Rlaarlo DSK 1/8 Buggy Put to the Test

Added: 2026-05-17

[00:00:00]Welcome back to part two of this DSK 1H bugget from Rala. Can it redeem itself?

[00:00:05]We're going to find out.

[00:00:08]Now, before we get into this video, just a few things I want to clear up from the last video. I'd say 99% of the comments were really positive, and I really appreciate you watching and commenting on that video and seeing it for what it was. That video was not staged. It was not done on purpose. I did not take this car out to break it. I wanted to see how it performed at that track. And I was very disappointed. And as you saw from the footage, it was less than 3 minutes and this thing broke. Now, since I put that video out, there has been other people having the same issue, which I think has made people realize, yes, it wasn't staged. Yes, it wasn't done on purpose. Of course, after that happened, I am going to show that on the video. My loyalty is with you guys, the subscribers, the people who watch the video. I don't hide anything. Everything has to be shown. The next thing was apparently this car is not a basher.

[00:00:59]What is it? The kit version is definitely aimed at the racers. So this version is an RTR. It doesn't have race tires on it. It doesn't have race electronics in it. So what is it for?

[00:01:09]That is my question. Most people who are going to buy the RTR are just going to want to hoon it around, bash it, and have fun with it. And that's exactly what I was doing with this. So yeah, tell me in the comments if it's not a basher, what is it? Because you're not going to race this thing. It's far too heavy. And anybody who's done any 1/8 racing or watched any 1/8 racing know that these cars are raced hard. They go fast. They jump. They bash into each other. This wouldn't last 2 minutes on a racetrack on a competitive 1/8 race. Not a chance. Right now that's cleared up.

[00:01:39]Let's get into this video. Usually on my second video of a car, I would tune it fully, take it apart, look at the diffs, but because on that first video we didn't have a chance to properly test this, I'm not going to do that. I still want to run it as stock. So, we're going to have a quick look over it, tell you my feelings on this top play and what I think the issue is. Then, we're going to take it back to the track and we're going to properly run it around and just see if we can get some laps in and see how it does actually perform. And then, if it does survive that, we're going to send it and just see how durable this thing is. So, as you saw from the last video, the main issue with this boogie is this plastic top plate here. We've seen quite a few of these snap on other videos, as well as my own, and it seems to be snapping in the same place. One thing I do want to question is why Veralo not picked up on this earlier.

[00:02:26]Now there's two options for this.

[00:02:28]They've tested it properly and they've known it's a weak spot and it's broke, but they've just sold it anyway. Or they've not tested it properly and they don't know it's a weak spot and they've sold it anyway. I don't know which of those is worse really, but this should have been picked up and this should have been resolved. I want to give a massive, massive thank you to Sirius RC here in the UK. He managed to source me the spare part I need. So, another plastic piece which we've put on the car. I have ordered the 7075 aluminium piece, but yeah, huge thank you to him. Fantastic site. I will put a link below. It's non affiliated or anything like that. He does all sorts of RC cars. Fantastic customer service, quick delivery. He is a official Ralo distributor. As you can see, I've got the new top plate in there. Now, one of the things I'm hoping is that when they manufactured these cars, they overtightened that screw and that screw, and that's what caused it to fail there. That is wishful thinking, and I've only just knit these up. So, they are in there, but they're not overtightened. But I think for me, the main issue on this top plate is not necessarily that it's plastic, cuz I think we still may have issues when we put the aluminium one in there. I think the issue is a how thin the plastic is, and two, how it's actually tied into the bulkhead. As you can see from here, we've got three screws, which you'd normally see into the front center brace and into the steering columns. That is pretty normal. But then what you would normally see on most 1/8 buggies is it would tie in with at least another four screws. So rather than just having two screws there, it would have two screws going in through the shock tower into the actual piece or it would be a two-part piece. Cuz the other problem is as well these pins what are in these upper arms are not hiding anywhere.

