Autoworld Super III chassis question

[red73mustang]

Been away in 1/32 land for quite a while and still dabble with the H.O. 1/64th cars now and then. I'm sure this is common knowledge, to most of you, but can anyone tell me if the AW inline Super chassis will fit an of the old AFX, Tomey, even Johnny Lightning / Autoworld bodies or could they be out there on their own?

I compared the body clip to the Tomy Super G+ one and they are slightly different.

Regards, Chet

[RichD]

The ears on the Super III chassis are further forward than the ones on a Tomy chassis, so Tomy bodies are not a direct fit. The Super IIIs have very large tires as well, the cars are almost 1/64th scale so a Tomy body would have to have the wheel openings enlarged in any case. You could grind off the ears and glue on a Tomy wide body adapter clip.

[red73mustang]

That's what I thought. Really surprised that Autoworld created an "Orphan Chassis" that is not backwards compatible with the older AFX stuff or even its own current line of Autoworld bodies

[BIG E]

For what it's worth, most racers I've spoken to (I personally don't run any of these) have not had good experiences with the Super III chassis.
Tales of overheating, meltdowns, ect.
For my own taste, when I wanna go fast, I stick to the TOMY A/FX Super G+ and Mega G chassis. Just puttin' it out there... Enjoy! -- Ernie

[RichD]

Here is the review that I did when the Super III first came out:

I bought a Super III car to check it out, I paid $20 for a red Mustang. It is a similar design to the original Patriot car, the motor magnets are polymer and the traction magnets are small neos. The pickup shoes are very thick and need to be bent at several points to sit flat on the rails, the shoe springs are the double type and appear to be made of copper. There are four different positions for the front axle. The gear boss is not properly designed, if the crown gear did not rub on the chassis it would pop out of mesh. The drag must slow the car down. The car is very wide, too wide for two of them to run side by side on a normal track, even on my MaxTrax it would be a tight fit. The axle holes do not go all the way through the wheels, so the wheels cannot be pushed on further. There is a body clip similar to the ones that Tomy SG+ cars have and a magnet retainer clip like Patriot cars use. The ears on the body clip are the same size as the ones on a Tomy clip, but the clip is about 1/8th of an inch further forward on the chassis. The armature is 6 ohms and is similar to a Tyco arm. The motor brushes are shorter than the ones on a Patriot, the screws have Phillips heads. The wheels and tires seem to run fairly true, the rear tires are nearly a half inch in diameter. The body was heavy to the point that it degrades the car's performance considerably. The NASCAR type bodies that I saw were about 1/64th scale, very large for an HO car. I wanted to first try the car as close to stock as possible so I only broke the motor in and adjusted the pickup shoes. The car turned a 3.5 second lap without the body compared to 3.3 seconds for a stock Tyco car with silicone on sponge tires. Putting on the body added nearly a second. The Super III car wants to under steer off the track at the limit. The chassis sits a bit high at the front so shaving the front tires would probably fix that. With all of that magnet there is plenty of grip with the stock tires, although the car could be lowered a little in the back. My car does not have a lot of power, when I tinkered with the pickup shoes I did reduce the shoe tension a little and I did see a little pitting on one shoe.
Next I pushed up the traction magnets and sanded the bottom of the car; then set the magnets flush with the chassis and superglued them in place. I pulled the stock rear wheels and tires and replaced them with 0.300 inch diameter double flanged wheels. With a pair of slip-on silicone tires the overall diameter was 0.490 inch. There is enough clearance to use a somewhat smaller diameter tire. I replaced the stock front tires with Tomy front tires; there is still room to lower the car in front. I had to shave the guide pin; it wants to wobble a little and needs to be glued in place. The car now does about 2.7 seconds, still without the body but with the body clip on and the width is now legal.