DRIVING THE BEAST

If you’ve got a fun place to run the Raminator right outside your garage, that’s the ideal situation for this big rig. Otherwise, transporting this beast is best tackled as a two-man job and a van or pickup truck will definitely be appreciated. The good news for me is that I have a Tacoma and a buddy who was more than willing to help me take the Raminator for a spin. Unloaded and in the dirt, this big rig has a presence about it that you don’t get from any other vehicle out there. It gave me almost the same feeling that I get when I look at a full-size monster truck; you just look at it and say WOW. The engine starts with one pull once the carb has been primed, and it has considerably more snarl with its steel tuned pipe than the similar, muffled engines you might find in a leaf blower. This is an 80-pound truck, so I wasn’t expecting it to blast off like an electric 1/10 or 1/8 scale truck, but I will say the acceleration was better than I thought it would be. The engine does take a little bit to spool up and get things moving, but it’s not long before the tires are spinning and throwing dirt. The stock gearing gets the truck up to its top speed of 16 mph in a few seconds, which may sound slow, but remember, we’re talking about a 40-inch-long, 80-pound rig here. Primal includes an optional gear set for the transmission that will get you closer to 20 mph, but at the expense of acceleration. I’d rather have the low-end grunt. At any speed, the Raminator needs a lot of stopping power, and Primal really came through. The brakes are fantastic; they modulate well and didn’t fade. As for handling, the sway bars are a little light and that allows the chassis to lean more than I would like for smooth-surface cornering, but in rough terrain where the truck belongs, the sway bars were perfect, and stiffer ‘bars would have limited suspension movement. Deep ruts that would have swallowed 1/10 or 1/8 scale trucks were easily steamrolled by the Raminator. And yes, it will jump. I sent the Raminator flying off a big pile of dirt to see what it could do, and the experience was unlike anything I’ve had with smaller trucks. Once the truck launched, the excessive weight of the front axle made that nose drop hard. A fistful of throttle is usually the answer here, but grabbing the gas did nothing to level the truck out Those giant shocks did their thing and took the nose-first hit, as long as the truck wasn’t pitched too close to vertical. When it was time to pack up the Raminator for the day, I tested the on-board engine cutoff by switching off the transmitter as the truck idled. As soon as the receiver was deprived of signal, the engine cutoff did it’s thing and shut off voltage to the spark plug to kill the engine.