Thanks for the welcome
Brilliant! next time i'm down at the club, i'll be sure to say Hi Dave. Bit of a rookie mistake on my part, but I didn't consider ease of getting replacement parts! My only real reason for going 4wd was most of the cars I have at the moment are 2wd, so I was thinking about giving 4wd a go, but in hindsight, 2wd takes more skill, and as you say, is better value to start with. I did see a few of the Ansmann buggies running, and they didn't look bad at all, so i'll probably have to consider one of those more serious, i've heard they tend to be more fragile though? the Schumacher Cougar SV does look good though, although it looks like they've gone to ground, so must now be end of line?
In terms of budget, i'm looking to keep things sub £150 for the car, and will definitely upgrade to brushless at some point, I just wanted to get to grips with the car first before developing it a bit more.