Your shocks may be the first thing you think about when considering your suspension, but there are other factors you need to take into consideration as well. The tilt of your tires and the center of gravity, for example, also have a role in getting the best performance from your RC. Here's what you need to know about the basics of RC Suspension Tuning with pointers to more detailed information when the manufacturer's recommendations aren't good enough.

You can go it alone and use trial and error to learn how to fly that new RC airplane or helicopter. Or, find an experienced pilot to fly with you using a buddy box. Find out how this works. It's a safer (and potentially less destructive) way to learn how to really fly RC aircraft.

Another way to learn to fly is to start with RC Flight Simulation software. Use both methods. The flight sims let you practice flying night and day in any weather and the buddy box system lets you put that flight sim experience to use with a little less risk than going it alone.

The lastest reader response to What Was Your First Hobby RC Car or Truck? talks about the Midnight Pumpkin by Tamiya. dash909 writes:

"My first rc car was my brothers broken midnight pumpkin that i bought for $40. Me and my dad made a new shaft for it in the gearbox which held one of the gears in place. I bashed that truck like no other untill pretty much tires were hanging off and everything else was broken. Now i have a traxxas revo 3.3 and a stampede."

The Midnight Pumpkin is an electric 50's style pickup/monster truck kit (compare prices). Like other classic Tamiya RC kits an updated version was released in recent years. When I went to do a search for more info on the Midnight Pumpkin one of the first things I found was an entirely different sort of radio controlled pumpkin. If you want something more interesting than RC spiders and bats this coming Halloween, start building your own RC pumpkin. This RC Pumpkin instructables tutorial includes a video and complete instructions. That's one way to recycle an XMODS RC. Although you might need something a bit more powerful if you use a much larger pumpkin.

The Midnight Pumpkin may be a classic RC but I bet the kids will get a real kick out a radio controlled vegetable rolling around the kitchen or down the sidewalk.

Check this out on YouTube: RC Huge Jump HPI Savage Flux Amazing Driving skills My first Control "Misty Front to Back" by SavageJunky is 7:38 minutes of jumping. The one described in the title occurs in the first few seconds of the video and is repeated in slow motion. Quite a few flips (and near flips) and great landings nearly every time on a wide hilly dirt track. Here's the lastest Savage Flux 2350, a 1:8 scale electric 4WD off-road RC from HPI Racing (compare prices).