Well Raf I've just built my first Madrat today and I'll give you this short review
The Good...
Parts quality is quite high, well moulded and for the most part very clean cast parts. The main Chassis is excellent and all the suspension arms parts follow suit. Overall all the 'bits' are excellent.
The car as a whole is a bargain at £45, some fiddly bits during construction but that was due to failings in the instructions and not failings with the car.
It runs very well...even with the stock shocks (see below) and the car has a pretty decent spec for being £45. It gets bouncy at times but that's to be expected. I think I could have added a bit more diff grease when I was making mine but that's something I'll address when I get round to doing a service.
The Bad...
First off the instruction are a bit vague at times which caused me to actually damage the T plate (rear suspension mount) as I tried to attach parts I was not supposed to yet, I buckled the plastic but this has been fixed by added two washers (from B&Q m3.5) to the mount points to add support for the screws...a very satisfactory fix but one that could have been avoided.
The T plate and design of the rear end could be better, it's the cars Achilles heal design wise but like I said above can be worked around.
The other thing bad about the MadRat are the shocks...They come pre assembled and mine looked like they were built by a blind chimp suffering from parkinsons disease..okay maybe not that bad but you get the picture
They don't perform too bad..just could be made a bit better...
They are pretty standard size though so you can probably upgrade with little issues. I've got a set of the Xpro shocks on Backorder.
Bottom line for £45 it's a fantastic car even with the things I've mentioned above. If you wanna bounce around a garden, park or club track without a huge amount of overhead get one... hell at £45 you buy another one if something breaks
I do actually have another full car on backorder just for spares...
The Madrat is a great little run around, it has some issues but I'm hoping these might become fewer over the next year as the car and parts develop.
I see good things a head for these cars...even national competition is not far off I think
I'm planning to let mine evolve and to build on the base car I have, see how far I can push this very decent little car.
If it does not mature as well as I hope then I'm only out a hundred or so quid...So far though things are looking pretty good for this budget line.
K