# Lighted Tuff Ones chassis??



## Marty (Oct 20, 1999)

This chassis came out of a Flamethrowers Sand Van Dune Buggy. It looks like a Tuff Ones silver plated chassis and wheels/tires only w/gear plate, gears, arm from a standard T-Jet. Did someone go to the trouble of putting wires under the pick-up shoe holders, or is this a late production that Aurora was using up old stock to move product? Whaddaya think?





Marty
Marysville, OH


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## alpink (Aug 22, 2010)

in my experience, all t-jet type chassis from Aurora that had lights also had an extra plate on each hanger that the wire was sort of crimped into.
anything might have been possible from a late release when Aurora was in the death throes.
it certainly appears to be TuffOnes chassis by the silver plating that someone managed to wedge wires between the plate layers and provide connectivity to the light.
I doubt it was disassembled and re-riveted, but anything is possible.
looks like you should get a TuffOnes gear plate and replace the crown to restore this.
you can then advertise it as a prototype and get a couple thousand from the one-upper-collectors!


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## Marty (Oct 20, 1999)

alpink said:


> you can then advertise it as a prototype and get a couple thousand from the one-upper-collectors!


Since we're buddies, I'll let you have it for $1500.00:thumbsup:

After I posted this I was thinking Aurora had the lighted chassis and left over inventory of the Tuff Ones electricals which of course don't have the crimp for the wires. The wires look to be way under the pick up shoe holder, I don't think it was pushed under there. And I agree with you, it doesn't look like some one drilled out the rivets and replaced them.

Marty
Marysville, OH


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## Joe65SkylarkGS (Feb 15, 2010)

It def looks like some kind of a transitional chassis. 

Paging Mr_Aurora!!!!

How bout it Bob???


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## slotcarman12078 (Oct 3, 2008)

Are my eyes playing tricks on me, or is that the end of the wire visible inside the rivet hole in the top picture upper rivet?


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## Bill Hall (Jan 6, 2007)

slotcarman12078 said:


> Are my eyes playing tricks on me, or is that the end of the wire visible inside the rivet hole in the top picture upper rivet?


Tink its da armacher Joe...but it is a great illusion.


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## Gerome (Sep 25, 2011)

The top wire doesn't appear to be under the hanger plate.


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## tjetsgrig (Nov 1, 2009)

Not factory! Look at the crown gear, doesn't have the 14t pinion, its a homemader!! Also has grey tip, red wire motor!

JS


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## Ralphthe3rd (Feb 24, 2011)

tjetsgrig said:


> Not factory! Look at the crown gear, doesn't have the 14t pinion, its a homemader!! Also has grey tip, red wire motor!
> 
> JS


Jim, he wasn't suggesting it was a pure Tuffy chassis, he was just wondering if it was an end of T-Jet era, spare parts throw together from the factory- Build of the Flame Thrower Sand Van(Dune Buggy), which was at the very end of the T-Jet era. We can see the gearing is wrong as well at the top plate/arm to be a Tuffy chassis, but why couldn't it be factory? And they just used a left over plated Tuffy Chassis case, and threw the rest together ?.....although the wire connection to the pick-up plates is very sketchy.


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## hefer (Sep 18, 1999)

Didn't the Sand Vans come with Tuffones wheels on the front and A/FX rears?


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## alpink (Aug 22, 2010)

hefer, yes.
the key here is this is a reconstructed chassis.
it has the wrong gear combination to be a Tuff Ones, yet the electrics are completely silver plated, as only Tuff Ones were.
the Sand Vans that were lighted had the extra plates on the hanger area for the wires to crimp into.
I think this is a fine example of someone using clever craft to create a nice custom chassis.
probably the reason the gear plate ( and thus the gear ratio) has been changed is for the light bulb holder that was much more common on regular t-jet chassis.
for most people it was much easier to change a crown gear than to change the pinion gear on the cluster shaft.
it might have been very easy to spread the pick up shoe hanger with a pocket knife enough to sandwich the bare part of the light bulb wire in and that the pressure would be enough to hold it. 
especially if the person knew well enough to stake the rivets again to increase their holding power.
it is highly unlikely that workers on production lines in Asia would have been given instructions to sandwich the wire in the pick up shoe hanger instead of using the readily available extra plate with the crimp.
but, I am open to the fact that anything can happen
and I am honored to have had the chance to present my ideas regarding this. 
great thread.


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## Grandcheapskate (Jan 5, 2006)

No one has mentioned the two holes where the wires come through the chassis. Tuff Ones chassis did not have those holes. So you either have:

1. A homemade job which would have required drilling those two holes into a Tuff Ones chassis

2. An end-of-the-line Aurora "use what we got left" chassis (unlikely because of the way the wires are under the hangers).

This may have been a skeleton Aurora lighted chassis (with the holes) with Tuff Ones electricals (an end-of-the-line surprise) and someone decided to add a light (most likely).

I haven't broken out any of the Tuff Ones that were sold by REH on AFX cards, but maybe some of them have oddball combinations.

Joe


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## slotcarman12078 (Oct 3, 2008)

I think the wire holes were in all of the chassis after they started making Flame Throwers. It wouldn't make much sense to have two different chassis bases molded. The plastic parts are the same except for the holes. Note that the later top plates have the hole for the bulb clip on all the later top plates whether they were lit or not. If I would venture a guess at this point I would assume someone along the way needed a lighted chassis and did what they had to do to make it happen.


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## Grandcheapskate (Jan 5, 2006)

slotcarman12078 said:


> I think the wire holes were in all of the chassis after they started making Flame Throwers. It wouldn't make much sense to have two different chassis bases molded. The plastic parts are the same except for the holes. Note that the later top plates have the hole for the bulb clip on all the later top plates whether they were lit or not. If I would venture a guess at this point I would assume someone along the way needed a lighted chassis and did what they had to do to make it happen.



Interesting thought. To answer the question, we need someone with many original Tuff Ones to check them to see if any have holes for the wires. The only one I have as a runner does not have any holes.

Joe


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## Illinislotfan (Mar 8, 2009)

I have 6 Tuff Ones chassis. All are used, and I am the original owner of none. Three of the chassis have holes for flamethrower wires, and three do not. The three that have the holes for wires are all numbered chassis, 1, 2, 3 etc. like Marty's. The three that don't have the holes are lettered chassis, A, B, C etc. Not enough of an expert to know what that means, if anything.


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## tjetsgrig (Nov 1, 2009)

Ralphthe3rd said:


> Jim, he wasn't suggesting it was a pure Tuffy chassis, he was just wondering if it was an end of T-Jet era, spare parts throw together from the factory- Build of the Flame Thrower Sand Van(Dune Buggy), which was at the very end of the T-Jet era. We can see the gearing is wrong as well at the top plate/arm to be a Tuffy chassis, but why couldn't it be factory? And they just used a left over plated Tuffy Chassis case, and threw the rest together ?.....although the wire connection to the pick-up plates is very sketchy.


Understood Ralph! SCM made a great point, Ive got a bleep load of Tuffy chassis and the majority have the holes in the chassis and gearplate! Somebody did a clean conversion to chuck some flames!

JS


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## slotcarman12078 (Oct 3, 2008)

As far as the holes are concerned, it may have also depended on where the chassis were made. One factory could have handled both Tough ones and regular lighted T Jets, and used the same chassis base for both. Another manufacturer didn't make lighted, but also made tough ones and theirs didn't have holes. I did some digging a few weeks ago, and was absolutely floored by the volume of T Jets Aurora made. Somewhere in the neighborhood of 25 million by 1965!! There's no way one plant could produce that many. Think of how many different stickers we find on chassis and bodies. Hong Kong is common on the last batch of chassis REH was distributing. Some were made in NY, Isn't Singapore on some chassis too?


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aurora_Plastics_Corporation
Scroll down to Model Motoring...


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