HemiStorm

I don't usually get offended, but what the hell are you on about??? Me doing something to an ill person??? What are you speaking of?

You shouldn't care what others say, it's personal, it looks good, you made it your own, that's what counts! Still needs light pods

There are more out, but not everyone is on forums.

The rest of them are on their way, had some tremendous shipping issues to the United States. Jason was in fact the first of my distributors to receive them.

PMSL!

Very cool ideas for paint! But for the love of god, please put some light pods on it.

Thanks for the detailed pics and opinion so far. The gaps in the side, gassers in mind, they're for engine cooling. As I don't own a flux, the gas cap was the obvious thing to leave uncut. Having the pull start uncut too would add too much inconvenience I felt for a large part of the users. I might look into having an insert made, not sure yet. If you fit your headlights and everything is nice and snug, there won't be much of a gap in front. I did make more room under the front part if the shell to accommodate the new taller Killer RC battery lid. The gear cover on the flux seems indeed wider than on the gas version, on which it's spot on. Looking forward to see them painted, keep me posted!

Painting mesh is super easy if you use drywall tape, it's what I did on mine. You stick the drywall tape to the shell, mist it with black, take it off, spray silver and off you go! For an even better effect you can spray some matte clear on the outside.

Glad to see a detailed and unbiased description, Noj! Curious to see it painted, although I did a lot on mine, they don't require that much.

Very much appreciated, I'm curious what you think.

The Losi is a great car, but it never caused such a stir as the Baja has. Cars like the Baja only come by once a decade, it's unique, I still enjoy mine. And based on how intrigued I'm with it, still after all these years, making the Addict is almost my way of making a tribute to the car that really made me "get my RC on". Starting the HemiStorm business has brought me so many cool things. Not just my RCs, but experiences that will be remembered till I grow really old. I've been places, met people, done things and all of it started when I got my Baja. I love the cages that are available on the market, but last year when I built my Kraken Beetle with two spare wheels, I also realized I kind of lost the plot. I wanted to go back to some minimalistic, agile and fast that doesn't need 70 cc to put a smile on my face.

I never got offended, sorry if I came across that way. It has just been a crazy amount of work and stress to make this happen. While with some other options it may seem you are getting more value for money, I can honestly say that once you put an Addict side to side with ANY of them, you will instantly see the work I put into it. Separate parts will be made available, as it was the case with the Penta. In two and a half years of Penta experience it turns out that there are no real concerns in doing that, as in it's not like I've had to produce 20% more roofs or anything. Overall there is not more than 4% production difference between parts, so doing it in a similar way with the Addict is no issue. I'm eagerly awaiting the first of you to get your hands on one to tell me what you think of it. I'm confidently looking forward to your thoughts! High fives to all of you, always nice dialogues on this forum. Civilized and well founded arguments, I'm taking notes as I'm always trying to improve. I care for this hobby. Perhaps more than I show.

Buying direct is never an option. Here is in brief how it works: my distributors are the ones who partially make a project like this possible. Without their trust and support (and indirectly also financial backing that comes with it), none of the products would ever hit the market. This is a very costly product, I dare say impossible to finance as a one man company without having some sort of backing from others in the industry. I will also try to explain why the distributors and retailers have become more apprehensive towards these kind of products. Other manufacturers ( I won't say any names) have in the past first supplied distributors with "special pricing". As soon as they had stock, stores were approached. Keep in mind, at this point several hundred products are already on the shelves at the distributors, waiting for stores to call in their orders. Stores however got similar offers, similar pricing, so who would buy from a distributor, right? This is where dozens get sent out to stores, waiting to be sent out to consumers. Now if a company like that afterwards goes on forums and bombards you with new pics every day, and even offers you a group buy, with the same "special price" both the distributor and stores got, you can perhaps only imagine how much dead stock and dead value is sitting around globally. Distributors and stores are there for a reason. I'm not good at selling stuff. I'm good at designing, at taking risk to make things happen. I like to paint. I like to film. Any I also like to spend time with my wife and kids, go for walks, take a zillion pics of my retarded cats, you name it. Distributors and hobby stores provide a service that I can't. I would never shame their trust and bypass them to satisfy a few who disagree on my pricing. In the big scheme of things, I can honestly say I'm proud of the Addict, how it turned out both in looks and price, and I'm fortunate to have a network of distributors so I can focus on other things. Things like showing other hobbyists how I paint, coming up with even more products. Mowing my lawn, being a dad. I hope this makes sense.

I'm a one man business, and this also makes it hard to be more competitive when it comes to pricing. If I want pricing to be more competitive I'll be forced to go the "China route", and I care too much about quality to do that. I do my very best to keep things as affordable as I can, and some of my personal decisions add to the price tag. For example the Addict being precut: Sure, being precut does add to cost, but there's a good reason behind it apart from cutting being a pain: I don't want to blame my customers "for cutting incorrect" in case of issues. Sure you can compare pricing to a (discontinued and therefor cheaper than ever) Proline shell, but for full comparison also throw in the undertray as the side pods on the Addict are as effective, yet less prone to damage. And perhaps a custom roofplate. In the end, my products are not for everyone perhaps. Maybe just for a select few. Which is fine. Just know I went above and beyond to offer you a different option with more ease of use, whilst trying to keep it as affordable as I could. If you prefer an uncut shell, or one that looks like a shoe, there's plenty of other options out there.