I've been looking as a few can motored cars I recently acquired and noticed some had gold wire arms, some had green. What is the difference between the two? Also, I'm betting Mabuchi makes both but what is the model number?

There are a lot of older can motored cars out there that could compete with the Tomy Turbo and I'm trying to get an idea of the potential of these motors. I've noticed HP-7's and some older cars could run in the same class as the Tomy Turbo.

heres what i know about mabuchi can motors

hp-7 motors: galvanized sheet metal frame; usually a gold wire arm but also seen green wire arms

tomy turbo motors: smaller frame than hp-7 motors, looks like it might even be aluminum

the mabuchi can motor from tomy turbos also appears in:

artin ho
micro-scalextric ho
marchon ho

i scored a gross (144) of hp-7 on ebay a few years ago. i had a bunch of bare tomy turbo chassis, and i made some ok performing tomy turbo hybrids. the shaft in the hp-7 motor did need to be moved slightly (i used my wheel press)

but based on my fooling around, i think the tomy turbo type can motor is a better performer.

i have seen that can motor in red wire (most common; standard in tomy turbos), green wire (sold as a hop up part from BSRT for tomy turbos, also see them stock in marchons, especially the black chassis), and gold wire (also see alot in marchons).

slotcar world often has marchon chassis from $3-4.

http://www.slotcarworld.com/HOindex.htm5

the motors in the marchon chassis are direct replacements for the tomy turbo motor (but the pinion gear on the marchon motor doesnt quite match the tomy crown, close enough to work but not perfection)

Thanks Mike. Since my track is still masked I haven't had a chance to do testing on the one's I have. I've seen the BSRT Spinner can motors on Scale Auto's site and might go that route when I build my Panoz in a few weeks. Too much horsepower is going to be a bad thing at LSMR, so a stock canner with maybe a 7/24 gear and some nice .450 AST's would be the hot set up.