Wow, time flies, I remember racing with these buggies, Kyosho Ultimas, Associated RC10 gold pans, Losi JRx2, Schumacher Cats, etc., fun times! Great article with all the pictures of vintage NIP parts and buggy build. JG Mfg, Kyosho Option House, Litespeed, Robinson Racing, Thorp Dirt Burners, Trinity, Kimbrough Products, Team Novak, Tekin, Sanyo Nicads, using change like nickels and quarters as chassis weights, etc. Couple cool videos too, check out the link for full pics and details! 
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Happy 30th Anniversary Joel Johnson (and how to build a WC’87 Ultima replica) – Vintage Dirt-Burners
Happy 30th Anniversary Joel Johnson (and how to build a WC’87 Ultima replica)
August 6, 2017 TomEG Clones, History, Replica Builds 7
Joel Johnson showing his World Champion Ultima, 28 years apart. In the picture to the left the car has #7 and white wheels, as it is from the qualifying rounds of the WC. The restored car to the right has #3 and yellow wheels, like it was in the finals.
Well, now that it’s (to the day) the 30th anniversary for Joel Johnson’s legendary victory with the Kyosho Ultima in the 1987 Romsey World Championships, and Kyosho seems to have missed the window of opportunity to celebrate, we’ll just have to make our own party!
HAPPY 30TH ANNIVERSARY, JOEL JOHNSON, AKIRA KOGAWA, ERNIE PROVETTI, TEAM KYOSHO INTERNATIONAL AND TEAM TRINITY.
As many of you know, Joel Johnson’s 1987 WC Ultima is quite different from the Ultima kits released to the public. The kit most like Joel’s car is the Ultima Pro. But even so, there were actually very few custom made parts, as most of the car could be built with hop-ups from various sources and brands. I have been “investigating” since back in 1987, and about 10 years ago I was in contact with Joel, and did a small series of e-mail “interviews”, where he told me everything he remembered about the car. The goal was to write an article, and try to have it published, but that never materialized, other than a story on my old web site, with a list of the special parts he used. A couple of years ago I was contacted by the late Daniel Rowlands, who asked if I could assist him in restoring what was left of the original car. That lead to a series of blog entries that I published on my old web site, and did a round up of, here on the new site. Please read it if you haven’t already done so. During that restoration I believe we managed to piece together the last pieces of the puzzle, and make a somewhat verified list of different parts used on that car. Most of these parts are hard to come by today, so I will try to list what I would consider suitable replacements, wherever that is possible. For purists it would probably be a no-no to use replacement parts, but then you should brace yourself for quite some years of searching….. At least then you’ll have the time to save up for what it would cost you.
Kyosho Tomahawk buggy. It was painted white, with silver and pink stripes on the sides. The body had the original Tomahawk bolt-on mirror on the right side. The wing was a Kyosho Optima Mid wing. The Optima Mid was raced at the same event in prototype form, and finished second behind Masami Hirosakas Schumacher CAT XLS (only named CAT XL back then). Well back to the Ultima. The wing was painted white (a very lousy paint job, actually), and had large transparent side plates, mounted with black servo tape. If you want the body to look like it did in the qualifying rounds of the World Championship, just change the #3 decals to #7.
Original body: Kyosho SC-71 Tomahawk body parts set.
Original wing: Kyosho OT-107 Optima Mid wing (with transparent winglets).
This is the saddle pack version of the graphite Trinity chassis. The one Joel used did not have the saddle pack cut outs, but otherwise was the same.
Joel did not use the standard style chassis, although the Ultimas that came in 2nd and 3rd did. The chassis used by Joel was a flat graphite Trinity chassis. It was made by Composite Craft, and sold by both Composite Craft, Trinity and D&D. The chassis used was the solid version, not the one with saddle pack cut-outs. These chassis plates are hard to find, and also very difficult to reproduce due to the hard to find no-weave graphite material and the front kick-up.
Original chassis: Trinity #8028 Ultima chassis plate, or Composite Craft or D&D Ultima chassis plates.
Posible replacement: Trinity, Composite Craft, D&D Ultima chassis plates with saddle cut outs. The Duratrax Ultima chassis could also be used as a replacement. It’s easy to distinguish the Duratrax chassis from the Trinity chassis as the Trinity chassis has a longer “tail” behind the screw holes at the rear.
When they arrived in Romsey for the event, they realized that the track was very flat with almost no loose dirt at all. It actually reminded them of a on-road track. That made Trinity boss Ernie Provetti call Trinity HQ in USA, and had them send a special triple wound motor by express mail. That was the only motor Joel used in the competition.
Original motor: Trinity Monster Horsepower #2004 Pure Gold silver can with 17×3 armature. You will be looking for a motor that says “1985 WORLD CHAMPIONS”.
John Gudvangen Manufacturing (JG Mfg) fiber glass shock towers for the Ultima.
Earlier it was reported that Joel used Trinity shock towers on his car, but these were only made as graphite parts (the same Composite Craft material as in the chassis) and not fiber glass as seen on his Ultima. The set he used was the green/yellow fiber glass towers from JG Mfg (John Gudvangen Manufacturing). I’m not sure about the part numbers of those JG shock shock towers.
Original shock towers: JG Mfg fiber glass Ultima shock towers.
The shocks used were the standard Kyosho Option House gold shocks, found on the Turbo Optima and many of the Optima Mids.
Original shock absorbers: Kyosho Option House W-5001/5002 short and long gold shocks.
The wheels used on the car in the finals were yellow dyed Kyosho Turbo Optima wheels at the rear, and yellow dyed Turbo Scorpion (cookie cutter version) wheels at the front. If you want to make it as it was in the qualifying rounds, just leave the rear wheels white.
Original front wheels: Kyosho Turbo Scorpion (cookie cutters) wheels, dyed yellow. I don’t know the part #.
Original rear wheels: Kyosho OT-67 low profile wheels, dyed yellow in the finals, and white in the qualifying rounds.
Original dye: Lightspeed Dylon #0200.
At the front the original Ultima tires were used. The rear tires were Kyosho Option House four row, square pin tires.
Original front tires: Kyosho Ultima (and Scorpion) SC-26.
Original rear tires: Kyosho Option House W-5032 rear tires.
This is the repro motor guard from Pargu in Korea. The one Joel used was a champagne gold/brownish colour, but otherwise it looks the same.
The motor guard used was the champagne/brownish variant of the standard motor guard for the Ultima.
Original motor guard: Kyosho UM-28 (champagne/brownish).
The turnbuckles for both the upper suspension control links, and the steering links were from the Option House special rod set.
Original turnbuckles: Kyosho Option House W-5005 special rod set.
Instead of the standard dog-bones, Joel used the Option House universal swing shafts.
Original universals: Kyosho Option House W-5061 universal swing shafts for Optima, Ultima and Optima Mid.
This is the spur gear used. You will also need a matching 48 pitch counter gear.
The gear cluster outside the actual gear box was made by Robinson Racing, and was of the finer 48 pitch variant. These came in both black, white and blue, but the spur used by Joel was black, while the counter gear probably was white. The number of teeth on the spur are unknown, but was probably 58. Beware when buying these spur gears, as poor quality control by Robinson Racing let through a lot of these gears that wasn’t completely round.
Original spur gear: Robinson Racing RRP-3158 (black)
Original counter gear: Robinson Racing RRP-3142.
Dirt Burners ball diff to the left. These also came with a black gear. In the middle and to the right are two different packs with the Kyosho Option House ball diff. The parts are the same, though.
Here there is actually a bit of controversy. The thing that is certain is that Joel used a ball diff. Akira Kogawa made a prototype ball differential, that I know several Team Kyosho drivers used in the event, and Kogawa believe Joel was one of them. Joel only remembers using a prototype ball diff, but unsure if it was Kyosho or Thorp.
Original ball diff: Kogawa/Auto Model/Kyosho prototype or Thorp prototype.
In an ad, just after the WC, Kyosho said Joel used their ball bearings.
Nobody knows if Joel actually used the Option House ball bearing kit, even if Kyosho claimed so in ads (they also claimed he was using the Kyosho UM-26 shock tower set, which he obviously didn’t). So here I’d say, use any good quality ball bearings, and you’re good.
Original ball bearings: Unknown, however Kyosho said it was the Kyosho #1974 kit.
Joel used Trinity’s plano-convex wing buttons, in natural aluminum colour.
Original wing buttons: Trinity #6008 wing buttons.
Possible replacements: Wing buttons from the Scorpion Kyosho SC-62 wing mount kit.
I didn’t find any good pictures of the Yokomo Dog Fighter wing mounts, so I just included a picture of my Akira Kogawa tribute Tomahawk, where you can see the same mounts.
Joel used a pair of bullet style Yokomo Dog Fighter wing mounts, mounted on the rear side of the rear shock tower.
Original wing mounts: Yokomo Dog Fighter ZC-110.
A standard Associated RC10 antenna mount was used.
Original antenna mount: #6338 from the Associated RC10.
The linkage from the Associated RC10 was used. The linkage from the servo is also the same RC10 type.
Original servo saver linkage: From the Associated RC10, I don’t have the part numbers.
The original servo saver was locked with a nylon zip tie, and a white, slightly cut, servo mounted Kimborough servo saver was used.
Original servo saver: Kimbrough #114 servo saver for Futaba (25 spline).
The front body post that Joel used is from the Kyosho Scorpion.
Original front body post: From Kyosho Scorpion.
The oval cut fiber glass plate used to hold the front body post was actually one of the few custom made parts on Joels car, and could easily be made from a piece of fiber glass.
Her Majesty weighted in with some added value to the car,
Two British 1 Pound coins were stacked and glued to the left side of the chassis.
Joel told me he was using the 1985 version of the KO Expert EX-I.
Original transmitter: KO Expert EX-I, 40MHz, 1985 version.
The pictured Novak NER-2S is the 27MHz version which has a black antenna, as opposed to the yellow antenna 40MHz version used by Joel.
A 40 MHz (yellow antenna) Novak NER-2S for the old style Futaba G-plugs was used.
Original receiver: Novak NER-2S 40MHz G-plug.
Here is the Futaba FP-S132H J-plug version of the G-plug FP-S32H used by Joel. The only difference is the plug and the label that says 132 instead of 32.
A Futaba FP-S32H high-speed mini servo with G-plug was used. The mounting lugs were cut off to make it fit in front of the Ni-cad pack.
Original steering servo: Futaba FP-S32H G-plug.
This is how the Tekin 190 Pro electronic speed controller used by Joel Johnson looks like. Joel had gold heat sinks on his.
Joel used a Tekin 190PRO speed controller with gold heat sinks. The cables to the motor went through some drilled holes in the rear shock tower.
Original ESC: Tekin 190 PRO.
The Ni-cad cells used (6 cells) were Trinity matched red print on yellow Sanyo Cadnica 1200SC cells. They were soldered together with small plates, and the positive end at the rear left side and the negative end at the front left side.
Original Ni-cads: 6 Trinity matched Sanyo Cadnica 1200SC cells.
"thumbsup"Happy 30th Anniversary Joel Johnson (and how to build a WC’87 Ultima replica) – Vintage Dirt-Burners
Happy 30th Anniversary Joel Johnson (and how to build a WC’87 Ultima replica)
August 6, 2017 TomEG Clones, History, Replica Builds 7
Joel Johnson showing his World Champion Ultima, 28 years apart. In the picture to the left the car has #7 and white wheels, as it is from the qualifying rounds of the WC. The restored car to the right has #3 and yellow wheels, like it was in the finals.
Well, now that it’s (to the day) the 30th anniversary for Joel Johnson’s legendary victory with the Kyosho Ultima in the 1987 Romsey World Championships, and Kyosho seems to have missed the window of opportunity to celebrate, we’ll just have to make our own party!
HAPPY 30TH ANNIVERSARY, JOEL JOHNSON, AKIRA KOGAWA, ERNIE PROVETTI, TEAM KYOSHO INTERNATIONAL AND TEAM TRINITY.
As many of you know, Joel Johnson’s 1987 WC Ultima is quite different from the Ultima kits released to the public. The kit most like Joel’s car is the Ultima Pro. But even so, there were actually very few custom made parts, as most of the car could be built with hop-ups from various sources and brands. I have been “investigating” since back in 1987, and about 10 years ago I was in contact with Joel, and did a small series of e-mail “interviews”, where he told me everything he remembered about the car. The goal was to write an article, and try to have it published, but that never materialized, other than a story on my old web site, with a list of the special parts he used. A couple of years ago I was contacted by the late Daniel Rowlands, who asked if I could assist him in restoring what was left of the original car. That lead to a series of blog entries that I published on my old web site, and did a round up of, here on the new site. Please read it if you haven’t already done so. During that restoration I believe we managed to piece together the last pieces of the puzzle, and make a somewhat verified list of different parts used on that car. Most of these parts are hard to come by today, so I will try to list what I would consider suitable replacements, wherever that is possible. For purists it would probably be a no-no to use replacement parts, but then you should brace yourself for quite some years of searching….. At least then you’ll have the time to save up for what it would cost you.
Kyosho Tomahawk buggy. It was painted white, with silver and pink stripes on the sides. The body had the original Tomahawk bolt-on mirror on the right side. The wing was a Kyosho Optima Mid wing. The Optima Mid was raced at the same event in prototype form, and finished second behind Masami Hirosakas Schumacher CAT XLS (only named CAT XL back then). Well back to the Ultima. The wing was painted white (a very lousy paint job, actually), and had large transparent side plates, mounted with black servo tape. If you want the body to look like it did in the qualifying rounds of the World Championship, just change the #3 decals to #7.
Original body: Kyosho SC-71 Tomahawk body parts set.
Original wing: Kyosho OT-107 Optima Mid wing (with transparent winglets).
This is the saddle pack version of the graphite Trinity chassis. The one Joel used did not have the saddle pack cut outs, but otherwise was the same.
Joel did not use the standard style chassis, although the Ultimas that came in 2nd and 3rd did. The chassis used by Joel was a flat graphite Trinity chassis. It was made by Composite Craft, and sold by both Composite Craft, Trinity and D&D. The chassis used was the solid version, not the one with saddle pack cut-outs. These chassis plates are hard to find, and also very difficult to reproduce due to the hard to find no-weave graphite material and the front kick-up.
Original chassis: Trinity #8028 Ultima chassis plate, or Composite Craft or D&D Ultima chassis plates.
Posible replacement: Trinity, Composite Craft, D&D Ultima chassis plates with saddle cut outs. The Duratrax Ultima chassis could also be used as a replacement. It’s easy to distinguish the Duratrax chassis from the Trinity chassis as the Trinity chassis has a longer “tail” behind the screw holes at the rear.
When they arrived in Romsey for the event, they realized that the track was very flat with almost no loose dirt at all. It actually reminded them of a on-road track. That made Trinity boss Ernie Provetti call Trinity HQ in USA, and had them send a special triple wound motor by express mail. That was the only motor Joel used in the competition.
Original motor: Trinity Monster Horsepower #2004 Pure Gold silver can with 17×3 armature. You will be looking for a motor that says “1985 WORLD CHAMPIONS”.
John Gudvangen Manufacturing (JG Mfg) fiber glass shock towers for the Ultima.
Earlier it was reported that Joel used Trinity shock towers on his car, but these were only made as graphite parts (the same Composite Craft material as in the chassis) and not fiber glass as seen on his Ultima. The set he used was the green/yellow fiber glass towers from JG Mfg (John Gudvangen Manufacturing). I’m not sure about the part numbers of those JG shock shock towers.
Original shock towers: JG Mfg fiber glass Ultima shock towers.
The shocks used were the standard Kyosho Option House gold shocks, found on the Turbo Optima and many of the Optima Mids.
Original shock absorbers: Kyosho Option House W-5001/5002 short and long gold shocks.
The wheels used on the car in the finals were yellow dyed Kyosho Turbo Optima wheels at the rear, and yellow dyed Turbo Scorpion (cookie cutter version) wheels at the front. If you want to make it as it was in the qualifying rounds, just leave the rear wheels white.
Original front wheels: Kyosho Turbo Scorpion (cookie cutters) wheels, dyed yellow. I don’t know the part #.
Original rear wheels: Kyosho OT-67 low profile wheels, dyed yellow in the finals, and white in the qualifying rounds.
Original dye: Lightspeed Dylon #0200.
At the front the original Ultima tires were used. The rear tires were Kyosho Option House four row, square pin tires.
Original front tires: Kyosho Ultima (and Scorpion) SC-26.
Original rear tires: Kyosho Option House W-5032 rear tires.
This is the repro motor guard from Pargu in Korea. The one Joel used was a champagne gold/brownish colour, but otherwise it looks the same.
The motor guard used was the champagne/brownish variant of the standard motor guard for the Ultima.
Original motor guard: Kyosho UM-28 (champagne/brownish).
The turnbuckles for both the upper suspension control links, and the steering links were from the Option House special rod set.
Original turnbuckles: Kyosho Option House W-5005 special rod set.
Instead of the standard dog-bones, Joel used the Option House universal swing shafts.
Original universals: Kyosho Option House W-5061 universal swing shafts for Optima, Ultima and Optima Mid.
This is the spur gear used. You will also need a matching 48 pitch counter gear.
The gear cluster outside the actual gear box was made by Robinson Racing, and was of the finer 48 pitch variant. These came in both black, white and blue, but the spur used by Joel was black, while the counter gear probably was white. The number of teeth on the spur are unknown, but was probably 58. Beware when buying these spur gears, as poor quality control by Robinson Racing let through a lot of these gears that wasn’t completely round.
Original spur gear: Robinson Racing RRP-3158 (black)
Original counter gear: Robinson Racing RRP-3142.
Dirt Burners ball diff to the left. These also came with a black gear. In the middle and to the right are two different packs with the Kyosho Option House ball diff. The parts are the same, though.
Here there is actually a bit of controversy. The thing that is certain is that Joel used a ball diff. Akira Kogawa made a prototype ball differential, that I know several Team Kyosho drivers used in the event, and Kogawa believe Joel was one of them. Joel only remembers using a prototype ball diff, but unsure if it was Kyosho or Thorp.
Original ball diff: Kogawa/Auto Model/Kyosho prototype or Thorp prototype.
In an ad, just after the WC, Kyosho said Joel used their ball bearings.
Nobody knows if Joel actually used the Option House ball bearing kit, even if Kyosho claimed so in ads (they also claimed he was using the Kyosho UM-26 shock tower set, which he obviously didn’t). So here I’d say, use any good quality ball bearings, and you’re good.
Original ball bearings: Unknown, however Kyosho said it was the Kyosho #1974 kit.
Joel used Trinity’s plano-convex wing buttons, in natural aluminum colour.
Original wing buttons: Trinity #6008 wing buttons.
Possible replacements: Wing buttons from the Scorpion Kyosho SC-62 wing mount kit.
I didn’t find any good pictures of the Yokomo Dog Fighter wing mounts, so I just included a picture of my Akira Kogawa tribute Tomahawk, where you can see the same mounts.
Joel used a pair of bullet style Yokomo Dog Fighter wing mounts, mounted on the rear side of the rear shock tower.
Original wing mounts: Yokomo Dog Fighter ZC-110.
A standard Associated RC10 antenna mount was used.
Original antenna mount: #6338 from the Associated RC10.
The linkage from the Associated RC10 was used. The linkage from the servo is also the same RC10 type.
Original servo saver linkage: From the Associated RC10, I don’t have the part numbers.
The original servo saver was locked with a nylon zip tie, and a white, slightly cut, servo mounted Kimborough servo saver was used.
Original servo saver: Kimbrough #114 servo saver for Futaba (25 spline).
The front body post that Joel used is from the Kyosho Scorpion.
Original front body post: From Kyosho Scorpion.
The oval cut fiber glass plate used to hold the front body post was actually one of the few custom made parts on Joels car, and could easily be made from a piece of fiber glass.
Her Majesty weighted in with some added value to the car,
Two British 1 Pound coins were stacked and glued to the left side of the chassis.
Joel told me he was using the 1985 version of the KO Expert EX-I.
Original transmitter: KO Expert EX-I, 40MHz, 1985 version.
The pictured Novak NER-2S is the 27MHz version which has a black antenna, as opposed to the yellow antenna 40MHz version used by Joel.
A 40 MHz (yellow antenna) Novak NER-2S for the old style Futaba G-plugs was used.
Original receiver: Novak NER-2S 40MHz G-plug.
Here is the Futaba FP-S132H J-plug version of the G-plug FP-S32H used by Joel. The only difference is the plug and the label that says 132 instead of 32.
A Futaba FP-S32H high-speed mini servo with G-plug was used. The mounting lugs were cut off to make it fit in front of the Ni-cad pack.
Original steering servo: Futaba FP-S32H G-plug.
This is how the Tekin 190 Pro electronic speed controller used by Joel Johnson looks like. Joel had gold heat sinks on his.
Joel used a Tekin 190PRO speed controller with gold heat sinks. The cables to the motor went through some drilled holes in the rear shock tower.
Original ESC: Tekin 190 PRO.
The Ni-cad cells used (6 cells) were Trinity matched red print on yellow Sanyo Cadnica 1200SC cells. They were soldered together with small plates, and the positive end at the rear left side and the negative end at the front left side.
Original Ni-cads: 6 Trinity matched Sanyo Cadnica 1200SC cells.
