Protruding from the back of the engine is what they are calling an exhaust. It doesn’t exactly increase performance as you would expect a pipe to; it’s more a case of deflecting the hot fumes away from the buggy. There have been reports saying that if you remove the extra tubing at the rear… it will go faster. The only problem with this is that you’ll then be expelling the fumes directly onto the aluminium support running across the rear shock tower, and as we all know, aluminium becomes more pliable when it’s hot and will potentially turn the brace into a limp bit of plastercine.

The drive train

On the other side of the engine, the power comes out! A standard centrifugal clutch transfers the power to the massive steel clutch bell which is held in place by a sturdy plastic three pronged brace. The 17 tooth pinion sits in front of this and marries up the massive 57 tooth spur gear. Of course you don’t normally see any of this as it’s nicely protected by the plastic gear cover which is held on by, guess what, yes body clips!

Behind the spur gear sits a purple aluminium plate and the double steel vented brake discs, these slide on to an aluminium hex bolted directly onto the drive shaft which then runs into the gearbox.

The entire gearbox and rear diffs are all sealed in a big plastic case and this is then sandwiched between two horizontal purple aluminium plates. The bottom one of these runs forward under the engine and bolts onto the main chassis and this combination creates part of its integral strength. The rear A-arms also look pretty strong too and the CVD drive shafts running out to the rear wheels have funky plastic boots at each end to keep the muck out. There is only so much time I’ll put into cleaning a kit and as nothing was broken I didn’t venture into stripping this rear section down completely. If I had wanted to though, the instruction manual gives a complete step by step guide to doing it, just as it does for every other section on the kit. Every process you need to go through is covered, starting with the things you do most regularly like changing the air filter and going right through to rebuilding the four gear spider diffs, which are filled with 1,000 weight silicone oil from the factory with another bottle supplied for when you rebuild them. Being new to large scale, the instruction manual has proved an invaluable tool while I get to know my way round.

The front end

So while the back end looks like it’s as tough as old boots, I have to admit the front end looks a bit vulnerable. Like the rear, it has a huge set of aluminium threaded shocks poking out of the top and bolted onto the shock tower, but with the chassis being extremely narrow at the front, the shocks and even the A-arms look very exposed. Just behind the shock tower and at the very front of the chassis sits the cam steering system that again looks like the sort of thing you’d find in a 1:8 buggy or truggy, just scaled up.

It’s alive

So I go back to that wet field in the middle of Wales where I first clapped eyes on this buggy and completed a few simple things needed to get the buggy running, like fitting the rear wing, aerial tube and charging the receiver pack with the supplied AC charger. There’s no break in instructions with the Baja which perhaps suggests it doesn’t need to go through a break in procedure, to err on the safe side though I ran the first tank at no more than half throttle around the Control Freaks site before we headed off to the beach. After four days camping and with a five hour drive home ahead of us, I wasn’t too sure if travelling to a beach in the opposite direction was a good idea. But Loony from Trackside RC Supplies had also cracked open a Baja and the thought of two of them cruising over the terrain they were designed for had too much appeal, so we headed off in convoy to Borth beach in north Wales. The view from the top of the bay as we approached the beach was enough to get my enthusiasm frothing. Over two miles of sand with a host of sand dunes behind it, even the Baja let out a whimper of excitement when it clocked this. With the engines fired up we let the Bajas loose and in no time they were off cavorting in the sand like two over excited Golden Labradors. This was the first time I was really able to let the buggy go full pelt and get it “on the pipe”. There is a remarkable difference to this kit between poodling around and going full chat. To say it’s sluggish at low speeds is a massive understatement, a bit of tuning helps with this but in general and like all petrol engines, the power builds up. This is the biggest thing to get used to when driving a kit like this, there is no instant torque so a lot more skill is required to keep it on song as you approach and go round corners. Moving from the beach and into the dunes gave us the next challenge, in between these was a strip of large pebbles which the Baja just cruised over. The suspension on this buggy is just so supple and even though the chassis is so long, it rarely gets grounded out, instead it just rocks then powers over obstacles. The sand dunes also proved easy to tame, while this is only 2WD it has all the grunt you need and as long as you had it pointing the right way from the outset, it just powered up.

The aftermath

We certainty left Borth beach with some huge grins on our faces, in fact the experience kept me smiling for the whole five hour drive home. Once back I was keen to get some more run time with the Baja so I broke our own rules and took it for a rip around the track. The confined space here really didn’t do it justice and when I let Nobby have a go, the Baja suffered its first breakage, a front shock shaft. It was done after an awkward landing so I let him off and after all I’ve broken lots of his RCs! The Baja is a reasonably capable jumper and in Wales, Loony had his clearing a single track road, the thing you need is a nice shallow incline for the jump and not a curved lip like we have on the track’s jumps.

Final thoughts

I’ve got to admit when I first got the Baja, I was thinking where on Earth am I going to run this thing? Well I seem to have found plenty of places and have now had over four hours of run time with it. Of course this is made easier by the long run times and ease of use plus the fact that it’s so much fun to drive. I have broken another front shock shaft since and steering turnbuckle and this leaves me believing the front end is a bit vulnerable. HPI provide a bag of upgraded parts with the Baja and this includes new rear shock shafts but not front ones! The large scale racing scene is alive and kicking (well, up north it is) and the BRCA have for the first time that I’ve ever seen had the foresight to revise the rules on the kit size which allows the Baja to be raced if you wish to. I have a slight urge to do just that because the buggy handles so differently to anything else I’ve driven, it would be a good and challenging experience. But at the end of the day, the Baja is a basher and made to let rip over large open spaces which it does so exceedingly well, Mr. Kipling would be proud. There is a hefty price tag with this kit but you get a lot for your money including a full selection of upgraded parts, a load of tools and coming as such a complete package it’s ideal for absolutely anyone, you then have the added bonus that it looks simply stunning ripping up and down.

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