[00:04:02]They're floating in there. So the only thing that's holding this front end onto the front bulkhead at the top is literally those two screws. So, when we replace this with a steel one, they could quite possibly rip out or damage the bulkhead. For me, this part needs to be redesigned. It needs to be beefed up, and they need to rethink how that ties in. I think we're going to see a lot more issues with this area. But hopefully, we'll get a nice run out of it. And as you can see from here how thin this actual piece is. Uh there's not much to it at all. And you can see there where it's actually breaking around where the screw heads are, which is 100% the weak area. The other issue I had with this car was the motor mount came loose. And then when I tried to reme mesh it, it just kept making funny noises. Now, thank you to someone who commented on that video, and I can't remember who it was, he mentioned that he's noticed on his spurgeear that it's got a high point, which means the spurgeear is not accurately being machined and it's not perfectly round.

[00:04:52]So, even if you set your mesh at a certain point, as it goes around, it's going to higher up and then it's going to make a noise and it's going to not be a good mesh. So, you're going to have to set your mesh quite loose on this, which I have done. There you go. Hopefully, this motor man won't move. I put the washers in so it gets a bit more of a bite. And I put some thread lock in there as well. So hopefully that stays put. Apart from that, the rest of the buggy held up well, but as you saw, we didn't really test it very much at all.

[00:05:16]Let's get this out. Let's see what it can do. Fingers crossed we don't have any more issues. Let's go. Well, the weather gods are on our side. It's been peeing it down all night and now we're okay. So, let's give this dragon another chance. I'm going to initially run it on 4S. I want to see how it gets around this track. Give it a chance. I really want to see just how it feels, how it runs. I've not had a proper chance to do that yet. If it survives that, then I'll put it on to 6S.

[00:05:47]It's 5:30 a.m. in the morning. Nobody about. Absolutely beautiful. This is the best time to run an RC in my opinion.

[00:05:58]Right, let's see what this can do. I'm really looking forward to this. Please, fingers crossed me it doesn't break on the first jump.

[00:06:30]Heat.

[00:06:34]Heat.

[00:06:42]LET'S try and get a feel for this car.

[00:07:13]See how he takes these jumps.

[00:07:17]See how he corners nice so far. Does feel nice on 4s.

[00:07:27]Actually does feel nice and planted, nice and smooth. Feels heavy.

[00:07:40]If I was going to say this feels like anything, it feels more like my uh Coralia Suga, the 17th scale, than it does a 1/8 booger, just because of the weight of it.

[00:07:54]But I tell you what, it's dealing with this trap really nice.

[00:08:01]Done a few laps now. We haven't broke it. Go on.

[00:08:13]Nice.

[00:08:15]One thing I will say is it has lost a little bit of its punch on 4S.

[00:08:28]Shocks are working really nicely though.

[00:08:30]I will say that.

[00:08:36]Just so worried about that front end.

[00:08:54]Oh, nice. Very nice.

[00:08:58]Whoa. Bit slidy on that time out there.

[00:09:03]Beautiful.

[00:09:10]Oh, nice. Nice.

[00:09:14]Tires are hooking up well as well. It's been raining overnight, so Oh, yes.

[00:09:26]But we're getting some laps in.

[00:09:37]is a little bit wiggly actually. It's um I haven't got my confidence with it yet.

[00:09:50]It's not as nimble as my 1/8 Corali buggies.

[00:09:56]nose dives a little bit.

[00:09:58]I think that's the SC. Corners nicely.

[00:10:03]Jumps beautifully. I will say that it jumps very nice.

[00:10:10]As you can see, it does tend to nose dive a bit if you don't give it a bit of power off that jump. I mean, it's on 4S and it's a heavy car, so Whoa, that was a nice jump.

[00:10:21]I'm going to bring it in in a second.

[00:10:22]Just check that top plate. Give it one more lap around.

[00:10:50]All right, let's just have a check of this top plate. Just see what it's saying.

[00:11:04]Now, we're looking all right.

[00:11:06]Looking okay.

[00:11:10]Still got good mesh.

[00:11:15]Motor's cold, which I knew it would be.

