Tamiya Stadium Blitzer Restoration (part 1)

Back in mid 2010 I bought an original Tamiya Stadium Blitzer (58106) on eBay.  I had never owned one back when it was originally released because I was still in college and at the time I wasn't interested in stadium trucks.  From the pictures I knew it would take a lot of time and some new parts to restore, but overall it appeared to be in decent used, but not abused, condition.  Certainly worthy of a restoration.

These pictures are from the original auction.  The body was not painted well due to poor masking and some sort of reaction between the black and yellow paint that left spider lines everywhere.  It also had some damage to the rear mounting holes that I did not think was worth trying to fix.

Note the original mechanical speed control.

Some washers were used as a bottom spring retainer:

 The usual scratches and scrapes from a well-used vehicle:

The wheels were yellow from being stored in the sun:

Totally wrong tires (too narrow) for the Blitzer wheels:

Damaged rear body mount holes:

As I usually do for a complete restoration, I disassembled the truck down to its individual pieces and cleaned everything.  All metal parts were given a bath in motor spray to remove all dirt and grease and all plastic parts were soaked and washed in warm water with liquid dish washing soap.  Then, each part was evaluated to determine if it was in good enough condition to be used again, or replaced with a new part.

The final list of new original replacement parts was not bad:  Manual, Body, Decals, Rear tires, Rear shock X parts tree, Front shock tower (old one was permanently bent on one side, but not cracked), and some missing screws.  I also found some new original wheels to use for shelf display instead of the yellowed ones it came with.  Someday I will try the "soak the wheels in hydrogen peroxide in the sun" trick to try to whiten the yellowed wheels.

I replaced the aftermarket Speedworks Blueprint series motor with a Trinity Midnight 27T stock motor and added full ball bearings (it originally had plastic bearings throughout).  Finally, the mechanical speed control was replaced with an electronic one.

I rebuilt the chassis using the manual.  Here are the first pictures taken on the evening I finished the chassis rebuild.

Next step:  Paint the body in box art style using original decals.