[Tee Bee]

I just went to a RS on the way to work to check for ZZ availability(no luck yet), but the girl showed me the new Viper. They had one set up to run as a demo. She let me try it out on their low pile floor and it was pretty cute so I bought it. I've had it at work for a couple of days now. All we have to run it on there is smooth tile flooring. It's too slick, the Viper will not hook up on it, only spin out if driven very fast. Regular concrete is too rough and bounces the car around violently unless it's smooth like a tennis court. It's 1/43rd scale, about halfway between out ZZs and Mini-Z. Cool size. As said before, the steering is a geared servo, but seems noisy and slow for real racing action. It's still fun to run it around by itself, though. The proportional speed control seems to work very nicely, though not as smooth as a mini-z. I think it's a lot of fun overall, and it looks nice, but I'm a little dissapointed with the way the body attaches(6 screws) and the lack of parts to improve it any. Typical of a RS product. I was really wishing for an Epoch Spec 2 after seeing them on this site, but the immediate availability and lower price suckered me in at RS. Does the Epoch have a rear diff? The Viper has a straight axle, ala ZipZap. When turned on a surface that's got good grip, you can hear the outside rear wheel hopping up and down if the car doesn't spin out. A diff would really improve this car's handling, but maybe I'm expecting too much of this small, cute car. Hope this helps someone.