| March 26 2004 Review |
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 Click Here To Buy This Car Now Spirit Reynard 2KQ By Shawn Smith Click here to have Genie read this review out loud to you in Microsoft Agent AUDIO! [Click here to chat about this item on our Forum] Appearance:  Getting my first glance at the new Spirit Reynard 2KQ I was initially pleased by several things. First, and most importantly, I was happy to see that the shape of the car looked very much like the 1:1 prototype. Spirit had a few slot car enthusiasts upset with the overall shape of the Ferrari 512M so it was a relief to see that the Reynard looks very good comparatively speaking.  I can also say that the paint on the Reynard seems to be an improvement over the previous models as well. On the Spirit Lola I had examples of paint over spray between two over lapping colors and with the Ferrari I had some ‘orange peel’ effect on the back of that as well. The Reynard though looks much better in the area of pain quality control so that makes me instantly happier.  In fact, the only real complaint I have about the finish pertains to the lack of clear coating on the striping especially over the red. I accidentally scuffed a red stripe with the tip of a screwdriver and now I have the smallest silver scratch right behind the front fender louvers on the left side. (sniffle, sniffle)  All kidding aside I do feel Spirit has made some good improvements with their paint production on this Reynard. Sponsorship logos are all crisp and nicely applied and even the smallest words used on the car, the driver’s names on either side of the cockpit, are all very legible and sharply painted.  Our Reynard driver though could be one area that might need a little help. Nothing serious mind you but the poor little guy doesn’t have a whole lot of room to move around in there and Spirit’s use of a full driver figure somewhat compromises the position of the driver figure. Other interior details are fine though including some tiny little colored markings on the dash panel, the typical fire bottle and the hand painted safety belts on the driver figure.  The rim detail is also very nice and once again includes Spirit’s wheel post mounted disk brake details. As was the case with the Lola, Ferrari and now with the Reynard it isn’t uncommon to see one or two of these brake details a little loose inside of the wheel. They won’t come off obviously but they could be a source of noise if they begin to ‘chatter’. Performance:  Getting to the ‘go fast’ parts requires the removal of four screws from underneath the chassis. Pay attention though that the two screws in the front are shorter than the two in the back. Forget this and you could accidentally damage a body post by trying to crank down one of the longer screws in the front holes. Its best to pay attention as you take them out and save yourself a headache later.  Here you can see the flat and wide area of the Reynard chassis. Most of what you see as open space in front of the motor is actually a little unusable for tuning as the interior fits right down against the chassis pan. If you plan to tune it you’ll want to focus on the areas to either side of the motor and the space just behind the front axle.  Speaking of the front axle; the Reynard 2KQ comes with a full front axle, unlike the stub axles used on the Ferrari, as well as without the brass friction strips used on the Lola. This is again an area I’m happy to say Spirit has listened to and made some modifications to.  Another bright spot is the Reynards use of the inline motor versus the sidewinder. While a sidewinder motor configuration is known to be preferred by many slot car racers it was painfully too apparent that Spirit had some issues with sidewinder motor shafts rubbing on the tires of the Ferrari 512M. Understandably the shape of the Reynard’s body truly dictated the use of the in-line configuration but as with all of the other changes so far I was happy to see it. There is one drawback here however and that is the total lack of grease and oil used on both the gearing as well as the axle bushings. I found this area of concern with both the Lola and Ferrari 512M and sadly this is one area that has not been addressed with this latest release.  Another frustration that has not been addressed is in the area of the Spirit tires. Both the Lola and the Ferrari had issues with tire molding stubs and the Reynard is continuing the tradition. While this can be remedied it is none-the-less an issue that can effect the heavily desired ‘out of the box’ performance. The mass of rubber on the front wheel pictured above is the worst of the four tires but something like this can effect how a slot car runs and I hope Spirit can take a good look at changes here in the future.  Returning to a happier topic requires nothing more than looking at the magnet set up on the Reynard 2KQ. The bar magnet used here is ample enough for a lot of slot car enthusiasts and the design of the chassis keeps the magnet close to the rails. Sanding down the rear tires until all of the tread had been turned into slicks also lowered the magnet if even fractionally but when it comes to magnetic down force every small amount can add up to a larger benefit to magnet fans. So let’s talk about how it runs! This particular Reynard was certainly a lot quieter than the Lola I tested and its magnetic attraction to the rails allowed for faster cornering than I saw from the Ferrari 512M. While I did manage some pretty quick times out of the Reynard it did seem to lack a certain amount of torque that I like. Acceleration was smooth but not as robust as I might normally prefer and I found that to pull off fast laps I had to work on keeping cornering speeds as high as possible rather than worrying about how much throttle I had to apply leaving a turn. Most times hovered just above the 2.8 mark on the 30-foot Carrera test track and that is certainly faster than the majority of cars I’ve timed on the track. The fastest lap, according to my RMS timing software, was listed as a 2.784 and that isn’t anything to laugh at with cars like the Scalextric Lister LMP Sport pulling off 2.714 fastest laps. The Final Verdict:  A lot has been worked on by Spirit and for that I am thankful. There are a few things that still need to be addressed but once they find a way to work in greasing the gears during production and creating a better tire I think Spirit will have an even nicer car. That being said the Reynard 2KQ proved to be a quick and competent competitor on the track, once it was tweaked to my liking, and lap times really told the story. The Spirit Reynard is a nice car overall that I would probably recommend more to the intermediate and veteran slot car enthusiasts than I would to a novice slot car racer yet that doesn’t mean that you novice guys shouldn’t pick one up. Just make sure to take it apart, grease and oil the moving parts and also make sure to check those tires for the problem I pointed out and you’ll find that you’ll enjoy your Reynard a lot more than if you hadn’t taken the preventative steps before trying to run it. 
Video will take about a minute to download on a 56k modem. Click Here To Download Spirit Reynard 2KQ Video Special thanks go to Eagle Distributing for providing me the chance to get a better look at this latest Spirit Reynard 2KQ release! As always, feel free to contact me if you have any additional questions and I will be happy to answer anything that I can. Shawn Smith SJSlots@hotmail.com |
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