Hey Guys,
I had some time on the track with the new AW 4 gears and racing rigs/ Here is my results
The Rigs,
They look nice, the rear of the trailer opens to see nothing inside, LOL.
as allways they are top heavy and don't seem to really be made to drive around a track. This is sort of the same impression I had with The Aurora also. If the idea is drag racing, maybe they are ok, The same old problems with wheels and axels, bumpity bump. The new tire compound seems to be worse after they sit in the box a while, just like a real race car. If the tires sit in one spot too long they get flat spots. This just adds to the fun of trying to keep them on the road.
As far as they go a nice novelty in my opinion. The rear trailer has 6 spots where it attaches to the truck. It comes apart pretty easy so that is good news for the custom guys. All in all it is not a bad car, same old with the wheels, other than that it was a fast runner out of the box for a pancake type car.

The 4 gears
Now these were a fun car right out of the box. They ran fine, handle well with the duel magnets.
I took one of the magnets off, it did not seem to make much of a difference in handeling. There was a speed improvement so I pulled the second off. It was at this time the same old wheel problems showed themselves. The car could not get traction and hopped down the track. Now the good news, I have not had a chance to do this but I do believe if the wheels are corrected, the second traction magnet is removed, and a set of poly mags are installed the car will hook up. If it does It will be a screamer. I will order some polys magnets as soon as I can and try this out. The chassis seems to be quite lively with no traction magnets and I can't wait to try it with the above upgrades.
Well If anyone has a 4 gear, some poly mags and time to get some good wheels on one please post your results here!
Thanks
for reading
Chris

For the semis - Little tip: remove the tires when you're not racing. Prevents flat spots and stretching. Also, give them a vaseline (or other petroleum product) rubdown. You'll have grippier tires that work better on some routed tracks than silicones.

Also, wrap a little tape around the connector peg on the trailer. This will take up some of the side play, making for a tighter fit which will improve handling.

Chris, I wrote up a review on the 4-gears I bought from you in the box stock thread. I ditched the neos and after writing that I even went to supertires in the rear.

Chris, I wrote up a review on the 4-gears I bought from you in the box stock thread. I ditched the neos and after writing that I even went to supertires in the rear.

For the sake of continuity between the two related threads, you can mostly see what Grungerockjeepe posted in the thread noted above given in the quote copied below. Mostly...

Got my Bandito and '56 today. Here were my impressions:

4-gear chassis:
--Only flaw was each had a wobbly rear wheel. Everyone said theirs have been much truer than in the past, but luckily I had a pair of spare real (AFX) 4 gear rear wheels so no sweat there. I just put the 2 good AW ones on the bandito and the AFX ones on the '56. The axle holes in the chassis were just the right size, no excessive slop and they seem to line up so the chassis sits flush on the track. The tires were true, no lumpy bumps. Lovin the ansen sprint style wheels, here's hoping they get a set of rears sized for the standard XTs and use ansens all around on some future releases.

--Both motors run strong and the geartrains are very smooth. Is it me are these AW armatures getting even stronger with each release?

--Guide pin is now the flag-only design. If you dont like that, hope you were saving all the extras from earlier XT releases. OR break out your end nippers, clip off a little bit, bevel the edges with a swiss file and it'll work just fine on your Tyco and Lifelike track.

--Neo magnets? We dont need no stinking neo magnets! Ive never been the #1 fan of powerful traction mags but seriously, this is WAY too much magna-grip--much more than the standard ultra Gs. I didnt even bother running either with these in place, it felt like 2 pounds of pull when I stuck one on my track. Lose em, use em on something else. The motor magnets provide just the right amount of grip for acceleration but let you slide thru the turns. But im not complaining, thanks to these and all the neo dots Ive liberated from the rest of my ultra G's Ive got a big stack that I use on other projects.

--I put this idea out there in another thread, but the Super III and 4-gear bodies/chassis wont be doing any swapping. So this makes the 3rd chassis from AW to use basically the same style body mounts but nothing is in the same position as anything else. The front screwpost holes are there, so theyll retrofit AFX 4-gear bodies (possibly minus the basket handles) and theyll make for some easy conversion and custom jobs.

Regular orange Baja Bandito body:
--Good detail all around. The surfboard is a nice touch, just like the psychedelic paint job, peace sign on the nose in place of the VW, the pushbar bumpers are cool, and the overall look is what you'd expect from a retro modded street rod bus. The air scoops and 8 straight pipes must mean that something nice and nasty is powering this thing!

--Minor gripes, but the pipes being separate pieces look breakage and loss prone, and the chassis mounts look fragile but not as thin as the ones on the '56. Also, this had orange glass which kinda blends in with the orange paint. The purple glass from the '56 wouldve looked good here, and the orange wouldve worked on the '56. JMHO.

--Anyone else notice the headlight piece? Flamethrower 4-gears must be on the horizon somewhere.

Flat black '56 Ford p/u:
--Very close knockoff of the original Aurora design which always looked good. The primer black is meaner looking than the original glossy one. A real nice touch! Flame job tampos are crisper than the original hazy ones from Aurora. The mustardy yellow looks good against the black, and the little red outlines give it good depth.

--Minor gripes are (again) fragile looking chassis mounts. Theyre very thin, since the basket handles are right under the running boards which is understandable, but couldnt AW have take a small liberty with the design and moved the stacks down to sidepipes just to get some more plastic under there? Again, a minor gripe. If it ever breaks, it'll be a bigger one. Not too high on the mirror shine on the bed cover. Having owned 5 Jeeps, leather grained vinyl has a satin or semi-gloss luster to it as opposed to gleaming like laquer. Again, its a minor gripe.

Overall, I think AW has another hot item on their hands. Their QC isnt picture perfect quite yet, but it seems to improve noticealby with each release. If they continue that trend along with continuing to conjure up cool new bodystyles with attractive paint jobs they cant go wrong. Looking forward to future releases!

The Hutt mostly tries to help except when it is episode number 57 where the good Hutt is replaced by that bad, foul, cruel, nasty Hutt, The Rogue Avenger. Mostly...

:drunk::hat::freak::dude::tongue: