FLYA1201
Renault 5 Turbo
(Drivers: Ragnotti &
Andrié)
1st Rallye Monte Carlo 1981
by
Daniel J. Dyke
An Ongoing Review
Last Modified: 8-7-2005
There was a point when the thought of the purchase of a Fly car as a runner was a distant mirage. Usually, and then only rarely, they were bought as shelf queens to be used in dioramas or to take up shelf space, but when I saw the new Fly Renault R5, I knew it was an inexorable fate that this car was destined for the track. The price was stiff for a rally car, but our local raceway, Fastlane Hobbies, had their first anniversary sale and offered 25% off all Fly cars in stock. This brought the car into the reasonable realm of $48.24 and so transaction was made, my money for a Fly. Even then I considered the price a little steep.
History
This car is legendary because of its performance, but its looks that added greatly to that legend. It looked brutal when it first appeared and somehow reached the soul of people worldwide. I don't know if it was just the looks or the knowledge of what was in the engine bay that enhanced the mystique of this car. Technologically this car was a milestone for Renault as no sedan to that point had been fitted with a turbo motor. The company had been using the technology in F1 and those of us who are old enough to remember have memories of tremendous power being unleashed on tracks with long straights. Renault decided to put that technology to use in a rally car of all things. This does not seem strange now, but then the turbo lag was long.
The prototype was built in in 1978, but not raced until the following year. The Fly car is the one that recorded the R5's first win. What a win it was! In only its fourth outing the car won the prestigious Monte-Carlo rally. The rest of the history of the R5 is long and complex, but a good summary can be found at the Renault Website.
Looks & Livery: This is a great looking car. Both the paint and the plastic are well done. The real test will be how well it holds up in our brutal no magnet rally series. Right now the car is one of the nicest liveries on a rally car I have seen and it definitely is the nicest one I have. Can we expect more liveries from Fly? Their website pictures four more liveries to be made in the near future. I hope this is only the beginning as there were hundreds of these cars raced. I saw one statistic on the web that over 350 different cars were raced in the R5 cup or in rallying. This could be a real cash cow for Fly if the model catches on.
Front: One nice touch is that the driver and navigator/co-driver have their heads angled toward each other as if they are conferring. Was it intentional or not, who knows, but it is nice. The most obvious omission is that of working lights. OK, I will give them the turn signals, but a Rally car needs lights and an on off switch on the bottom. I would have paid $20 more for the lights. A light kit will be added in the Dungeon of Doom and Despair to make this intoa proper car.
Back: Note the muffler which was painted a gold color like the real car.. Again, I want lights but real brake lights that work. We had these back in the 60s by using mercury switches. At the price Fly is charging I want something a little extra. Note they did include the rear window wiper.
Harness/Straps: Yes, straps! Instead of molding in the three point harness Fly actually made straps that go over the shoulder and are attached under the body. Just a small touch to add the feeling of realism.
Feet: Often times the feet of the driver and co-driver are cut off to make room for parts or to save weight. A good chunk of the legs can be taken off as a weight saver.
The Scale Issue: People who want to know can make up their own minds. For me the car is close enough. What is odd, unless I have bad stats, is that the car is slightly larger except for the front track, which is too small. I added a wheel spacer on each side of the front axle and the car looks better
Specification Length Slot Car Wheelbase 95.7" 98" +2.4% Front Track 53.0" 50" -5% Rear Track 58.1" 60" +3.3% Length 146.6" 152" +3.6% Height 52.9" 54" +2.1%
Technology
Recently Fly has been supplying cars with some new technology. The most obvious changes are in the chassis and in the tires.
Chassis: This chassis is a sidewinder layout, but differs from most previous offerings by abandoning the separate motor pod and frame for a single piece unit that if viewed from a distance, could be confused for a Monogram or a Carrera chassis. The chassis is held on by three screws; one in the rear and two in the front. It is similar to the FLY MARTINI LANCIA 037 which was reviewed by both Phil Wicks and Harry Wise. Note that the chassis comes with a bar magnet in front of the motor and pocket about halfway back that will hold a button magnet which is not supplied. There is plenty of open space for weights or magnets. The engine can be glued in by running a bead of glue along the front of the motor where it meets the chassis, but on my car I didn't think this was necessary.
Tires: The tires are also the new compound found on the GT-40 and other recent cars. They are great tires. The front ones, which appear to made from the same material, were coated with a thin layer of something that quickly began to peel off. I wonder if it is something to reduce grip.
Bearings: The bearings are not brass, but rather the plastic type. This is no big deal to me as I can find no speed improvement by going to a brass bearing.
