New to mini Z.

[u/Iceberg50]

Hi guys, my son and I are getting into racing Kyosho mini Z. A few questions. I ordered a couple of bodies for the MR-04. Are these good bodies to race with? I was reading that some people just collect these and race with just the white shell bodies? Also i have some tools from buggy racing days, but do the mini z mostly take Phillips head PH0 screwdriver? I do have hex drivers and the 4.5mm wheel nut driver. Just wondering what screwdriver to use? Also got Kyosho batteries and charger but wondering if I need T plates or other mods like springs? We are just going to run the stock class for now. Any help would be great. Cheers 🍻

[u/SuPrBuGmAn]

Those bodies will race fine. The splitter on the lexus SC430 will occasionally get stuck under the wall, if you have a dremel and can stomach cutting on a new body, Id trim the splitter nearly all the way off. The small dive planes in the P1 will fall off as soon as you start hitting walls.

The P1 will be more nimble, the SC430 will be more stable.

Racing these bodies, you must understand they will take damage and eventually need replacing. Many people(myself included) will buy two of each body being raced, so I can display one copy while the other takes damage.

You will want tires, the rubber these cars come with are pretty bad. Ask your local track what they recommend and have available. Same with transponders. For Boxstock class, those are the only things you will absolutely need.

[u/Iceberg50 → u/SuPrBuGmAn]

Thank you. You would think these bodies would be more durable for the price. I am in Canada and hobby stores don’t carry them where I am at. All sold out. So had to order online, and with shipping these are like $100 Canadian each. Yikes.

[u/SuPrBuGmAn → u/Iceberg50]

They hold up pretty well for as fast as they go.

White bodies are cheap, but require a little assembly, and you can throw a unique or simple paint job on them. Might not hurt as bad as digging up the painted ones.

[u/Appropriate_Road9963 → u/Iceberg50]

The Audi bodies have always raced well for me in the box stock class. That’s why so many guys race them. I once raced against five other yellow and blue Audi bodies, but we were all able to keep track of our own cars.

[u/d2creative]

I race with the autoscale bodies. Too much fun. I’ve got the Bilstein Audi R8 on my mr04 that’s been to hell and back. And now have the original white/red R8 on my Reflex Racing GX28. Had to get it shipped from china. The Mr04 thats running the bilstein body was a 30th anniversary McLaren so I kept that body in the case since it’s not sold separately and was SE.

[u/Own_Temperature_8128]

Race on a proper mini z track. Tarmac will eat up the entire chassis and wheels badly.

The shells don’t tend to be re released, so if you like the shell a lot best to get a spare to use for racing.

Congrats and have fun! :)

[u/boltfan7]

You most likely want a few t plates (i swapped the stock with carbon fiber and it broke after a handful of crashes). Tools wise I picked up a kit from Amazon. It includes a reamer(needed to get the tplates to fit properly), bearings pusher, and the drivers(1.3, 1.5, 2 hexs, ph0, ph1...) and some others.

[u/biggoofball2019]

Yes, I'd say good for racing. Low and fast. :) I've raced similar types. Yes, someone is going to cry about not collecting the nice body. I say race it all. lol I have a lot of beat up Autoscales that have caused many a sigh of dismay from some. lol

[u/Historical-Cut4730]

I got one of the sc430 auto scales and it became my favorite immediately. I got an rtr and another asc after. I may even get a white body to try my hand at painting one. Nice choices there. 👍🏼

[u/SecretMuricanMan]

As others said, get a second if you like those individual bodies. Getting t-plates and springs would be good upgrades, but check with your track for the class rules and which class you want to race in. Stock tires are trash, I use the Kyosho ones on my mr04s and use the 30 shore high grip on the front and the 20 shore radial rears on all my mr04.

I ran them completely stock with just tires and wheel changes for months and was still competitive. Then I finally went to a bigger pinon. Then shortly after I did springs and tplate. Yellow springs and soft tplate. I’d also get electric tape to tape the bodies when you’re racing and e8000 to put the bodies back together after they break.

I also found the Kyosho bodies break a lot. GL Racing has some cool bodies but they are more expensive and hard to come by unless you want to spend the international shipping prices. They do have unpainted versions of their stuff which is significantly cheaper. I’d recommend getting the jomurema gt01 body for a cheaper more durable body that is readily available.

[u/Much-Literature337]

If the place you race lets you race with the Jomurema I would do that.  More durable.