| March 3, 2007 Review |
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 Spirit Peugeot 406 Coupe Review By Shawn Smith Appearance:  If you aren't familiar with the British Touring Car Championship you might not have any clue what these cars are. If you are, like me, interested in about anything motorsports related series like the BTCC is something I look forward to in the winter months as the 'Speed Channel' takes its seasonal break from showing 'everything NASCAR' and thankfully shows some of the racing action from other places in the world. The models that will be the subject of this review, the Peugeot 406 Coupes, participated in this body style as early as 2001 and last information I could find on the internet suggests that this body style participated in to the 2004 season.  Looking at several of the images I could find Spirit has done a really good job capturing the shape and liveries of both of these cars. Both the red 'Team Mardi Gras' car and the yellow 'British Team' version look very much like the real thing with only a few small details being different.  Fit and finish on both models are pretty good overall, a slight gap between the red cars front bumper and right fender being the only real fit issue I could find. From a paint quality standpoint both cars look really good with crisp graphics, vivid colors and a glossy finish.  Detail wise the bodies are a little on the light side although there might be a reason for that, something we'll expand more on the performance part of the review. Up front separately applied headlight lenses and a Peugeot emblem are the highlights with each car having body color matching side view mirrors and a black center mounted windsheild wiper.  In the driver's cockpit the detail is a little more plentiful. The dashboard might not be detailed with buttons and gauges however the interior does have a near-full interior tub with a roll cage, fire bottle and a high backed racing seat holding our driver tighly in place. Speaking of the driver figure... both are the same, having the same decorated helmet and blue racing gloves and both are strapped to their seat with bright redish-orange separately applied seatbelts that attach to the back of the seat.  Checking out the rear of the cars the tall rear wing sits high above the trunk-lid with solid red tailight details, prototype images actually show the real cars have small sections of clear on the lower centers of these lenses which the models do not, and each car has a small separately applied muffler detail that is actually mounted on the chassis.  Rims on both cars are a solid black plastic eleven-spoke design with each wheel surounding silver direction slotted brake rotor details front and back. Tire sizes look very small yet the real versions didn't look a heck of a lot bigger and depending on how you have your axles set up you can decrease the amount of wheel to fender clearance. Wait a minute... did I just say you can adjust axle height in these cars? Oh yes I did. Let's check it out. Performance:  Ok, time to get down and dirty. Normally I try to have about the same number if images showing the outside as I do the inside however in the case of these Spirit Peugeot GT coupes there is far more to talk about on the inside. Flipping the cars over on their roof there are only two screws you need to be worried about to get the body off of the chassis. Screw number one is directly behind the tip of the guide blade and the other is near the very rear of the car right in the center.  The third screw you see does not need to be removed to get the body off and it's purpose is to help hold in place the Peugeot's motor pod in place. Also note from this view a first for the Spirit line of slot cars... as has been the recent trend with other manufacturers an angle-winder motor set up makes its debut in these Spirit GT cars.  Body now out of the way we get a closer look at both the angle-winder set up as well as the motor pod. The motor, mounted in its angled position within the motor pod is fitted with a 12 tooth brass pinion that spins a white 32-tooth nylon plastic axle gear. At the back of the motor pod please notice the two silver spring equiped screws used to make adjustments to the up and down movement permitted to the pod assembly.  The motor pod itself sits nice and flush in the chassis opening and by adjusting the silver screws out you can increase the amount of travel of the pod.  As the car comes the screws are in about half way. Using a standard phillips head screw driver turn each screw until you find the desired height that best suits your driving preference.  Here the screws are about all the way backed out and as you can see in the next image having the screws loosened allows for a substantial amount of movement of the pod.  You can also do the reverse, limiting the amount of movement of the motor pod by tightening the screws all the way down although if you do I recommend taking out the springs and storing them in one of your parts containers or taping them to the bottom of the car case. For my personal driving style I liked the chassis set up in this more rigid application.   Heading towards the front of the Peugeot coupe you will notice even more adjustability. Not only can you adjust the car's motor pod to your liking you can also raise and lower the height of the front axle in the chassis by turning small steel hex-wrench screws which are installed in the chassis in to each of the front axle towers.   Using a standard Slot It size wrench you can turn the screws 'in' or down in to the towers and by doing so it presses the car's front axle downward which in turn lifts the chassis and body away from the track surface.  In the image above you can see that by adjusting the left side all the way down how much of a difference in ride height you can create. The right side wheel is lifted all the way up in the tower while the left is pressed down firmly towards the bottom of the axle mount. Keep in mind that this has a direct relation to how much of the guide rides in the slot, and I'm a little confused as to why anyone would need to lift the front end of the car away from the track, but if you think your cars needs to ride a little higher you have the option in this car to make that adjustment with the built in 'tunability'.  