Perusing old Ebay sales yesterday I found out about a 4WD '80s kit for the first time, from a Japanese company called Mugen which I was only vaguely familiar with.
The Bulldog came around in the mid '80s and ticks all the boxes for me as a unique and interesting kit! What I immediately dug about this one is the seriously chunky looks, the air-damped monoshock suspension (i'd sure love to see/hear how that works close up), the vertical chassis design, the 4WD four-wheel steering (which somehow all adds up to the acronym "AWDS") and the cage body, which was complemented by a polycarb body for the Bulldog II.
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| Bulldog (left) & Bulldog II (right) |
The cage buggy design seems very reminiscent of the
Kyosho Vanning, Hirobo Zerda and AYK 4x4 Viper. 1985 certainly was the yeah of the cage body! In fact just from looking at pictures you'd be forgiven for thinking it's a 1/8 scale or larger; the blunt and functional design just makes it look bigger than a 1/10 which it is.
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| Bulldog II body |
The Bulldog is a really great example of the variety and innovation that kits displayed in the 1980s. I have read in a couple of places that out of the box it had a few flaws if you wanted racing performance, which required some ironing out, but with big bruiser looks like this and it's unique design I'd be happy just to own this monster and admire it's character! They go for rare-kit money these days but i'll keep my eye out for a non-silly priced one from now, what a great looking car! Thanks to besty22 for his showroom images at
tamiyaclub.com and there's a cool rebuild article at MSUKFORUM here:
http://www.msuk-forum.co.uk/forums/topic/209767-mugen-bulldog-awds/
The four wheel steering linkage, vertical chassis design and
large air-damped monoshocks are all clearly shown here:
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