By Ross Ballot
RC4WD’s Trail Finder 2 is perhaps the most well-known and widely driven highly-detailed RC crawler or trail truck out there. Focusing on details and form over capability and function, it’s not the best crawler out there, and it doesn’t pretend to be, but goddamn is it a nice piece of machinery. The TF2 platform has been out for a while now, allowing RC4WD to perfect the details of their scale 4x4s, and the newest offering– a 1985 Toyota Pickup– is the manifestation of such exploits.
Fun fact: The Trail Finder 2 platform is over a decade old. So with a new release, what’s actually new? This 1985 Toyota Pickup model gets a pretty cohesive and substantial round of upgrades, all of which we’re thankful to see for a dated chassis. Most notable is the ultra-retro 1985 single cab Toyota Pickup design, accessorized with a period-correct roll bar and high-mount KC lights.
That pretty body also gets a new quick-release mount system. This is honestly excellent news since the old system was anywhere from annoying to infuriating depending on the mood of the user. There’s also new BFGoodrich Mud-Terrain KM2 1.7” tires with the GripTec Red compound and hand-painted white lettering. That’s some above-and-beyond stuff right there. The wheels are 1.7” stamped steel SR5-style lookers with scale hubs that you remove with a socket.
The big story here is the Toyota body. To a guy who cares more about performance than peacocking, the actual appearance of this thing is extremely is impressive. It’s the first RC truck I have had second thoughts about running and subjecting to my regular gambit of trailing and rock crawling. Then I remembered that it’s ultimately a toy meant to represent the full-size thing and that my own full-size rig is scratched and bruised in ways that show it has been used as intended.
Underneath the hood of this 1/10 scale RC is the legendary 22RE engine with painted details, and the truck is sprung on X-Ring shocks mounted on V2 Toyota axles with Xtreme Velocity Duty axles shafts. Being a Trail Finder 2, this is a leaf-sprung rig with a leaf-under-axle configuration. The truck can be reconfigured to have the leafs over the axle, and RC4WD even provides the directions to do so. The benefits of doing such come at the expense of the dialed-in factory-look scale aspect of this rig, but in turn you get extra ground clearance, better off-road capability, and the ability to run larger tires. Needless to say, we will eventually be doing the suspension reconfiguration on this test unit.
Let’s discuss the suspension further. About those leaf springs: They’re period correct, and that’s awesome, but they take some getting used to. Out of the box, the springs themselves are extremely stiff. So much so that I actually said out loud, “Man, I can’t believe how stiff this thing is.” Then I looked around to see if anyone heard and remembered I was home alone. So, thankfully only Google and my iPhone heard. Whew.
The stiffness of the leafs also means you need to adjust your driving style to account for this, at least until they soften up and really let the shocks themselves do more of their job. Driving or piloting a leaf-sprung RC (whether scale or full-size) is completely unlike anything else. On the trail, even out of the box, it’s simply an awesome, totally different experience.
Backing up a bit, it’s no secret that the RC community has a love-it-or-hate-it relationship with leaf springs and the RC4WD brand alike. You have the die-hard fanatics, and then you have those who wouldn’t touch either with a ten-foot pole. One of the latter’s concerns is usually portrayed as build quality, and with any RC4WD product you need to nut-and-bolt the rig for tightness of all the pre-installed hardware. And as for this test unit, that means pre-”installed” stickers, too, which needed some finessing. Minor qualms, but qualms nonetheless.
The build quality is otherwise solid, though it should be for an RC dating back so long; Toyota certainly nailed the build quality of the 5th gen 4Runner by the end of its run, and it’s one of the best-built vehicles of all time. The new RC4WD single-cab body is quite nice, with real craftsmanship as the showcase here, especially for us Toyota fans— and don’t forget, this is a scale-forward truck, so it’s more about the details than outright capability.
We (i.e., I) do have to voice a few other qualms: The included remote is old and feels even older. We’d at the very least like to see the wheel on it reflect the era of the truck it controls instead of looking like it came out of the early 2000s tuner scene. The battery straps are, too, ancient and infuriating. After ten minutes battling these needless frustration points I promptly affixed Velcro to the battery and its tray, immediately remediating the needless straps.
Similarly, the new quick-release body mounts are better than the screw-style mounts used on prior RC4WD trucks, but the new design is still far from perfect. Getting the body and mounts to line up requires some manipulation, and we can’t help but think other brands have figured out the body mount situation much more simplistically. Then again, for a first go at a modern mounting system, it’s certainly a huge improvement over what prior TF2s had to deal with.
Pricing comes in at $569.99, which is in line with other Trail Finder 2 rigs. That’s a huge number if you’re most familiar with the smaller side of RC crawlers, like I am. But as far as details go, the new Trail Finder 2 is unmatched.
Ultimately, the newest TF2 is a very good time, especially if you’re a Toyota fan and/or care about your RC vehicle representing the full-size side of things in reality. It’s nowhere near the most capable RC4WD product; those looking for such should seek the C2X or Bully. But looking at this TF2 bouncing along the trail is just pure joy. Still, this truck isn’t as much about the driving experience as it is the experience of looking at it doing what it’s capable of. Hardcore trailers or crawlers should look elsewhere and brands like Axial, Redcat, and Traxxas have you covered. Yet those interested in true scale RCing and running flat/hiking trails will find the newest TF2 to be pretty close to perfect, especially if you’re a Toyota fan or someone who loves what are not retro 4x4s.
Bonus: Because so much of the RC hobby is tinkering and making things your own, I wasted no time throwing a bigger, grippier, more aggressive set of wheels and tires onto the TF2.
Pulled from a stock Axial UTB18 Capra 4WS (which now runs the stock tires that came on the RC4WD C2X), the directional Mickey Thompson Baja Pro X tires mounted to Pro-Line Holcomb Crawler Bead-Loc wheels look properly mean underneath the Toyota’s body. Sure grips better, too…
(Disclaimer: RC4WD provided the vehicle for the purpose of this review.)