[00:11:18]Right. Let's see how controllable we can get it over this jump. Some nice smooth jumps over this one.

[00:11:29]Nice.

[00:11:34]Oh yes. Look at that. How smooth that jumps.

[00:11:43]Oh, nice.

[00:11:52]Oh yes.

[00:12:05]Oh, it's getting dirty now.

[00:12:12]Look at that go.

[00:12:15]Beautiful.

[00:12:23]Beautiful.

[00:12:28]Let's try out this corner properly.

[00:12:31]See if we can get full pelt and make this jump.

[00:12:37]Oh, not quite that time.

[00:12:40]Try and get a better line.

[00:12:43]Just caught on her nicely though.

[00:12:46]Come on.

[00:12:51]Oh, beautiful. Beautiful.

[00:12:56]Nice.

[00:13:06]Oh, what a beautiful jump.

[00:13:11]Oh, first proper crash. Are we all right?

[00:13:16]We're all right. We're good. We're good.

[00:13:17]We're good.

[00:13:23]Nice.

[00:13:28]Oh, yes. Yes. I'm starting to smile.

[00:13:31]He's starting to smile.

[00:13:39]He's starting to smile.

[00:13:46]Oh yes.

[00:13:49]Right. Confidence is getting a bit more now. So let's just see how quicker we can get around this track now.

[00:14:08]It's not about how fast you can get on the trigger. It's how smooth you can get around a track like this.

[00:14:24]Oh yeah. Oh. Oh, that was nice.

[00:14:28]Just Oh. Beautiful.

[00:14:45]Did you see that? That was absolutely beautiful.

[00:14:49]He jumped so well.

[00:14:52]Come on.

[00:14:55]Redeem yourself, you little bugger.

[00:15:01]Yes, that was nice.

[00:15:20]It is actually driving really nicely, I must admit.

[00:15:25]Got to give it that.

[00:15:32]for just like bashing, hooding around and and racing on a track like this with your mates. Um, very good.

[00:15:40]Suspension is definitely definitely very good. I do like it. It's probably a bit too tall.

[00:15:51]The suspension is probably a little bit too tall and the body and the car is set up a little bit high for actual competitive racing, but for stuff like this, it's ideal.

[00:16:13]Nice.

[00:16:14]Nice. Oh. Oh, we lost it. We lost it.

[00:16:19]We're all good though. We're all good.

[00:16:20]Thing is with these new RC's like this, you know.

[00:16:25]Time will tell if it's going to be any good or not.

[00:16:31]It's definitely a bashing buggy this one though. I mean, you couldn't race this.

[00:16:35]It is just too heavy.

[00:16:41]But it's good fun to bash 100%.

[00:16:53]Oh yes.

[00:16:58]And it's taking everything I've thrown it out so far. Remember, we're slow fors.

[00:17:08]Still not liking the electronics.

[00:17:13]If anybody's really not bothered about the electronics, then just get a roller uh and add your own.

[00:17:21]I think that's the key thing. Oh, we've hit LVC. That seemed really quick.

[00:17:32]Oh, is the uh battery plug come out?

[00:17:34]Let's have a look.

[00:17:36]That seems very quick for LVC.

[00:17:40]Ah, no. Battery plugs in. Has the SC turned itself off?

[00:17:48]Oh, that was weird.

[00:17:51]Yeah, the ESC had turned itself off, I think.

[00:17:56]Yeah, and the uh fan's not working on the ESC either. Unless it's one of these what um comes on when it gets too warm, cuz it's not hot at all. The front plate is still okay.

[00:18:09]She's good. It's still holding on.

[00:18:13]Arm feels a little bit wobbly, but I'm not concerned about that. Makes them go faster if they're a bit loose, especially when you're racing, but that has come quite a bit loose as that. But like I said, I'm not worried about that.

[00:18:26]That might actually help put less pressure on that top plate. These top arms been a little bit loose. And for little clips are all right.

[00:18:35]Suspension still feels all right.

[00:18:41]No, seems all right though.

