Kyosho Pegasus Restoration (part 1)

The Kyosho Pegasus is a very low-end car that was designed to compete with the Tamiya Grasshopper and Hornet back in the 1980's.  It has friction shocks and suspension arms that pivot by the bending of plastic instead of a hinge pin design that is normally found on off-road vehicles.  You don't see a lot of them around today, probably because they got broken after heavy use.

I can remember looking at the Tower Hobbies catalogs when I was young, wishing that I could get the Pegasus, or maybe the Icarus, which was based on the same basic chassis.  I had no idea how the cars were designed or how well they performed back then.  I was simply intrigued by the overall look.  Before I got this example, I still had no idea how the chassis was built until I actually got my hands on it and looked at the manual.

Here are the three original auction pictures of the car:

The seller described it as assembled, but never run, and in outstanding condition.  As it turned out, nobody else bid so I won by default.  

Once I received the car, it was very clear that it had never been used.  All of the plastic parts were new and most of them still had the mold flashing on them.  Whoever put this together didn't trim anything.  Not only that, but almost all of the screws were only 80% screwed in to the parts.  Very odd.  It was like someone rushed to build it just enough to have a rolling chassis, but stopped once it was together and resembled a finished chassis. 

All was not perfect, however, as there were a few parts missing that I couldn't tell from the auction photos such as the steering servo mounts, steering tie rods and ball connectors, servo saver, and the lights that mount on the body.  The wing was missing, too, but I knew that before I bid.  The tires were in decent, but not perfect condition.  Due to the car sitting on a shelf for years, the rear tires developed flat spots.  The rubber was still pliable and not cracked however, so I was able to put some foam in the rear tires to help push the flat spots out.  Overall I was pleased with the purchase.

I took the car apart all the way down to the individual screws and parts, which was very easy to do because none of the screws were tight.  Since the parts were new, I did not have to clean them like I usually do when I get a chassis to restore.  After trimming the flashing from the plastic pieces using a hobby knife, I started the assembly using the manual as a guide.  All plastic bushings were replaced with ball bearings. The build was very easy, which was to be expected since this was a beginner's kit.  I had to skip steps that required the missing parts, but there wasn't a whole lot to it.

I managed to find a steering rod spare parts package rather quickly, but the steering servo mounts were more difficult to find.  Well, actually they were easy to find, but part of a much larger plastic parts tree that was priced higher than I wanted to pay.  I kept waiting and finally found a really trashed Pegasus chassis that was missing a lot of parts, but had the servo mounts I needed:

I bet this has a story to tell

It came with these loose parts, too:

I probably paid too much for it, but still less than the PI-3 parts tree that contains the steering mounts. I got some spare parts in the process, too, including gears, rear dogbones and drive cups that were still in useable condition.  The steering  joints in the above photo look like they are from a Kyosho Optima, so they have nothing to do with the Pegasus chassis.  I guess the seller just happened to have them stored with it.  The rear axles were garbage because they were so worn down from using bushings, and the arms were junk because they were ripped apart for who-knows-what-purpose.  But the servo mounts were there, and in perfect condition.  I cleaned them up and finished installing the steering servo.

Lastly, I picked up a reproduction wing from TeamBlueGroove on eBay since the original was missing.

I had one rather bad mishap during the assembly:

I broke a rear axle when it rolled off the workbench and fell onto the concrete floor of my basement.  It hit the floor just right and broke at the weakest point where the threads end and the smooth part of the shaft starts.  If it had hit the floor with the big cup part on the opposite end, it probably would have been perfectly fine.  After some choice words to myself, I had to start the search for some replacement axles.  Thankfully, I found some more brand new ones, and for not too much money.  Now I have spares, too, in case another one breaks.

I decided to keep the stock motor since I wanted to use a vintage Futaba MC112B electronic speed control that I had stored away.  I fitted the radio components and hooked everything up.  Using the Gelly Roll paint pen from Sakura, I painted the white lettering on the tires.  The chassis is now complete.

All that is left now is to paint and decal the body and wing once the weather warms up.