The old saying of you get what you pay for applies here, as you will see in the pictures and information contained below. We have personally reviewed the R2 Hobbies AE86 and the R2 2010 Fake Camaro. If you have read the review on the R2 Tofu AE86 you will have seen how incredibly terrible the body and paint job was and how flimsy the lexan is. We had to resort to painting on top of it with flat black plastic paint, this was the only way to save this case from becoming scrap. The Camaro was slightly better but still suffered from the common problems in buying knock offs like missing decals and full masks. R2 Hobbies and other clone/knock off retailers often display the items with what appears to be licensed logos, or strategically take the picture to avoid showing the fakery. Only to find out upon closer inspection after you buy it you will find there are little to no proper company logos in what we have deemed “Selective Copyright Infringement”. Although you will find some of the details of the unpainted bodies to be not bad, you will need to keep the body out of the heat. We have had multiple reports of these bodies melting after running in the sun for a few hours. If you think about all the money, time and effort you put into creating these bodies, having your body melt is unacceptable. Now that being said, if you are in the market for a “Subarn, Nissain”, or a “Honda S2009” or our favorite the “Poosche 911” look no further! More horrible examples after the jump along with a top 5 worst knock off body list! Let us know your experiences and leave a comment below!
Top 5 Worst Knock Off Bodies
NUMBER 5: AMC/AGM Benz?!
NUMBER 4: Honda S2009?!
NUMBER 3: Ken Blcok Focus
NUMBER 2: Poosche 911!!
NUMBER 1: Bamborghini Gallaroc?! WTF?!
Have you seen the clear version of the clone bodyshell…
it’s a bit more better from the pre-painted version of it
also i’d look at it on economically side of iti’d rather use the cheap clone body for bashing or training and use my usd40 plus yokes / tammy’s or speedway pal’s for the comp..
I agree with your statement. Now a days keeping up with the hobby is difficult. Having these cheap clone diffinitely helps especially for beginners. Once your bit with the hobby bug its then better to move on to the elite bodies. No one wants to spend 40 plus on a nice body and mess it up. It gets expensive over time.
I thought the same thing, after running Tamiya bodies. But some bodies, like Street Jam S14, are very thick lexan. I’d say at least twice the thickness of HPI bodies, which are thicker than Tamiya (in my experience). I picked up a Odyssey from r2, its laughably thin and will look it when drifting around a track. It’s so bad I’m turning it into a static body for Police lights etc…
tl:dr; it’s worth it to buy a good quality body in the long run.
Yeah, totally agree that a better product will be better in the long run. They last longer and are capable of taking more damage.
I think you nailed it on the head, once you get hooked, you will gravitate towards the quality stuff 😛
It may be marginally thicker, but still lacks in quality or details. You use what you can afford, I dont blame anyone for buying these, but it is best if you know what you are getting into before buying. Yes it can be a good use for training/bashing, we do understand that aspect of it.
big ethical & moral issue with supporting cloned products when the original items are still available for sale.
the more you support fake/clone makers, there will come a time when no company is going to bother investing in R&D for new design/product… already now with all the “retro” flavours in vogue, innovation for truly futuristic design is somewhat stifled compared to progress made in 1950s/60s/70s.
also if you are (or plan to be) any type of designer, artist, engineer hoping to make a living out of your design… good luck trying to milk royalties from manufacturers, whilst cloners steal your design.
What comes around goes around 🙁 we can only pray China starts designing decent new stuff… then US/Europe can copy it 😛
I do understand where you are coming from. Coming from a designer point of view, the clones are indeed taking money all the hard work that the original manufactures and such.
In my defense, I only rock the clones on practice days and when trying to prefect painting skills. When I take my cars out on the road, I only bring nothing but the best.
And Im sure you are not alone when it comes to this aspect of the hobby. 🙂
Such is the industry. Manufacturing in China is extremely cost effective, so more companies send their products over there for manufacture. Due to no copyright laws or protection laws in China, it opens up to cloning and mass producing on a large scale. When you dont need to pay R&D, and you can just copy, the cost is naturally lower. This is why consumers need to make a better decision when buying this stuff. Either you choose to support the real products or clones, its up to you with your dollars.
I’m a body guy. I’ve never bought a cloned body before, ever. Now have I bought cloned chassis parts? YES. Sometimes as a fan of hobby in the U.S.A. we get charged a high amount of cash for the imported products for our hobby. Also guys, some of the cloned stuff is made in the same area or sometimes the same factory! Let’s take StreetJam, whom I LOVE TO DEATH. SJ has their products made in China, then not only three months into the release of the any SJ chassis (R31 & ZEON) there’s a clone on the market?!?! There’s clearly something highly wrong with that? Now these bodies are just some crap! I’ve had guys tell me that when the cloned bodies are in the sun, the body melts……WTF!?!! I’ve seen it all?!!? Oh and those bodies are not even LEXAN?!! There PVC the same stuff we used when we started drifting?! YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR…………
Thats the side-effects of lower quality products, they are cheaper for a reason. Just think about the cost difference compared to the real thing, chances are they are in the materials used vs what is substituted. There are occasions where clones are same/equal to originals, but those are rare and dont happen very often.
I bought the Honda Van knockoff and the GTR Itasha style and they are pretty indestructable. Imagine a rubbermade trashcan on wheels. They make great beginner car bodies. You can crash the heck out of them and you cant even tell! I’ve never had one melt before after driving in the sun before. That would be funny! Now the AE86 and other cars look pretty horrible to me. Maybe the older designs were better.
We believe this stuff is based on the batch. Sometimes the mold they use, is newer and produces better details when new versus one that has been used for 1000 runs. Other times its the material they use to make it, perhaps they had less of product a to mix with product b, this will cause issues with the end product. Sometimes you will get a good one, other times you wont. Its all based on which batch you get.
Are you killersushi99 from youtube?
The Corolla Levin (Yellow) is quite the site. Lots of misspelled sponsors my two favorite on the body are “TRC” instead of “TRD” and instead of “Run Free” it has “Run Flee”
lol, yeah, always funny seeing how they get around copyright infringements. 😀
They Also have “TBMIYA” for Tamiya and “hqi” for hpi LOL
lol so true! They must think they can get away with just changing 1 letter. lol
I believe its Bosch not Bosche 🙂
I wonder what Ken Block will say about this?
(Blcok) so funny . And the car isn’t a ford it’s a focus.
I admit that I have bought 2, a Mitsubibhi lancer, and it makes a great body to practice drifting. Also bought a truck for my stampede and it cracked after hitting a wall (15 minutes).
I bought the Honda Van knockoff and the GTR Itasha style and they are pretty indestructable. Imagine a rubbermade trashcan on wheels. They make great beginner car bodies. You can crash the heck out of them and you cant even tell! I’ve never had one melt before after driving in the sun before. That would be funny! Now the AE86 and other cars look pretty horrible to me. Maybe the older designs were better.
Are you killersushi99 from youtube?
We believe this stuff is based on the batch. Sometimes the mold they use, is newer and produces better details when new versus one that has been used for 1000 runs. Other times its the material they use to make it, perhaps they had less of product a to mix with product b, this will cause issues with the end product. Sometimes you will get a good one, other times you wont. Its all based on which batch you get.
They Also have “TBMIYA” for Tamiya and “hqi” for hpi LOL
lol so true! They must think they can get away with just changing 1 letter. lol
I admit that I have bought 2, a Mitsubibhi lancer, and it makes a great body to practice drifting. Also bought a truck for my stampede and it cracked after hitting a wall (15 minutes).
I wonder what Ken Block will say about this?
(Blcok) so funny . And the car isn’t a ford it’s a focus.