Something that would make more sense to me, and with the holes molded in the chassis you would assume this is why the chassis was made this way, would be to take the adjustment screws out of the towers and to place them under the axle to try and help limit how much up and down movement the axle has when running the car at it's lowest point to the track. I tried to set the car up this way, as you can see by the image above... however sadly the screws as they come from the factory are too tall and in order to get them far enough in to the chassis to re-install the axle you would need to drill through the bottom of the chassis or cut down the length of each screw. In other words when I got the screws in as far as they would go I couldn't get the axle back in the car without making modifications. Bummer... I would much rather have a way to keep the axle higher up in the mounts, and free from excess movement, although it can be done, with a little work and I will be doing it to my cars very soon.  Now for you magnet racers here is another important thing to know. As the car comes from Spirit the Peugeot GT's magnetic downforce is very much on the light side. Those of you who have and love to drive stock NINCO cars will feel right at home with one of these Spirit models. The bar that comes in these cars is a bit on the small side, and mounted in front of the motor, making the car very easy to slide through the turns and very easy to overpower the rear tires. During my testing I have to admit I found it a little difficult to make the car power out of the turns smoothly. The motor has possibly too much torque for normal home track racing and added to the light downforce, lightweight car and movement permitted by the motor pod the car had a tendancy to hop or bounce ouf of a turn under hard acceleration.  One way I attempted to solve these issues was to try something a lot of magnet racers love... and that was to add more magnet. Taking the small stock bar magnet out I attempted to use a much stronger Slot It 'race-magnet'. 'Should be perfect' I thought to myself as the Spirit chassis even has the square notches I needed which would allow the H shape of the magnet to sit closer to the rails. Well... the magnet fit perfectly, so I was at first very happy, however once I placed the chassis back on the track to test the grip I heard the magnet hit the rails. Squatting down to track level I looked under the car and much to my dismay sure enough the chassis was flexing in the middle under the stress placed on it by the stronger magnet and this was allowing the magnet to touch the rails. I then flipped the magnet over, because the raised parts of the magnet are shorter on once side than the other, but the magnet strength again flexed the chassis and pulled the chassis down too close to the track surface. In fairness to the magnet the fault might really sit with the chassis as it no doubt could use some additional strengthening, something that I will also have to attempt in the future, and part of me wonders if the flexible chassis also helped contribute to the bounce the car hard when hitting the gas out of the turns.  Back to the motor and tires here are some things you will need to know. While its not obviously stated on the motor this motor is rated by Spirit at 24,000 RPMs at 12 volts however it has been tested to crank our closer to 20,000 at 12 volts. Running this motor at 15 volts generated over 26,000 RPMs and that is where my power supply was set for my testing so I should probably turn the voltage down to about 12 or 13 and run the car again. Less RPM's won't make the magnet any stronger or the chassis any stiffer but maybe it will help reduce the effects of this motors strong torque characteristics and some of the hop I saw in the turns. About the tires... the tires on both of my test models needed some serious truing to make them run their best. All four rear tires had noticable low centers and high outer edges that needed to be sanded to get the tires smooth. Keeping in mind that these tires are very low profile any sanding down of the stock tire lowers the car even more but it will need to be done to assure the best contact with the track.  One final important note pertains only to the yellow version of the Peugeot which upon testing was found to have a badly bent rear axle. This was especially surprising, partially considering the case displays information claiming these cars are made with 'callibrated components', yet none the less it was true that the yellow car had something wrong with it. Now... here is the good news; I contacted Kimrey Enterprises to advise them of my findings and was told that several others had reported the same thing all with the same yellow version. Contacting the manufacturer Kimrey was told by Spirit that they had been made away of the matter and was working to resolve the problem. What's this??? A manufacturer agreeing there was a problem and taking the steps required to fix them for the end users? Certainly not something that is common in our hobby and it is a very good sign in my opinion that Spirit was willing to be held accountable for their error. Kimrey told me that Spirit would be sending out not only replacement axles to fix the bent ones but that bushings and the axle gear were also likely to be included in the replacement parts and that once they come in from Spirit Kimrey would be sending the replacements to all stores who ordered the cars and to those who have already purchased them. Very good customer service by both the manufacturer and distributor!  Final Verdict:  Wow... a lot to think through and decide upon with these new Spirit Peugeot GT coupes. No doubt in my mind that these cars have the potential to be potent racers although I'm a bit torn on how much effort it will take to turn these high powered missles in to smooth racing machines. Magnet racers will no doubt be wanting more downforce but it will require being creative with both chassis strengthening or magnet placement. A 'tweaker' magnet closer to the rear axle might be just the trick as it will get the downforce closer to the tires where it might be needed and placing it farther towards the back negates much of the flexing seen in the center of the chassis. For you non-mag racers I'll have to leave the motor pod and front axle adjustments to you as for my magnet preference and plastic track racing I liked the car best with the motor pod tightly in place and the axle as high up in the chassis as possible. As far as the motor goes the power these little beasts make might be too much power for the traditional home racer yet there are those out there who love these high RPM and high torque power plants. Find a way to harness the power effectively and you will have a very light, fast and good looking racer... Thanks go to Kimrey Enterprises for providing the new Spirit Peugeot 406 Coupe for review. I'm very pleased to have Kimrey on board and I'm looking forward to hearing more from them on the Spirit line of slot cars. As always, feel free to contact me at the email address below with any questions or comments and as always, happy slotting! Shawn Smith sjslots@hotmail.com |
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