Little Red Line Tournament OG vs NEO

Mattman213 Monday, 10/5/2020

My Son and I decided to crack open some minty and unbelievably gorgeous NEO Classic and RLC "Red Line" cars this weekend and give them a rip down the track, see what they are made of.

All but the Nitty Gritty Kitty have re-pops of the oldschool bearing style thin axles and the Kitty has a strange but really slick capped style wheel that doesnt look like a cap at all but it still rolls really well.  We gave them a couple runs and then I had an idea...

We dug out my original Red Line beater/junk yard box and pulled out every casting we could find with 4 wheels and that would make a full pass down the track and put together a little Tournament.  Can any of these rusty busted POS's challenge the new crop of old school style castings?

We tossed two more cars into the mix to make 32 (not pictured).  All but 5 of these are untouched, as they came out of the pile.  The other 5 have been worked on in some way or fashion.  The only car with a full "resto" was the blue Firebird vert in the front.  More on that later.

We got out a random number generator and set up the first round 

Round one had some major upsets and some awesome racing but no close races surprisingly enough.  Down to 16 moving on to round 2

Things heated up some in the round of 16 and a couple cars that surprised us in round 1 continued to show some speed.  Namely the Purple AMX which whooped on the Nomad which I had picked to win the round handily.  The cars which had been worked on in the past all made it except the Firebird who got STOMPED on by one of my favorite originals, the Chrome Boss Hoss Mustang.  (Firebird will be getting a respray here soon, paint didnt cure long enough before getting some chips)

"Racetoration" Noodle Head vs super nice Mantis.  Poor Mantis woulda WHOOPED the Noodle if we hadnt worked on it prior, it was a...flop when we first got it.  Its super quick now.

Down to 8 and things are starting to tighten up as far as the competition.  Some good races in this heat.

The other nice Mantis went up against the Baja Bruiser which has the NICEST set of through axle Red Line/Black Walls on any car Ive ever owned.  It has some graphite work done to it and it screams.  The AMX was up against the green Short Order which also has some light graphite work done to it and is straight as an arrow.  It has since been put into the "Racestore" pile to be worked on.

The blue MKIV is a ROCKET but went against the Racestored Noodle  and the beater Mustang had no chance against the other "Racestored" project gold Side Kick.

Down to 4 and go figure...its the 4 that have had some sort of attention paid to them in the past.

It came down to the Noodle and the Baja Bruiser in the end but the Noodle was too much to handle.

I then put the top 5 fastest beaters head to head against the NEO's...

The NEO's are some of the best looking cars Ive ever had the pleasure of running down my junk track and they are super quick and smooth, just like they were back in the day...but they were no match for the lightly worked beaters.  Only the Boss Hoss lost his race but all 4 worked cars moved on.

Im sure a little work would get the NEO's up to par and they might even be kinda nasty but...I dunno.  They are so sharp I might keep them aside for now and focus on trying to give these beaters one more chance at screaming down the old orange track again!

Matt


Discussion

View member profile
redlinederby 10/5/20
Site manager

Very cool to put together. Great photos to boot. I don't have any original nor repro redlines but your pics make me wishin I had popped for a few. Especially that NEO green Rodger Dodger!


  • Man...I got a couple in a big classic Hot Wheels lot I won a long time ago when I was chasing after some Broncos and Bywaymans and Ive fallen in love since. If I find them under like $10 I snag em and have way more than I thought honestly now. One day I will restore the ones that are most complete and who knows what will come of the others. They are intriguing little cars. — Mattman213
  • I try to be very choosey when I spend more than the usual $1 for cars. Figure since I spend so much on the mainlines, I can't start going down the true collector road. They become the ones I ask for my birthday :) — redlinederby
  • I am the same way but I tear the beater redlines apart and try to bring them back to life which adds to the fun and value of each car to me. Seeing them wake back up again is super cool and when we get to the point of building tracks with turns that use boosters to keep the cars going round and round these Redlines will get many more miles put on them again! — Mattman213
View member profile
Rusty 10/8/20

Cool to see the ol' redlines running..


  • It was a fun time for sure. Fast little cars! — Mattman213

Great write up! I could sense the exciting races as the rounds went on to a great finish 

It's too funny as I did since attic digging a couple weeks ago and filmed a redline race. I film 2 to 3 weeks in advance of posting so it should be coming up soon!

Great racing!!


  • I cant wait to see it! I wish I could film a little better because it would have made this race come alive but Ill get there one day! — Mattman213
to join the conversation or sign-up now