The Auto World Super III first came out back in 2008. It was Auto World’s first foray into the HO performance landscape. The chassis suffered some teething pains and continued development over the next several releases. As improvements were added, the performance and reliability increased over time. This latest release took a giant step forward and with the addition of some very sweet gears, the Super III has come into its own. I’ll cover more of the performance improvement later in the article. Let’s take a closer look at the eight new releases in this series, the Auto World Super III Release 1 (SC383).
#1 2005 Ford Mustang GT – Torch Red/Black and Black Clearcoat/Red
#2 1970 Mustang Boss 302 – “Gulf” Blue/Orange #70 and Royal Maroon/Black
#3 2015 Chevy SS Stock Car – Black/Gold #13 and Blue/Light Blue #1
#4 2014 Indy Car – Metallic Blue/Yellow “Johnny Lightning #2 and Metallic Blue/Yellow “Johnny Lightning #1
2022 Auto World Super III Release 1 SC383 Super III Packaging
Now it’s time for the meat and potatoes! Let’s get a closer look at the chassis and those new gears. The pinion and crown gear have been completely re-tooled and are as smooth as butter. The whole drive train turns incredibly smooth and shows absolutely no binding or grabbing. The 7-23 gear ratio is perfect for most track layouts and offers a good balance of acceleration, braking and top end speed.
I plan on writing another complete performance article comparing the latest batch of new inline chassis out on the market. The new Supper III will part of that article. But for now, I can say the changes made in this latest release has escalated the performance envelope of the Super III. I race with the Lexington Cup Series and we have a class that uses the Viper VSPEC chassis with C10 magnets and 3.0 Ohm unbalanced armatures. In the latest race event on my 62 foot Viper routed track, the winner of the class averaged 3.4.98 seconds per lap and turned the fastest lap with a 3.288 seconds. Those cars have tuned tire heights and various gear combinations, but the car I’m referencing did have a 7-23 gear combination. We also race hard body stock car themes. So how does the Super III compare? I took one of the 2015 Chevy SS Stock Cars as they are the closest to the VPEC bodies we raced. After a 5 minute break in period and adjusting the motor brush tension with a quarter turn on each side, I turned a 3.953 second lap after a few passes around the track. Once I got used to the characteristics of the handling, I quickly dropped that time to 3.661 seconds…with stock tires! I’m looking forward to seeing what tire height changes will do to drop the times even further. After 20 minutes of turning laps, the car remained cool and held it’s speed and performance levels. I tried all eight cars in the release and all eight cars performed in a similar fashion with the Indy cars handling a bit better in the tighter turns. I think with the new gears and the previous improvements, Auto World has made good on the potential of the Super III. I’m looking forward to seeing what the top end performance limits this new combination will produce.
I am very glad to see that Auto World has continued to improve this design and kept up the efforts to bring better offerings. The new Super III is on the right track and will not disappoint. Look for the new Super III release in early October 2022.