This is the Tamiya Squash Van, it’s a remote controlled monster-truck-style van carefully designed with 1950s American styling cues, without actually being a replica of any specific vehicle.
The Squash Van is based on the still-new GF-02 chassis from 2014, it offers full four-wheel-drive, with independent front and rear suspension, and on this version, the body comes pre-painted and trimmed – ready for installation.
This is the Tamiya Squash Van, it’s a remote controlled monster-truck-style van carefully designed with 1950s American styling cues, without actually being a replica of any specific vehicle.
History Speedrun: Tamiya
Yoshio Tamiya opened a sawmill and lumber business in Shizuoka City, Japan just a year after WWII in 1946, supplying building material to a country rebuilding after the conflict. A wooden model section was founded inside the lumber company in April of 1948, and its first scale wooden ship model kit went on sale later that year.
No one knew it at the time of course, but that little wooden model ship would set the company off down a path that would see it become the world’s dominant model maker in the decades to come. A fire destroyed the Tamiya mill in 1951 and left the business heavily in debt. The lumber mill closed a couple of years later in mid-1953, and Tamiya became a specialist wooden model maker.
The first Tamiya plastic kits arrived in 1960, beginning with a 1/800 scale Battleship Yamato. In 1968 the company became the first Japanese model kit manufacturer to exhibit at the Nuremberg Toy Fair, in Germany, and launched the 1/35 scale Military Miniature Series the same year. Its motto, then and now, is “First in Quality Around the World.”
Radio control came next, and today it’s arguably what the company is best-known for. A 1/16 scale M4 Sherman tank in 1974 was Tamiya’s first R/C product, and the 1/12 scale Porsche 934 Turbo that followed in November of 1976 set off the R/C car boom.
Shunsaku Tamiya, the founder’s son, became president in May of 1977 and led the company as president, chairman, or both for the next 47 years. He died in 2025 at the age of 90, and Nobuhiro Tamiya, the husband of his granddaughter, is now the company’s president.
Above Video: This is the episode on the Tamiya Squash Van by RC Driver Online, it gives a great in-depth view of the model, and shows it in action.
The Tamiya R/C Squash Van
Tamiya introduced the Squash Van in 2023 as the first model on its new GF-02 chassis, a gear-driven four-wheel-drive platform derived from the earlier GF-01 that first appeared in 2014 underpinning the Toyota Land Cruiser 40 Pick-Up.
Rather than replicating a specific vehicle, the polycarbonate body of the Squash Van draws on 1950s American panel vans in general, with a rounded hood, widened wheel-arches, and headlights and grille set low in the nose.
The GF-01 chassis from 2014 used what Tamiya called a square setup, the wheelbase and track widths are almost identical, and it has a rear support roller to stop it flipping over backward under hard acceleration.
The newer GF-02 chassis stretches things out, the wheelbase is now 267mm, the track width measures 223mm at the front and 221 mm at the rear, and the body post spacing matches Tamiya’s long-wheelbase CC-02 chassis.
A 540 brushed motor sits low and central in an ABS monocoque frame styled, feeding front and rear diffs through sealed gearboxes that keep grit and grime out. Suspension is double wishbone at all four corners with friction dampers, and the steering servo mounts on the left with equal-length tie-rods.
The Squash Van has some heritage – Tamiya put a boxy van on oversized tires with the Lunch Box in 1987, and the Midnight Pumpkin followed later the same year with a body designed to recall classic 1950s American automotive styling cues.
Tamiya introduced the Squash Van in 2023 as the first model on its new GF-02 chassis, a gear-driven four-wheel-drive platform derived from the earlier GF-01 that first appeared in 2014 underpinning the Toyota Land Cruiser 40 Pick-Up.
The Squash Van body arrives pre-painted in Cobalt Green (PS-54) with a White (PS-1) roof and Smoke (PS-31) windows, the wheel arches trimmed and the mount holes are all drilled. A 540 motor and HobbyWing THW 1060 ESC are included.
In order to drive the kit, you’ll also need a 2-channel radio, a standard steering servo, a 7.2V NiMH or 7.4V LiPo battery, and a charger. This isn’t included to help keep the cost down, as many R/C model builders have them already on hand. You can buy it here direct from the official Tamiya Amazon online store.
Images courtesy of Tamiya
Articles that Ben Branch has written have been covered on CNN, Popular Mechanics, Smithsonian Magazine, Road & Track Magazine, the official Pinterest blog, the official eBay Motors blog, BuzzFeed, Autoweek Magazine, Wired Magazine, Autoblog, Gear Patrol, Jalopnik, The Verge, and many more.
Silodrome was founded by Ben back in 2010, in the years since the site has grown to become a world leader in the alternative and vintage motoring sector, with well over a million monthly readers from around the world and many hundreds of thousands of followers on social media.
