacher Mission FT if you are looking for a FWD car. At least the part are more readily available. The price for parts of the FF03 is almost laughable on eBay and Amazon.

MD

iTrader: (136)

I have an FF03 and it'a hard to find parts. Are there sway bars from another r/c car than work with the FF03? Thanks.

fyrstormer

iTrader: (1)

100,000cSt silicone oil is going to make a gear diff stiffer than any ball diff could ever possibly be. I use 100,000cSt silicone oil in my monster truck diffs. 100,000cSt silicone oil might feel similar to a tight ball diff when you're rotating the drive cups by hand, but when the diff is spinning at thousands of RPM the silicone oil is going to produce an enormous amount of fluid drag, whereas the ball diff will have the same resistance at any speed because its resistance is determined by friction between solid parts.

If you want your gear diff to feel like a ball diff, you're going to need to go down to 5,000cSt silicone oil, approximately. The diff will feel very loose when you rotate the drive cups by hand, but when spinning at thousands of RPM it will behave as you expect.

fyrstormer

iTrader: (1)

Not as far as I know, but you can always buy a few different gauges of piano wire at your local hobby shop and bend them to make your own swaybars. That's the same thing RC manufacturers use. I've even made swaybars for RCs that never had factory swaybar kits, and it works marvelously. You just need two strong pairs of pliers that you can use to bend the wire, and a piece of paper that you can trace the bend-angle onto so you can duplicate the same angle on both sides of the swaybar.

MD

iTrader: (136)

Thanks.

runten

i know this thread is dead just like the ff03 is, haha, but im in so cal and seeing if anyone still has one and if so, if theyre willing to part ways with it?