This Tamiya buggy is big enough to drive | GRR
Children of the 1980s and 1990s, rejoice! If it was ever your dream to one day have a scaled-up drivable version of your beloved Tamiya Wild One, this is your lucky day. Welcome to the Wild One Max, an electric-powered Tamiya buggy that’s big enough to drive.
It comes 37 years on from the release of the original Wild One RC in 1985, brought to life with the help of The Little Car Company. In case you’re unfamiliar, their CV includes the Bugatti Baby II (which we drove earlier in the year) and the Aston Martin DB5 Junior. The Wild One Max is 8/10th scale instead of the 1/10th of the original, weighs 250kg, is 3.5m long and 1.8m wide. What’s no different is that, if you so choose, you can still build this Wild One at home.
Its motor puts 5.5PS (4kW) to the rear wheels and is powered by a 2kWh battery, for a maximum range of 25 miles. Tamiya wouldn’t be Tamiya without a wonderful range of Hop-Ups and upgrades, so modular power packs can be added for increased performance and range. The 30mph top speed can be boosted, chunkier suspension and brakes can be added, as can four-point harnesses.
Full ‘packs’ with a selection of upgrades, gear the Wild One Max for specific uses. The Tarmac Pack road-biases it and yes... there will be Road Legal packs that add indicators, brake lights and so on. The Wild One Max can be upgraded to comply with European quadricycle regulations, or neighbourhood EV regulations in America. That’s the dream, isn’t it?
So what price for all this fun? Well, they’re taking £100 reservations now, while the full thing is expected to cost from £6,000 plus local taxes. Act fast, as build slots are on a first come first served basis and we suspect this will go down a storm…