[00:18:48]Yeah.

[00:18:49]Oh, no. Yeah.

[00:18:53]Yeah. Definitely hit here. I'll have to check this battery when I get back though and just see what voltage is on.

[00:18:59]Yeah, it's turning itself off again. So, definitely hit LVC. That seems quite quick. Could be another issue with the SC that it's um in LVC a bit too early.

[00:19:10]Like I said, I'll check that battery when I get back and I'll let you know.

[00:19:13]Right. 6. Look at that difference.

[00:19:17]Oh, now it's got some power. That is a massive difference between 6S and 4S.

[00:19:23]Look at that.

[00:19:26]Sounds different.

[00:19:31]Right, let's see how quick we can get around trying on 6s. Oh.

[00:19:45]Oh, I definitely throw it on 6s to 4s, I must admit.

[00:19:50]Just feels punchier.

[00:19:53]Still controller though.

[00:20:02]Oh yes, definitely got a bit more zip around it.

[00:20:11]I just checked that top plate as well when I changed the battery and it still looks all right. Doesn't like it's cracking.

[00:20:17]So maybe it is that it's overtightening from the factory. Who knows? Who knows?

[00:20:34]If that's the case, then they need to send anybody who's broke one of those pieces um a free one out.

[00:20:46]Oh, nice.

[00:20:56]Yes. Ah, going in there.

[00:21:00]Definitely a lot harder to control on 6s.

[00:21:05]Don't think it needs a gyro though. This is good fun though.

[00:21:11]Whoa. That was a nice jump that then.

[00:21:14]Oh, shredding up the grass.

[00:21:23]It's not the easiest thing to control.

[00:21:25]It's planted and it jumps nice, but you have to watch it.

[00:21:30]You know what I mean? It's not It's not as easy as say uh I don't know the Synchro 4 um from like I say it feels more like my uh Corali Asuga, but I'd say the Asuga with the slightly longer wheelbase is easier to control than this.

[00:21:49]But look at that. Did you see that? That was such a nice jump.

[00:22:00]Nice.

[00:22:02]The dragon is alive.

[00:22:07]Whoa.

[00:22:10]It flies.

[00:22:22]So, anybody out there who thought I was a relala hater, no I'm not. But I'm not a fanboy either. And my channel is dedicated to my subscribers and my viewers give my honest opinion.

[00:22:41]And I'm not saying this is perfect by any means, but it has redeemed itself so far.

[00:22:56]Oh, back end. I I do need to tune it though, and that's what we will be doing on the next video, obviously.

[00:23:05]Seems to want to swap ends a little bit.

[00:23:08]Um, which is unusual for a 1/8 booger.

[00:23:17]But I tell you what, whoa, he's smooth and he jumped and we crashed it.

[00:23:25]So I think it's time that we tested this. Now, if I break it here, I'm not going to blame the car because we're going to send it. And the reason I'm going to send it is before anybody says, "Well, it's not meant for that, we need to see how tough it actually is and what the weak points are." We've already found out one weak point which seems to be holding up okay today, but we need to see what other weak points there may be.

[00:23:56]And it's good fun. And that's what this hobby is about.

[00:24:00]And I want to send it. So, let's do it.

[00:24:04]Whoa.

[00:24:08]Nice. See, nice and easy to start off with. That wasn't too bad.

[00:24:16]Oh, I tell you what, that landed so nicely.

[00:24:21]Hardly any rebound at all. And that flew.

[00:24:26]Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay.

[00:24:31]Oh, WE ABOUT FLIPPED IT AS WELL. AND IT LANDED.

[00:24:39]AND WE'RE ALL GOOD.

[00:24:42]Look at that. This thing has definitely redeemed itself.

[00:24:48]Brilliant.

[00:24:51]Whoa. Whoa. That was my fault. Oh, we actually landed it. What was that? I don't know. Let's do it. Let's do it.

[00:25:02]Whoa. Come on. YOUR FEET. OH, WALK of shame.

[00:25:08]That flew well a long way.

