About Tassie Mini-Z Club
The story behind the club, what we run, and how we run it.
Tassie Mini-Z Club is a Tasmanian-based radio control car club dedicated to the art and science of small-scale racing. We focus on 1:28-scale indoor racing led by the Kyosho Mini-Z line — the sweet spot where die-cast-level detail meets hobby-grade race performance — and we welcome other manufacturers’ 1:28 chassis and builds in the classes where our rules allow them.
Club meets are their own vibe, but if you have never seen modular foam and 1:28 touring in the same room, this is the shape of the sport worldwide: tight lines, marshals at the corners, and a grid of cars that look like collectibles until the tone sounds.
Race-quality 1:28 gear at fair prices
Tassie Mini-Z Club runs a small online store of accessories for Kyosho Mini-Z and other 1:28-scale indoor racers — the tyres, tools, and upgrades members actually reach for between meets. We keep margins lean so more of your budget stays on the track, not on markups.
- Curated stock: parts we use, endorse, or source from makers we trust.
- Straightforward checkout — priced in AUD; every purchase helps support timing gear and loaner cars.
- Listed prices include standard shipping anywhere in Australia — no separate postage at checkout.
Our Origin
While Mini-Z has been a global phenomenon since its release in 1999, the scene in Tasmania has often been a fragmented collection of garage racers. Tassie Mini-Z Club was founded to change that—to bring the structure and competitive spirit of the international Mini-Z Cup to Tasmania, and to give a local home to anyone obsessed with palm-sized motorsport.
In a place like Tasmania, where winter nights are long and outdoor racing is often at the mercy of the Roaring Forties, the Mini-Z platform makes perfect sense. We race indoors on carpet and tile-based tracks, where the surface is consistent, the grip is high, and the wind doesn’t matter.
Our Mission
Social inclusion is how we run small-scale RC: everyone belongs here, whatever your age, background, budget, or experience. We host respectful, technically honest racing in Hobart — and taking part is free for everyone: practice, race meets, timing, and the community in the pits. Money is not a gate on a grid spot or on being one of us.
We are not just about going fast; we are about the friendships, the shared tools, and the plain human decency of a night at the track. Whether you are a veteran with decades in the hobby or someone who walked in without a car, you find people who want you there and who talk you through your first heat.
We believe RC racing is a legitimate pursuit of engineering and reflex. We treat our race days with the same seriousness as full-scale motorsport — but without the ego, and without pricing anyone out of the sport.
Inclusion, community, and mentoring
We mean it when we say the club is for everyone. Mini-Z can look technical from the outside—motor rules, tyre compounds, setup sheets—so we keep the door wide open: curious spectators, parents with juniors, people who have never soldered a connector, and drivers who have raced for years all share the same pits.
Across ages, the calendar is not one-size-fits-all. Adult racing and teen racing share our regular fortnightly meets, with classes and briefings matched to experience—from half-speed Driver through to the faster brackets when drivers are ready for them. We also run special kids events: shorter, focused sessions where younger children can try cars (including loaners where available), learn simple track rules, and build confidence in a calmer room before they join a full club grid.
Mentoring is not a boxed programme with forms to fill in; it is what happens when you lean over someone’s pit table and ask what tyre they are running, or when a regular walks a newcomer through a first battery change or class check-in. Members swap tools, help with setup and pack-down, and marshal each other’s heats so the night stays fair and keeps moving. If you bring questions, people answer them in plain English—we would rather explain something twice than let someone sit stuck because they were afraid to ask.
Community is the part that does not show up on a lap timer: checking in when someone has had a rough night on track, cheering a junior’s clean heat, and keeping the room respectful when competition gets tight. We look after the space and each other so the next meet is just as welcoming—alongside the expectations in our code of conduct.
How We Run
We aim for one club weekend per fortnight, balancing practice nights and official race meets. That rhythm gives members time to test parts or tune their chassis between race days, then bring those changes to the track under the clock.
The Classes
To keep racing fair and accessible, we run several classes on the calendar:
- Box Stock: This is the entry point. It’s strictly for out-of-the-box Kyosho MR-04 RWD cars (Readyset rules as published for the meet), brushed motors and NiMH batteries, unless the round brief explicitly allows a legacy chassis. By limiting modifications, we ensure that winning comes down to driving skill and basic car preparation rather than who has the biggest budget.
- Open 2WD: This is where the engineering gloves come off. Modified chassis, brushless motors, and advanced electronics are all on the table. It’s fast, technical, and represents the technical extreme of the platform.
- AAA: Mini-Z AAA as its own class — separate grid and rules from Box Stock and Open; check the round brief or race director before your first AAA entry.
- 2500: Brushless touring with published motor and electronics limits for that meet — faster than stock, tighter than Open 2WD; always read the sheet for the round.
- F1: Open-wheel Formula-style bodies and F1 class racing — a different visual and handling challenge from touring-style Mini-Z.
- Driver: Same box-stock rules and hardware as Box Stock, but run at half speed — ideal for juniors, first-timers, or anyone who wants full stock tech with a gentler pace while they learn the track.
The Community
Tassie Mini-Z Club is a family-friendly environment. We have members ranging from primary school students to retirees. We emphasize a “plain English” approach to the hobby—we won’t bury you in jargon without explaining what it means first.
We are proud to be part of the broader Australian Mini-Z community, aligning our rules and formats with national standards to ensure that if you race here, you can race anywhere.
Learning outside race weekend
Outside meets, a lot of us pick up setup and driving from long-form video and curated write-ups on the wider RC web — chassis prep, electronics, track craft at 1:28 scale, not only big bash builds. We sometimes embed examples in these guides so you can see real prep in context.
Image credit: Netcruzer
That material is for learning, not an official club endorsement. For anything that affects legality at our meets, use our published rules and ask the race director — the open web moves faster than any club brief.
Join Us
If you’ve ever been curious about RC racing but felt intimidated by the scale or the cost of larger vehicles, come and see us. We aim for one club weekend per fortnight — check our Events page for the next date and venue. Bring a car, or just bring yourself and have a look at what makes these micro racers so addictive.
We aren’t just a club; we’re a collection of Tasmanians who love the technical challenge of making a 15-centimetre car lap a track in under five seconds.
