The Good
Everything I read about, everything I saw on YouTube, all said pretty much the same thing, and they all were right: this is a great RTR truck. Great looks, quality workmanship, everything about it has been top notch. I feel like I'm getting into the hobby on a good foot, and I'm glad I bought it.
I love being able to crawl over rocks and obstacles and look good doing it. And that I found this truck on sale, at a price significantly lower than other trucks in its range was a good thing. It made me feel much better about getting those immediate upgrades I wanted.
But out of the box the truck is great. You could take that sucker out on trails all day and have a great time with it. I'd love to do all the lights up with the light kit, and maybe I'll do that some day. Nice option to have, and it looks great from the ones I've seen.
There's lots of room for upgrading, but the stuff it comes with is pretty damn good on its own. I can see blowing loads of money to make this a sick crawler [not that it's not pretty sick already], or even just replacing failed parts with upgrades. Either way it's going to remain a great truck.
The Bad
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| Blazer with ProLine tires. |
The first one I don't want to call truly bad, because I don't think that's fair. The Falken tires aren't bad, there's just better out there. I think the Falkens would be great tires to take out on a long trail run, going over everything and anything. They're perfectly capable of doing something like that. But they run into problems on the rocks. I think they're a bit too lively for the demands of rock crawling. They don't grab on like a tire should, and spin helplessly. I think if I was grading these tires in two categories, I'd say: trails, 8 - rocks, 4. I wish that wasn't the case with rocks, but I had a feeling it was going to be, and I'm really happy I went with the upgrade ProLine Hyrax G8 tires right away. So it's not all bad.
But this I don't understand, and maybe it's because I'm a noob at all this, or maybe not. Hopefully someone with knowledge will come by and read this some day and comment on why it is what it is. But it seems to me that the RC hobby has a thing where, no matter what vehicle you buy, there will always be that one weak spot. The one part that will break to end the first session. In the case of the Axial Blazer, it's the servo horn.
And this is going to be the last time I mention the servo horn here. But maybe I'm making a bigger deal out of this than I should be, and I'll probably look back at this and laugh in a couple years.
But I think the placement of the servo wasn't very well though out. It seems almost like an afterthought. I think they should have made it so the servo could be lowered if needed by maybe 5mm max. Something enough so that the servo horn can clear the frame rail. I mean, how do you set up such a sweet truck, then go and make a bonehead move like that? It's almost like two departments didn't talk to each other, the thing went to production and they discovered the problem there. I'm curious what other owners of this particular truck are doing about it. It's just weird that, sitting in all this sweet tech is just the dumbest thing. Makes me sad. Doesn't look like Axial has come up with a solution for replacement, either.
Summary
Servo horn issues aside, I think this was a great purchase. I'd do it all over again the same way I did before [although this time get tools]. I've been very impressed with how the truck has operated, and it's much more durable than I was expecting it to be. 3S Lipo capable, which gave me a much longer charge than I was expecting. If you're considering purchasing one, I would suggest ordering a 25T short servo horn. Install it while you're charging your first battery. Set the steering trim and you're good to go.
I wish I could take this everywhere.
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