[00:25:16]Awesome. Absolutely awesome.

[00:25:23]See how it does on the grass.

[00:25:26]Oh yes. Oh, I still see that then back end came out.

[00:25:36]Oh yes.

[00:25:43]Oh, look at that go.

[00:25:46]Oh, not looking forward to the cleanup.

[00:25:59]Whoa. What was that? Right. Come on.

[00:26:07]Whoa. That was a good test cuz that nose dive then. That proper nose dive. Are we good?

[00:26:15]We good?

[00:26:17]All good. Front plate. It's looking all right. I mean, we'll inspect the front plate proper once we get back and cleaned up. We'll inspect the full car, but it's looking all right.

[00:26:32]Let's just keep sending it.

[00:26:59]Heat. Heat.

[00:27:18]Perfect. Look at that.

[00:27:27]Right, let's get it back. Let's clean it. Get it all checked over.

[00:27:32]But I tell you what, this car has been one of the only cars that has done this to me where I've taken it out the first time. It's just absolutely me and then on the second run, it's literally changed my mind completely.

[00:27:48]Obviously, I need to check make sure we've got no damage or anything like that. But that was absolutely awesome.

[00:27:54]Right, we've got it back all cleaned up.

[00:27:57]Looking almost new. It's not perfect.

[00:28:01]Let's start with what we have actually broke, which to be honest with you is not a lot. The body has broke right at the front here. So, is going to be a weak point there. One of the things they could do is put some plastic bracing in there and around the back one as well, and that will prevent that kind of breaking. And it has snapped a little bit there, but not overly bad. Boogie bodies are pretty cheap to replace. The other thing we broke as well is the front of the battery tray that has just snapped uh completely off. I'll probably recommend running a third battery strap lengthwise and that should prevent that from happening. You have got a little hole there and you did have a little hole there. So, you can do that. That would be a tip for stopping that from happening. Apart from that, we have had no other brakes whatsoever. I know some other people have had issues with that rear dog bone bending. Mine hasn't. that still stays straight and the plastic rear bracer stays straight as well. But we didn't have any bad rear end landings, so that's probably what's protected that. But we did have a few bad front end landings. The shock towers are still nice and straight. The shocks are still working really well, and I do like the shocks on this. They are really well set up for big jumps and bashing.

[00:29:13]Uh the rebound on these are fantastic.

[00:29:15]With this top plate, the camera's probably not going to pick it up, but there is a tiny little hairline crack starting to appear near that screw. So I still would recommend using the 7075. So I think from factory this had definitely probably been overtightened and that's not helped. I also think as well I lost the little bits what fit in here and the arms are quite loose and I think again that has probably helped because that takes some of the stress out of that top plate. But who knows? We'll have to just wait and see how other people get on with that. But yeah, for now that top plate did hold on. Chassis has also held up well and that stayed perfectly straight which is good to see. Tires I'm really impressed with. They've held up well. Don't look like they're glued down fantastically well. They don't balloon too much. They grip really nicely. Uh these tires are very good. I mean they're not the cheapest when you look on the website to replace, but I think these will last quite a long time.

[00:30:13]Unless you use them on pavement or road all the time, then they will wear down quicker. But yeah, the tires held up fantastically well. So yeah, I'd say all in all the car has definitely redeemed itself to some point. Still not sure about that top plate, how long it's going to last. The electronics are not fantastic. I did check that battery and it went to LVC at 3.7 volts, which is quite high really. I usually go down to about 3.3 on my Hobbywing ESC with that brake issue on the ESC. And also as well, you can't always feel the throttle very well on it. But it jumps nice, it drives nice, it's not as nimble as some of my other 1/8 buggies. It is still a little bit heavy, but I think for bashing, this has got a lot of potential. So, in the next video, we are going to properly tune this. I am going to take out that ESC and put in a Hobbywing ESC, probably just an 8B150 G2. Change the controller as well, and then we'll see how it drives after that.

[00:31:08]Hope you enjoyed that. Thank you very much for watching. Until the next one, happy RCing,