Gears: Standard Fly sidewinder 11/36 gearing. I think the counting was correctly. There was no lubricant on the gears when the car was purchased. I plan on running them in with toothpaste.
Front Axle: The front axle is a solid floating axle. Some people shim the thing in place and others encase it in a piece of tubing to remove this feature. Those that do this claim they can get a tenth or two from the procedure. Part of the reason that this feature is bad is that on some cars the front tires will run into the bodywork when the axle is in the up position. On this car they do not touch the bodywork even with the spacers to fix the front track problem.
Guide and Braids. Standard. I cut my braids short to drop the guide down slightly, but that is a personal preference.
Trueness of Tires and Wheels: Excellent. The wheels only required minor truing. The wheels are fairly substantial for a plastic wheel.
Motor: Standard Fly sidewinder setup. On Fly sidewinders one usually has to cut off the ends of the motor shaft so that they do not rub the rear tires, but on this car this is totally unnecessary unless you are trying to remove as much mass as possible.
Magnet: Bar magnet. Pulled it out as this is a Rally car and we only run non-magnet rally classes. I did toss it toward the light and it stuck on the housing. The magnet does not slide back and forth like on the Lancia but has a fixed position.
Weight: The car is light for a rally car or small touring sedan. This adds to its quick acceleration.
Car Oz. Fly Renault R5 3.01 SCX Peugeot 2.74 SCX Fiat Abarth 2.50
MSRP: The retail price is $64.99, but I paid $48.74 on sale and got ½ hour of free track time.
| Dealer | In Stock | Dealer Price: | Shipping/Incentive | Real Price |
| Fantasy World | Y | $54.99 | $7.50 | 62.49 |
| Fastlane Hobbies | N | $64.99 | -$2.00/$4.00* | $62.99/$60.99 |
| HobbySpeed.com | Y | $58.94 | Free | $58.94 |
Performance
This car is very good for a non-magnet car right out of the box. We were running our non-magnet rally cars the other day and the best laps in the race were in the high 13s. Immediately before the race I turned a 14.08 with this car, but did not race it as it had not even been lubricated. It had excellent handling, but required a different technique from the SCX rally cars which are usually my weapons of choice.
It is consistent and really jumps down the straight due to the excellent traction provided by the sidewinder motor location and the light weight of the vehicle. I think it could even handle more power on big tracks and a little less on short ones. I hope to try a NC-1 and a PMTR 1500 in it in future tests. Another mod along this line that can tried is adding a pinion with one more tooth. The car is very light and this might be as effective as changing motors. I did this to a SCX Fiat Abarth with good results.
I ran the car at 12 volts and it became a different beast. My times almost equalled my earlier speeds. It was gaining in some areas because the rear was acting differently on the twisty part of the course. It was about dead equal with Brian McNay's RX-91 engined Lancia running at 15 volts.
The car has a very high center of gravity for a short narrow car and so a little weight can be added to lower the center of Gravity.
Problems : What would be a review without a listing of the problems. Not much to say except it is one of best Fly cars I have run straight out of the box without magnets. By this I mean that it ran without any tweaking when I put it on the track. I hope this is true across the line because it is discouraging to a new user to get a car and not be able to run it.
1) Too much traction from the front tires. These would be great on the back of something but I am a firm believer in a ZERO grip front end and so they are not good here. The fix is to replace them or coat them. I have had some success with car wax as a coating. The way you tell if something reduces grip is to put it on rear tires and see what it does.
2) Hop, Tip, and Jump. Simply stated the car likes to bicycle and then flop over. This has to be dealt with through driving style. A little weight would help if your rules allow it. Our rules do not allow such a thing and so I won't because tech inspection will quickly reveal weight.
3) Narrow front. Do the spacer trick mentioned above, if your rules allow it. Ours do and so I did.
4) The car needs lights! Real ones that light up and stay lit and it needs a switch on the bottom to turn them on and off.
My overall evaluation is that this car is over priced, but a must buy! This is a fairly competitive car out of the box, but is not the best I have ever seen in Rally cars. It keeps saying under all the faults, "I can go fast, but you have to drive me the way I want."
Special thanks are due to Ray Torbeck at Fastlane Hobbies and Raceways for the super sale and the free track time.
Links
Racing
http://www.rally-bohemia.cz/1981/images/photogalery.asp
http://www.renault.com/default.html?/gb/passion/culte_p3.htm
http://freespace.virgin.net/c.coleman/History.htm
Poster: Yes, there is an available poster of this exact car!
*Fastlane Hobbies gives you ½ hour free track time with the
purchase of a car. This is worth $2 in the summer and $4 from fall to spring.