Tamiya Wild One Max might just be the perfect ￡35k EV

“And for my next trick,” you can imagine Ben Hedley, founder and boss of The Little Car Company, saying before pulling the covers off his latest creation. Coming after miniature, third-scale versions of the Bugatti Type-35, Aston Martin DB5 and Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa, comes this, a full-size version of the Tamiya Wild One.

For those who aren’t children of the 1980s and 90s, the Tamiya Wild One was a hugely popular, 1/10th scale remote control buggy, first released back in 1985.

Now there’s the Wild One Max, a full-size version of the buggy that’s big enough for adults to drive – and best of all, it’s road legal. Powered by eight swappable battery packs with a total capacity of 14.4 kWh, the Wild One Max has a top speed of 62 mph and a range of up to 124 miles on-road, or about 68 miles off-road.

Features include a pair of Cobra bucket seats with four-point harnesses, a 5in dashboard display, Brembo disc brakes and adjustable Bilstein dampers with Eibach springs. The cockpit is wide enough for two adults and the vehicle measures 3.6m long, 1.9m wide, and has 270mm of ground clearance. It weighs about 500kg with all batteries on board.

The buggy is road legal, as it complies with the L7e quadricycle regulations in the UK and EU. That’s the same set of rules that allow small electric vehicles like the Citreon Ami to also be road legal.

Ben Hedley, CEO of The Little Car Company, said: “We are on a mission to show that electric cars can be fun...We’ve strived to make the Tamiya Wild One Max an exhilarating drive by following Colin Chapman’s ethos of 'Simplify, then add lightness'. In my opinion, modern cars are now too large, too fast, too complicated, and too heavy – we believe that there is an alternative. Our goal is to create innovative lightweight vehicles which bring the purity and fun back into driving."

Revealed this week is a special Launch Edition of the WIld One Max. Limited to 100 examples, it comes with a carbon fibre dashboard with matching key, and a titanium plaque in the cabin to show off its rarity. Customers who buy this version will also receive a Tamiya Wild One model kit, to build while they wait for their full-size car to arrive.

Speaking of which, the first deliveries of the Wild One Max, which arrives fully assembled instead of in kit form, will be delivered to customers from 2024. The Launch Edition is priced at ￡35,000 plus VAT and shipping, and can be secured with a 10% deposit.