Tuesday July 11, 2006

The X-Traction HO Slot Cars Have Returned!

by Rich McMahon

The X-Traction HO slot cars are back after a short hiatus.  These cars were previously produced by Playing Mantis and then RC2 under the Johnny Lightning brand name.  Now they are brought to us under the Auto World name. All of the X-Traction cars have a common chassis which are retro copies of the original Aurora AFX Magna-Traction which were made from 1972 until 1983 when Aurora went out of business.

I can understand why someone would bring these back as they were fast and fun cars to race.   These are the ultimate Aurora Thunder Jets with wide tires and motor magnets which extend down through the chassis to provide magnet enhanced traction.   Not too much traction that the car rockets around turns un-naturally, but enough to make a difference.   

What are the latest versions like?  Are they as good as the Johnny Lightning versions?  Are they like the original Aurora cars?  The answer is yes they are fun like the original cars from Aurora.  The most noticeable difference was that the wide rear wheels and tires are now mounted at the front too.   This did not detract from the appearance of the cars at all.  The front wheels do not turn independently of each other but it does solve the long time issue of the thin front tires coming off of the rims.

The tires are very soft.  This is great for traction but they can come off of the rims too easily.  A very small dab of glue is needed to keep them attached to the rims.   Other wise the chassis appears to be identical to the last Johnny Lightning releases except for the Auto World logo molding on the bottom side of the chassis.

The two cars I received were smooth running cars right out of the box.  I ran them on a Tyco track with standard Tyco controllers and power. They were very drivable with good throttle response throughout range of the trigger.  They were a lot of fun!  I did run them with the original Aurora and Johnny Lightning versions.  I did not have a lap timer to compare them but the Auto World versions seemed a bit easier to drive and possibly quicker than the Johnny Lightning versions.  I determined this was due to the new softer tires.  The new cars seemed a lot like my original and well broken in Aurora Magna-Traction cars.

As with the Johnny Lightning versions the bodies are modeled very well, it’s like Aurora did them.  But the graphics are much better than anything Aurora could have done, they are fantastic!

The current Mopar and Dukes of Hazzard releases are disappearing fast.  I look forward to future releases of these cars in different decorations and also new models.

- Rich

As always feel free to contact Rich about this article or just the hobby in general at our HO SCALE Online Forum!

Thanks go to Slot Car World For Providing Us With These Models!