Gotcha.
Gotcha.
Update time!
My son let his buddy drive the car, who promptly crashed it. Damage: one rear lower control arm. Luckily they are made of floppy plastic and act kind of like a fuse, they break before the axle or control arm boxes. Ordered a set of replacement aluminum lower control arms from Banggood for a whopping $8 (https://www.banggood.com/Feiyue-Upgrade-Accessories-Rear-Axle-Main-Girder-FY-01FY-02FY-03-RC-Car-Spare-Parts-p-1063941.html?p=4818154699821201605X)
I put the aluminum lower control arms on my car, and swapped one of my good lower control arms to my son's car. The idea being, I am less apt to crash my car, his needs the floppy pieces to take a beating. Plus, I'm Dad, I wanted to pimp my ride. 
The aluminum arms required a little grinding on the lower shock "bushing" to narrow it by about 2mm. The aluminum arms fit perfectly otherwise.
My spare stock front/rear diffs came in but my car is still going strong. I'm tempted to grab a spare metal rear axle assembly while I can get it cheap still, and just run the stock stuff til they all break. At that point I'll drop in the upgraded axle.
So we are nearing the $85 mark per car considering the upgrades and replacement parts. Still worth it in my opinion.
Still waiting for mine to show up so my little nephew can crash it instead of the B5M 
Appreciate the consumable update.
Thanks again for this review.
I found one of these on eBay for $59.99 including shipping! (it even came with the proper plug in charger for the US)
Awesome deal ! Great little toy for my son on his 8th Birthday. Highly recommend you guys pick one up. It'll make make a great Christmas present.
Indy-Guy, go ahead and order the complete rear axle from Amazon. It is still just $10 and so far my son hasn't killed it:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01LZVAYZC/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
My car on the other hand has performed flawlessly. I drive it a little nicer than my HPI monster truck, but it is still a hoot. Still well worth the $60 I spent. I took the spare tire off the rear and that helped with keeping it level during jumps. Next I need some real oil filled shocks to calm down the "butt bounce" during jumps.
You could darn near run a spec series race with these things.
In reply to slefain :
Thanks for chiming in.... Any recommendations on a spare (extra) battery? Don't need any more power, but longer run time would be nice. Also low $$, cause I'm a cheapskate.
In reply to Indy-Guy :
I haven't bought spare batteries yet, but I was planning on just getting stock ones.
Welp the factory batteries have both crapped out, but I'm not shocked. I dropped a 3000mAh 7.2v NiMH battery in my son's car and it is back in business. The only catch is it doesn't really fit in the factory battery box. I'm going to carve up my own car to fit the bigger 6-cell pack.
It is just as well, the NiMH packs are far more forgiving and easier to charge IMHO.
Not my car, but pretty much how the battery pack sits in it:
Update time! My son apparently got a little too lively with the controller and broke the self centering mechanism in his steering wheel. Took it apart but it is probably too delicate to repair. My solution is to just swap controllers with him. There was zero work to bind my remote with his car. Turn on his car, turn on my remote, beep beep, done. Apparently when the car is powered up it just looks for a compatible controller and binds to it.
The NiMH battery pack is working great, but I need to do some surgery to move it further into the cab. There is a bump between where the seat rests would be that is keeping it from moving forward. I'm going to cut it out on my car and see how it goes.
Still worth the price of admission!
In reply to slefain :
My son is still enjoying his too. I should have taken your advice about buying the rear axle right away, but, being the cheap SOB that I am, I decided to wait until it broke before ordering a stronger unit. I was rewarded with a VERY short wait, and so he now has the beefier axle mounted in there. Note: I had to open up the new rear axle and make changes to get the correct rotation. Installed it as delivered and the front and rear wheels did this magical counter-rotating thing. the fronts tried to pull the car forward while the rears tried to pull it backwards.
Even with this hicc-up and down time, it's still a TON of fun, and he's enjoying it greatly.
TLDR: It's worth the price of admission. Fun toy.
R/C can teach you so much, especially about steering and suspension. I remember moving the A-arms up and down on my RC10T watching the movement, changing a mounting point and comparing the difference.
Indy-Barely Functional-Guy said:In reply to slefain :
My son is still enjoying his too. I should have taken your advice about buying the rear axle right away, but, being the cheap SOB that I am, I decided to wait until it broke before ordering a stronger unit. I was rewarded with a VERY short wait, and so he now has the beefier axle mounted in there. Note: I had to open up the new rear axle and make changes to get the correct rotation. Installed it as delivered and the front and rear wheels did this magical counter-rotating thing. the fronts tried to pull the car forward while the rears tried to pull it backwards.
Even with this hicc-up and down time, it's still a TON of fun, and he's enjoying it greatly.
TLDR: It's worth the price of admission. Fun toy.
Doh! Sorry, I forgot to mention flipping the diff to get the correct rotation.
I already found my next cheap Chinese toy: https://www.gearbest.com/rc-cars/pp_1489163.html
Called the WPL C14, for $35 if it just sits on the shelf it would be a cool model. Tempted to get the RTR version just to see how it runs stock, then drop in hobby grade electrics later. It needs a real steering servo and speed controller apparently, and a real radio would help.
Awww crap, they went and knocked off the Tamiya Bruiser: https://www.banggood.com/HG-P407-110-2_4G-4WD-Rally-Rc-Car-TOYATO-Metal-4X-4-Pickup-Truck-Rock-Crawler-RTR-Toy-p-1307753.html?stayold=1&cur_warehouse=CN
Price is kinda steep right now, but I'll be watching.