I believe its Bosch not Bosche 🙂
Have you seen the clear version of the clone bodyshell…
it’s a bit more better from the pre-painted version of it
also i’d look at it on economically side of iti’d rather use the cheap clone body for bashing or training and use my usd40 plus yokes / tammy’s or speedway pal’s for the comp..
I agree with your statement. Now a days keeping up with the hobby is difficult. Having these cheap clone diffinitely helps especially for beginners. Once your bit with the hobby bug its then better to move on to the elite bodies. No one wants to spend 40 plus on a nice body and mess it up. It gets expensive over time.
I thought the same thing, after running Tamiya bodies. But some bodies, like Street Jam S14, are very thick lexan. I’d say at least twice the thickness of HPI bodies, which are thicker than Tamiya (in my experience). I picked up a Odyssey from r2, its laughably thin and will look it when drifting around a track. It’s so bad I’m turning it into a static body for Police lights etc…
tl:dr; it’s worth it to buy a good quality body in the long run.
Yeah, totally agree that a better product will be better in the long run. They last longer and are capable of taking more damage.
I think you nailed it on the head, once you get hooked, you will gravitate towards the quality stuff 😛
It may be marginally thicker, but still lacks in quality or details. You use what you can afford, I dont blame anyone for buying these, but it is best if you know what you are getting into before buying. Yes it can be a good use for training/bashing, we do understand that aspect of it.
The Corolla Levin (Yellow) is quite the site. Lots of misspelled sponsors my two favorite on the body are “TRC” instead of “TRD” and instead of “Run Free” it has “Run Flee”
lol, yeah, always funny seeing how they get around copyright infringements. 😀
I’m a body guy. I’ve never bought a cloned body before, ever. Now have I bought cloned chassis parts? YES. Sometimes as a fan of hobby in the U.S.A. we get charged a high amount of cash for the imported products for our hobby. Also guys, some of the cloned stuff is made in the same area or sometimes the same factory! Let’s take StreetJam, whom I LOVE TO DEATH. SJ has their products made in China, then not only three months into the release of the any SJ chassis (R31 & ZEON) there’s a clone on the market?!?! There’s clearly something highly wrong with that? Now these bodies are just some crap! I’ve had guys tell me that when the cloned bodies are in the sun, the body melts……WTF!?!! I’ve seen it all?!!? Oh and those bodies are not even LEXAN?!! There PVC the same stuff we used when we started drifting?! YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR…………
Thats the side-effects of lower quality products, they are cheaper for a reason. Just think about the cost difference compared to the real thing, chances are they are in the materials used vs what is substituted. There are occasions where clones are same/equal to originals, but those are rare and dont happen very often.
big ethical & moral issue with supporting cloned products when the original items are still available for sale.
the more you support fake/clone makers, there will come a time when no company is going to bother investing in R&D for new design/product… already now with all the “retro” flavours in vogue, innovation for truly futuristic design is somewhat stifled compared to progress made in 1950s/60s/70s.
also if you are (or plan to be) any type of designer, artist, engineer hoping to make a living out of your design… good luck trying to milk royalties from manufacturers, whilst cloners steal your design.
What comes around goes around 🙁 we can only pray China starts designing decent new stuff… then US/Europe can copy it 😛
I do understand where you are coming from. Coming from a designer point of view, the clones are indeed taking money all the hard work that the original manufactures and such.
In my defense, I only rock the clones on practice days and when trying to prefect painting skills. When I take my cars out on the road, I only bring nothing but the best.
And Im sure you are not alone when it comes to this aspect of the hobby. 🙂
Such is the industry. Manufacturing in China is extremely cost effective, so more companies send their products over there for manufacture. Due to no copyright laws or protection laws in China, it opens up to cloning and mass producing on a large scale. When you dont need to pay R&D, and you can just copy, the cost is naturally lower. This is why consumers need to make a better decision when buying this stuff. Either you choose to support the real products or clones, its up to you with your dollars.