VehiclesTamiya DF-03

Tamiya DF-03 Chassis

Name: Tamiya DF-03
Brand: Tamiya

1/10 scale · 4WD buggy chassis · sold as kits

Tamiya's DF-03 is a 1/10 four-wheel-drive, shaft-driven buggy chassis built from a kit, sold as the Dark Impact.

Every kit on it pairs a 78T spur with a 3.06:1 gearbox and axle stage, on a 272 mm wheelbase, so the pinion you fit is what sets the final drive. Tamiya prints no pinion chart for the chassis. The pinion, motor and tires come with each kit rather than with the chassis, so enter yours in the gearing tool to see the final drive and rollout.

Transmission & axle: 3.06:1
Spur: 78T
Wheelbase: 272mm
Introduced: 2006

Gearing Top speedsourced

The pinion, motor and tires come with each kit: enter yours in the gearing tool.

Tamiya DF-03 — Photo: Tamiya (opens in a new tab)

Kits on this chassis Built on the DF-03

Each kit adds its own body, tires, pinion and motor. The chassis figures below apply to all of them.

Kit	Part no.	Maker page
Dark Impact	58370	tamiya.comPage (opens in a new tab)
Dark Impact White Version	84400	tamiya.comPage (opens in a new tab)

Specifications

Last modified Sep 28, 2026

Spec	Value	Basis
Vehicle
Class The kind of vehicle the maker sells it as. It sets what the car is built to do and which cars it is fair to compare it with. Buggies are low, light off-road cars built for jumps and fast corners on dirt, clay or turf tracks. Drive All four wheels are driven. That gives more grip under power, especially on loose ground. The cost is more parts to maintain. Build A kit you build yourself from parts. Most kits come without motor, ESC, servo, radio and battery, and many without tires or a painted body. The manual lists what to add. Scale The maker's nominal size compared with a full-size vehicle. It works more as a class label than a measurement. A 1/10 monster truck is far bigger than a 1/10 touring car, so compare length and weight for real size.
Class	Buggy
Drive	4WD
Build	Kit
Scale	1/10
Drivetrain
Pinion The small gear on the motor shaft. Fewer teeth gear the car shorter: quicker acceleration, lower top speed and a cooler motor. More teeth do the opposite. On a chassis sold as kits, each kit brings its own. Spur The large gear the pinion drives. A bigger spur with the same pinion gears the car shorter. Pinion and spur must have the same pitch, or tooth size, to mesh. Transmission & axle Every reduction after the spur, multiplied together: transmission, differentials and axle gears. It is fixed by the design; the gearing you change is the pinion and spur. This one is worked out from the tooth counts the maker publishes. Final drive How many times the motor turns for one turn of the wheels. A higher number is shorter gearing: more acceleration and pulling power, less top speed.
Pinion	With each kit
Spur	78TStock	Stock
Transmission & axle	3.06:1Derived	Derived
Final drive	With each kit
Wheels & tires
Tire diameter The outside diameter of the mounted tire, tread to tread. A taller tire covers more ground each turn, which gears the car taller. Race tires wear down over a day, and a smaller tire gears the car shorter.
Tire diameter	With each kit
Power
Motor Motor KV is the RPM a motor turns per volt with no load. This vehicle comes without a motor, so there is no stock KV; it depends on the one you fit. Battery The highest LiPo cell count the maker rates the electronics for. This vehicle comes without electronics, so it depends on the ESC and motor you fit.
Motor	With each kit
Battery	With each kit
Size & weight
Wheelbase The distance between the front and rear axle centers. A longer wheelbase is steadier at speed and over bumps; a shorter one turns more tightly.
Wheelbase	272 mm10.7 inStock	Stock

How to read these figures

Stock is as the vehicle ships.
Calculated is worked from the stock figures on this page rather than stored beside them, so the two cannot drift apart.
Derived is worked out from gear tooth counts the maker publishes rather than printed as a ratio; the notes below say how.
With each kit means each kit on this chassis brings its own, so enter yours in the gearing tool.

How these numbers were settled

The Dark Impact manual fits a 26T pinion (MK8) beside 'Gear ratio 9.17 : 1' (step 7, PDF p. 6), and its parts list names the '78T Spur gear' (MG2) in spur gear bag 51248, beside a 55T differential gear and an 85T gear marked 'Not used' (PDF p. 26).

Tamiya prints the ratio for the complete drive rather than the stage after the spur, so it is derived: 9.17 x 26/78 = 3.057.
Tamiya's Dark Impact page prints the same 9.17:1 and a 272mm wheelbase.
No pinion chart is printed.
The pinion, motor and tires come with each kit, so they are not part of the chassis figures: enter yours in the gearing tool.

Sources

Every figure on this page traces to one of these; where they disagreed, the note above says which was used and why. Links open in a new tab.

Maker documents

Dark Impact (DF-03) instruction manual (Tamiya PDF) (opens in a new tab)Pinion and gear ratio step 7, PDF p. 6; parts list Spur gear bag MG, PDF p. 26d7z22c0gz59ng.cloudfront.netUsed forMain specs

Parts and electronics

Products 58370 (opens in a new tab)tamiya.comUsed forMain specsSize
Products 58370 (opens in a new tab)tamiya.comUsed forMain specsSize

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