Appleseed said:R/C can teach you so much, especially about steering and suspension. I remember moving the A-arms up and down on my RC10T watching the movement, changing a mounting point and comparing the difference.
I did that with Lego Technic. Nothing beats holding parts in your hands and moving them around.
I have one of these little buggies as well, and the primary pilot just turned 5. His biggest complaint is lack of battery life, so I picked up a spare stock battery. He's had a rear axle start to make noise so I swapped it out with one I sourced from Alibaba - straight drop-in and metal gears. It recently had some sort of steering servo failure so I've got a new one of those sitting waiting to go in.
Tons of fun. I've got an B5M that goes like a bat out of hell, but the cheap little Chinese booger is perfect for bashing around in the cacti with a kid at the wheel.
Curse you Gearbest and WPL!!
Do I need this? No. Do I want this? YES YES YES holy crap Yes:
https://www.gearbest.com/rc-cars/pp_1841778.html
Yup, six wheel drive. And it is $45 in RTR format right now. Or if I want to go kit based (needs electronics) and WWI level old school, it can be had for $35:
https://www.gearbest.com/r-c-cars/pp_009847372400.html
But wait, there's more! What if you just want a RTR double axle truck WITH TANK TREADS!!! Yeah, that's $46 right now.
These are all based on the WPL chassis which actually gets decent reviews. It has upgrades as well, including a 2-speed transmission! The 6x6 may be a birthday present to myself, especially for that cheap.
In reply to slefain :
Curse you sir. I drove many miles in one of those 6x6 truck and now I think I need to get one and make it look like my old real one.
Wow, things have progressed in RC cars in the last 30 years. I swear these things are cheaper now in $$ terms than they were back then, let alone counting inflation. Get back to me in two years once my grandson hit's 5 years old. I failed with my daughters, but I wont with the next generation. 
I need recommendation for my DE class. I teach a lesson on traction, braking and steering and use cheap ($30) drift cars that come with shiny plastic "tires." Problem is it only takes one kid with an inability to learn to cause damage and end the day. Do I spend more money on better quality in the hopes they last longer or keep buyingbthe cheapos?
In reply to Adrian_Thompson :
No kidding. My $150.00 RC10T kit (remember those?)cost $150.00 in 1990. That's about $300.00 these days.
Update!
Time to finally fix my son's car. I got a stock replacement front diff (with plastic gears) and dropped it in tonight. I'm hoping the new diff lives a little longer now that my son is a little more mature and has bit more self control.
Tonight I took it for a test drive before I cracked it open. I forgot that the upgraded rear axle I put in last year has a higher gear ratio. With the throttle turned up to 100% this thing is stupid fast, almost on par with my brushless Associated drift car. It pulls wheelies on asphalt from a slow roll.
My battery mount solution needs work. I am going to cut the middle bulkhead to let the battery move forward, which should help with balance.
I think for my own car I'm doing to order a set of replacement metal gears, which were not available when I did the rear axle swap on my son's car:
Another update!
Well, my son's car ate the metal diff rear axle. That surprised me. So now I have a set of full metal diff gears (front and rear) on order. Should be in by next Monday. I'm not expecting fine precision fit & finish on the gears, but I'll try to set them up best I can.
https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B07C3GZ81V/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
I already have two sets of stock plastic rear gears sitting around, so I'll throw those in a stock axle case to get him back running for now. I told him he'd need to dial back the trigger finger though until the metal gears come in.
My personal car is still running perfectly. My more measured driving style seems to be gentler on the car, while my son's "YOLO" driving style eats parts.
Nicely timed. I am resurrecting mine now. The batteries don't like my typical use case - long periods of storage followed by "hey uncle Keith can we play with my monster truck?". I'd basically given up on it, but last week a new set of batteries arrived and I'm going to try a different care regimen to see if I can keep them both healthy and more available.
I did have one problem with the mechanicals. I had to replace the steering servo a while back, and it wasn't really working well. I traced it down to a high level of friction in the...track rod? Basically, the sliding member that has the tie rods attached. It was very dirty and the servo couldn't generate enough power to move it. There was also a missing screw on the front subframe which was allowing it to shift instead of steering. I fixed both the other day and I'll be taking the truck out for a test drive soon :)
The driving style from my junior pilot is more "How hard can we make it crash". Which isn't all that hard on the mechanicals although the rear driveshaft has fallen out a few times.
I'm running 7.2V NiMH stick packs in our cars. Maybe the extra weight versus the stock little LiPo is the problem.
If I'd been smart, I would have looked up this thread and picked up NiMH batteries before ordering replacement LiPo ones. Like you said earlier, much easier to live with. I have a car from 1997 or so that still has viable batteries even after sitting in a box for 20 years.
Here's how I nestled the battery into my son's car:
The back of the pack just peeks out over the rollcage.
The battery is a little too far forward right now, usually it is on the spur gear cover. I cut off 3/4 of the bulkhead hump above the driveshaft to allow the battery to move into the middle of the car. Of course the neato driver had to go, but I had already yanked it to give the motor better cooling. I added a motor heatsink a while ago.
And here is the carnage inside the FY03 rear axle. The axle grease was red, now it looks like anti-seize. The gear teeth are rounded over. It pulled wicked wheelies down the street though!
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