Deegan Hevy Hitters: New by Artin 1/43
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The name of the new cars
and sets comes from Brian Deegan, an X-gamer and Motorcycle Free Stylist (See http://www.briandeegan.com for more
info). Brian has his own line of
toys and clothing called "Hevy Hitters," I guess Artin is trying to capitalize
on this. These cars and set are (at least for now) exclusively sold at
Wal-Mart. The picture below shows the two new Battery operated sets as well as
the new AC powered set (bottom)
The Set
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Let's take a quick look
at the set first, then we'll take a detailed look at the new cars. Nothing new
in terms of packaging, the traditional Artin cardboard box with graphics on top
is still the way sets are packaged, one of the reason they are so cheap. Once
you open the box, you see the traditional Artin packaging with plastic bags
containing most of the parts, two controllers, a battery pack (batteries are
not included), and an instruction leaflet.
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Following the
instructions is very easy and assembling the track should be done in less than
15 minutes even for first timers. The only thing to really watch here is that
some 45-degree turns have a narrower slot than others. These must be used for
the 180 vertical turn (at the top of the picture below) and are the explanation
for the new pin shape on the cars (see more on this later).
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The cars in this set are
4x4 trucks, which I would tend to believe, were made to look a bit like a
Hummer. Whether or not Artin was successful is up to you!
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Taking these cars on the
track revealed a couple of issues. First the jump is very tough to negotiate,
and my 6 year old got very frustrated with it. So I removed the half straight
leading to the jump, lowered both sides of the jump and that solved it.
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The other issue is a bit
more difficult to solve as I think that the cars are too fast for the track and
when driving it I could never be at full throttle, which is something that once
again frustrated my little one. Note that this is with the 6V battery operated
set.
The Cars
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The new cars released by
Artin under the Hevy Hitters brand are actually not all quite new. They are:
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Two Nissan 350Z (same as
2 years ago)
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Two Nissan Skyline
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Two Mazda RX8
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Two Mitsubishi Evo (same
as 2 years ago)
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Two "Hummer" trucks
(found in the sets)
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Two dirt bikes (found in
the sets)
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Whether or not they are
new is almost irrelevant, as at $4 per car it is near impossible to go wrong.
As can be seen, some cars (like the red Mazda RX8) have no window openings and
just black paint while others (like the blue Nissan 350Z) have window openings
in the body filled by a separate black plastic piece mounted inside the body.
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The cars all come in two
flavors: the "Anti-gravity Ground Effect" version and the "Race Car" version.
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As can be seen in the
pictures, the AGE version sports a blue plastic chassis while the Race Car
version sports a more traditional black chassis. The blue chassis was found
previously on some PowerPasser cars 2 years ago.
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Both Chassis have two
pin guides, one in the front, one in the back. This is designed to accommodate
the drifter track pieces. But the shape of the pin is new (slimmer with a divot
at the tip) and is designed to help the cars hold in the slots in the vertical
turns of the new sets. The picture below shows the traditional Artin pin on the
right, the PowerPasser pin in the middle, the new "Hevy Hitters" pin on the
left. Note that all these cars seem to come PowerPasser ready as they all have
the receptacle for the spring mounted pin installed inside.
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Another key difference
with the AGE cars is the new Rare Earth magnet, much stronger than the
traditional Artin Magnet (right on the picture below). The Racecars have the
traditional small magnet (middle), which is actually 2/3 of the larger magnet
(left) found on most recent releases by Artin.
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Opening the cars is
still a snap; one screw in the front of the car and disengaging the chassis
from the side tabs of the body does the trick. Looking inside, we find all the
usual Artin stuff with two major differences. The blue AGE chassis has a second
light (grain of wheat) towards the rear, but mostly the AGE car has a
new/different motor. I was unable to find any data on this new motor despite
the presence of some markings on them.
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Taking the cars to the
track is a bit of a mixed bag. The "Race Car" version (the black chassis with
the traditional Artin 1/43 motor) is too fast for the new small set but still
performs as usual on the 70 feet 1/43 Artin track at 7.5V. The "Antigravity
Ground Effect" cars (the blue chassis with the new motor) feel dog slow on the
big track but are perfect on the new small set as most of the track can then be
taken at full throttle on the 6V battery pack.
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However they look cool
!!!
Last Update: 8/19/06 Drop me a note