Carisma Impreza WRC Standard vs Upgraded - Is it worth it?

#KB162

Updated 2024-04-23 by Nicky

The Carisma Subaru Impreza WRC is a newcomer to the 1/8 scale rally car scene, joining the ranks of the HPI WR8 and the new king CEN 2023 M-Sport Ford Puma. After my disappointment with the car's performance, I decided to do some upgrades to make it a bit more lively. Was the effort worth it, or was it all a bit of a pointless exercise? Let's take a look and find out.
Disappointing Performance Out Of The Box
Even though the car was listed to only run on 2S lipo due to its brushless ESC and Motor that Carisma decided to put in the car, I was still very disappointed with the performance, especially compared to the running the HPI WR8 Flux and CEN 2023 M-Sport Ford Puma on 2S lipo.

When I tested the Carisma it achieved a low 17mph, but more importantly, the car felt dull to drive, which is a shame as the body looks the part. It felt a bit like Carisma did not research the competition, even still, like I put in my earlier review of the car, it felt slower and less enjoyable to drive than a Tamiya TT02 brushed car with a 2S lipo in it. 
The Upgrades
So the plan was straight into making the car quicker which should also make the car a bit more lively to drive.

After having a chat with the rest of the team here at Wheelspin Models HQ, I decided to go for a brushless motor that could run 3S or 4S. In the end, I went for the Etronix Photon 3665 size 2900kv motor, and due to the small additional space we had for the pinion gear, we upgraded the pinion from the standard 12-tooth pinion to a Traxxas 15 tooth pinion.

All that was left was the ESC, which thanks to my colleague donated an HPI 4S capable ESC. We didn’t have a car for it, so we decided to put that in to make a very cheap upgrade overall.
The Results

I have to admit I wasn’t knowing what to expect after doing this work on the car. Was it going to be a night and day difference, or was it going to be a slightly different increase in performance but still not that enjoyable to drive? 

The answer is Carisma should have gone 3S straight out of the box with this!

I have only run the car on 3S as it makes it a fairer comparison to the HPI WR8 and the CEN 2023 M-Sport Ford Puma Rally, but the difference with the upgrade is brilliant! We only used it for about 5 minutes outside the one morning before we opened the shop up, but it was a lot more lively and the speed has improved massively!

The only thing we spotted was the car could do with some thicker diff grease as it was quite unstable off throttle which Si feels is down to the grease in the diff, so that is something next on the list to do. Having seen the tyres after the 5 minutes of use in the morning, it is probably also worth us looking into some better tyres soon for it too
Summary

I'm pleased with the results of the upgrade I have done on this car. There are a couple of more things I will do to help with the performance, but there is a night and day difference compared to the car out of the box. I just don’t know why Carisma didn’t pay the small difference needed to get a 3S ESC and Motor in the car out of the box as I would have happily paid the difference for the car to have that performance out of the box. 

Funnily enough, Carisma has recently announced the ⅛ Carisma M48S Audi Sport Quattro S1 Group B monster, which comes with a 3S capable motor and ESC. Looks like Carisma learnt from their mistake with the Subaru, which is good to see! It probably won’t surprise any of you who know me and my inner Group B fanboy, that I have one of those on order too!

What is it like compared to the HPI WR8 Flux and the CEN 2023 M-Sport Ford Puma Rally? We will do a test between the 3 of them shortly and I will give my thoughts on this in another article.

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