FMS Suzuki Jimny 1/12 4WD RC Crawler

FMS Jimny by ROC Hobby

If you’re into hard-body crawlers and highly-detailed scale, is this the car for you? (Spoiler: yes, yes it is!). Made by ROC Hobby, in conjunction with Eachine, this is the FMS Suzuki Jimny – and it’s gorgeous! The vehicle is branded by official licence from Suzuki Motor Corporation Ltd. This lets the factory bring us scale detail at a pleasing level, right out of the box. Let’s take a closer look!

A Very Scale Model

We recently looked at the Jimny look-alike from RGT. It was a performer (for its size) and it had a lovely scale body. But now we have the FMS Jimny here the RGT is looking decidedly less scale in comparison!

The RGT was a mish-mash of different scale ratios. The track and wheelbase were inconsistent with the full-size vehicle and the body was a different scale again. We covered this in the article and videos for that vehicle – check them out if you haven’t seen them yet.

In contrast, the FMS Jimny is consistent in its overall dimensions, in and out. This does limit its off-road performance, but that’s a feature rather than a bug.

FMS Jimny Specs

• Scale: 1/12
• Length: 291mm x Width 135mm x Height: 158mm
• Weight: 925g with battery
• Wheelbase: 187mm
• Ground Clearance: 16mm
• Departure Angle: 60°
• Approach Angle: 61°
• Wheel Diameter: 60mm; Width: 15mm
• Top Speed: 8km/h (2^nd gear); 2km/h (1^st gear)
• Remote control distance: 30 meters
• Battery charge time: 25 minutes
• Battery run-time: 20 to 60 minutes depending on drive style & terrain
• 2.4GHz 4-channel transmitter
• 3-in-1 ESC, Receiver & Light Controller w/3x 9g digital servos
• Not Waterproof!

Scale Exterior

From bumper to bumper, the FMS Jimny sports a stunning array of accurately reproduced scale parts. The bumpers themselves look like the real thing, with integrated lights at both ends. Real mirrored glass adorns the flexible side mirrors. Under an opening hood you’ll find an engine bay filled with faux engine parts – not just a cover hiding the electrics! The battery and power switch live here, too.

The 3 doors open and there is a pleasing amount of scale trim adorning the body exterior. Flip the vehicle over and you’ll find a convincing appearance of the real car underneath, too. Just have a look at this!

Let’s Take This Inside

The scale party continues once you open a door and peer inside. The doors themselves have an inner skin with arm rest, non-functional window winder, open lever and map holder. The rear barn-style door also incorporates an inner skin with an approximation of the real thing. There’s also a wire pair visible near the hinges that goes up into the integrated tail and brake light at the top of the rear window – which also has the demister lines across it!

There’s a lidded storage compartment behind the rear seats, which independently fold down. The front seats both fold and slide forward and back. The dash is fully detailed with labelled dials and radio. Best of all, the steering wheel moves in conjunction with the front wheels! Just fit your 6” figurine in the front seat and you’re set for some real fun with suspension of disbelief intact!

A Bright Idea

Part of the appeal of the FMS Jimny is its slick light kit. The 3-in-1 radio-ESC-light controller gives tight integration with throttle and steering inputs, plus a separate channel to change light profiles. There are several settings from which to choose (manual except with light control outline here).

The lights can be found in the front and rear bumpers, the front grille, side quarter panels for indicators and the aforementioned tail-and-brake light in the rear window. The system works very well and adds to the scale experience in day and night driving.

Walk and Crawl

With those tiny 60mm tires and limited suspension articulation, you won’t be crawling any major terrain. But that’s okay, as the FMS Jimny is clearly intended to bring you more of a trail drive and light-obstacle clearing experience. The car includes a 180-size motor with appropriate gearing and power for the car’s size and scale nature.

In second gear you get walking speed from the car. That’s just fine for taking it along the trail. Then drop it into first for the harder obstacles and you have a decent little crawler. Limited in tire and suspension, sure, but still quite able if it can get sufficient traction.

Suspension & Geometry

Just like the real thing, the FMS Jimny sports live axles front and rear. There is three-link suspension (ie. with panhard) at each end, which is great for realism but not so much for performance! Again, given this is a scale machine, that is more than forgivable.

There are coil springs on all corners and angled shocks too. The shocks are not oil-filled and really their only purpose seems to be to limit the maximum articulation before the links reach the end of their throw. Without them, the coil springs could pop out. Still, the lack of proper shocks leaves the Jimny to bounce quite a lot on the bumpy stuff. Everything’s built to a price and in this case, the lack of proper shocks seems a logical place for some compromise.

Battery & Charger

The car comes with a USB balance charger that needs 5V and 2A. It outputs the required voltage range to charge the included 2S LiPO battery via its balance plug – that is, ~6v to 8.4v, at 1A. This means the 380mAh battery should be able to charge in 20 to 25 minutes, which is absolutely fine for a ‘cheap’ included battery system.

Note, the battery charger does not have a Storage charge program, so you want to try to keep this battery at around 7.4v when you’re done with it. For reference, empty is about 6.6v and full is 8.4v, so if you run it for 2/3 of the usual runtime before you put it away, that’ll be much better for it than storing it full or empty. It’s a LiPO thing.

Radio & DIP Switches

The little radio takes 4x AAA batteries. It’s comfortable in the hand and the steering wheel has a pleasing and precise spring and movement. There are end point and trim dials for throttle and steering, a 2-way switch for channel 3 (that’s high and low gear) and a button for channel 4 (to cycle through the light profiles).

There is also a set of 4 DIP switches on the top of the unit. These are all two-position switches whose functions are not listed anywhere in the included manual, so here are their functions:

• Switch 1: driving profile (down is forward/brake/reverse; up is forward/reverse with no brake)
• Switch 2: battery profile (down is for LiPO with Low Voltage Cut-off; up is for NiMH with no LVC)
• Switches 3 & 4: drag brake (3 Down 4 Down 25%, 3U4D 50%, 3D4U 75%, 3U4U 100%)

Finish & Durability

The FMS Jimny ships in an attractive EPP case. Being a hard bodied vehicle, the protection works well and the car arrives in good condition. Our unit had loose screws in the roof, with one screw out and the second rear one half out. Both of these were easy to screw back in (1.5mm hex driver) with threads intact. Our RHS side mirror was also loose, but that was easily tightened via the screw on the inside of the RHS door.

There was protective film over the windows and the wiring and electronics were tidily installed from factory. The car is designed in such a way that the fixings should not come loose with use, but if they do, everything is accessible without fuss, though you’ll need your own tools. The car will last as long as its driven as intended. Don’t push things too hard with rock crawling or running second gear in hard terrain and everything should serve you well for a long time.

The Verdict

Is it a rock crawler? Well, kinda sorta. Is it a trail truck? Also kinda sorta. Scale is the focus here and while there are some interesting bells and whistles like the steering wheel and light system, nothing is waterproof and the tires are not aggressive. The steering servo does have sufficient torque for the model and the motor is well matched to the transmission. Some pros and cons here – so where does that leave the prospective purchaser?

If you like scale and the smaller size of this model appeals to you, definitely pick one up. If you’re after a scale experience in 1/12, you will not be disappointed. However, if you want more capability in the rough stuff but you still want something in this size and with a moderate amount of scale, you might instead want to check out something like the MN86KS or the WPL C44KM. As for us, we’re gonna get this thing out and maybe even improve it a little – we’ll let you know!

Where To Get It

Who makes it: ROC Hobby under the FMS brand

Where to get it: AsiaTees ships globally.

Also available from: Banggood.