I think I'll call it Elvis
 

Not the most original name but it was the first thing that came mind, not that I have much of one. With that being said I should also mention that I have no plan what so ever. This thing will probably end up being the old fat Elvis to start with but I do have a couple ideas floating around like my usual divorced GD/lathe motor setup. Hopefully I can eventually get it back to the cool early Army Elvis but we'll see. This is my first Wheely King and I wanted to come at it relatively fresh so I've purposely haven't been doing any real research. I've skimmed through a few builds for some basic ideas on where to start.

So it started buy pulling it out of the box and staring at it for a bit. Unfortunately I've been overseas for the last couple months and really only looking at Axial's Scorpion so I was dissapointed with the WK in RTR form. I threw it back in the box and did a rebuild on my TLT Misfit while catching up on my Miller Lite backlog.

With that out of system the next morning ... well afternoon I pulled it back out of the box and stripped the WK down. Staring blankly at the axles, I figured it was time to get some ideas on link mounts. A quick scroll through the template thread and I got started on the axles. I got nothing on the rest of the truck. I'm designing on the fly, one componant at a time so this may be interesting.

First up is the 3-link mount using the standard TLT suspension stays. I used 1/8" Alumn. I don't think this will break. It's tied in at 5 points around the diff and then again at the axle hubs. I bent ends in to fit flush against axle c's rather use some sort of spacer and a longer screw. The screws seem to make enough contact even going through the 1/8" material but time will on that one.

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...xleMount01.jpg

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...xleMount02.jpg

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...xleMount03.jpg

Then came the servo mount. I'm not sure about this one. I't pretty similar to what everyone else is running but it may get evolved once I get it more complete.

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...rvoMount01.jpg

I had to notch out the link mount plate for my 645mg to fit.

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...untFront01.jpg

And last but least is the rear steer lock out plate.

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...RearLock01.jpg

Now I'm working on the upper 3-link setup. I'm gonna use the Traxxas Revo 102mm links for the lowers. The upper is looking to be a converted A-arm but more on that latter.

Nice-very good work.:)

In the words of the Guinness Beer commercial , Brilliant!!!!!!
Thats a brilliant upper link mount.
Nice Job.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iWqGLVaITsk

I really like how you made the link mounts a full axle truss. That will help minimize breakage if a big fall happens.

Looking forward to seeing more of this build! "thumbsup"

creative, nice work

Thanks for the replies. If I had a plan I'd be dangerous. I wanted a full truss on the axles because I plan to beat the heck out of this thing. If I don't break this everytime I drive it, I wasn't driving it hard enough. That and it's the one I'll loan out to friends.


I haven't started thinking about a chassis design other than it will be a TVP setup made out of 1'8" aluminum. I just ordered the Escalade body along with some other parts and until the body comes I'm not going to mess with making a chassis until I know the wheelbase. I did prototype some upper 3-links mounts. I'm starting with Maxx lower control arms but they're not quite wide enough. I'm starting with some spacers to fix the width issue but I've been kicking around the idea of just fabbing up something out of some cutting board material I've got laying around. It would make it easier for my motor mount. Yea the 65t lathe will be divorced and rear mounted to a GD-600 and connected via Traxxas sliders with steel u-joints, all of which is coming with the body. I really hate torque twist and it really reduces to almost nothing and lets me mount the motor low and almost wherever I want. All my TLT's used that system and the last 2 even used stock TLT shocks just to prove a point.

A comparison shot of the arms
http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...LinkArms01.jpg

Here's what they'll look like mounted. Before anyone asks but I'm sure someone will, thats not the chassis, it's just some scrap so I can play around with the geometry
http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...LinkArms02.jpg

Speaking of Geometry, I was having issues with the pinions hitting the upper link with the kingpins in a true vertical position. To fix it I adjusted the links to rotate the axle backwards.

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...isCaster01.jpg

It's quite a change to the standard config but it's not too radical of a caster change. I'm pretty curious to see how it will do in the rocks.

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...isCaster02.jpg

I'm not sure if the tilting of the tires will help or hurt. It may do nothing but test out how well I glued the tires but I'm thinking it will help a bit with sidebite turning to the rocks.

Got to playing around with shocks today. I've been thinking about doing a droop style suspension but I the way I bash on my rigs I can't bring myself to do it the normal way. I figure I need a little compression dampening. So pulled a set of shocks off my destroyed E-Maxx and and did some mixing and matching to find a good set of 4. Then dusted off the original friction shocks from my Mini-T for the springs, perfect fit in my Maxx shocks. I clipped a few coils off the Maxx and Losi springs and tweaked the ends so they sit somewhat flat.

I cut the Losi's down to 1 inch and the Traxxas springs down to 2 inches and slapped them together with some 20wt oil. I've never run shocks like this so it's an experiment and once I get it rolling I see what weight oil if any works for me. Thats assuming they work at all for me :roll:

The shocks springs barely compress each other with out a load. There's a 3/8 inch compression with 3/4 droop.

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...visShock01.jpg

How wide are those maxx Links? At the widest point...

I measure the arm itself at 47.8mm wide and I cut the arm down to 105mm. Uncut they are 136mm.

After playing around with the maxx arms a bit I think I'm going to drop them in favor of a regular 4-link on this build. The arms are narrower than the trans and I'd have to run spacers with my planned TVP chassis. With spacers I'm concerned I'll have durability issues and I don't want have replace custom parts. I could shave the WK trans mount posts down and get the chassis narrow enough to not use spacers but I don't want to mod the trans case yet. I want have an adjustable wheelbase and if I shave the trans down I'll lose the space to get it down under 12 1/4" because of clearance with the trans. I want to be able to get down to 11 3/4" with the links I have.

While the arms may be a bust for now, the shocks seem to work great. I modded the caps with Traxxas ball joints. It added a little more length to them but makes them easier to mount. Since Elvis is no where near completion I mounted them up on my Misfit and took them for a test run. The TLT isn't set up for a quasi droop system with ground clearance but with the added length of the rod ends on the caps it only dropped my clearance by about 1/4". I noticed a bit more performance, enough that I might make another set for it. With the drop in ride height I still noticed an improvement. Right now it's a little fast with the 35T in it and the spring/oil combo worked well. Once I drop the 65T in it I could get away with heavier oil at the slower speeds. It didn't float wheels as much as I thought it would but it did seem to force a little more grip with the Mashers.

Well my parts showed up early show I got on with the rough chassis. When I say rough chassis I mean I'm only half way done with it so I think it looks nasty. I drove it around for a couple minutes just to make sure I got the electronics wired up right. I still have to lock the axles, figure out body mounts, skid plate, better steering links and that kind of thing but here it is.

It's fully loaded and setting at ride height. There's only 3/8" drop until it's completely bottomed out all the way around so this is where it rides.

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...ssisMock01.jpg

Here's a quick shot of the bottom

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...ssisMock02.jpg

Here's the poser articulation shot. I have over double what I expected. I was slightly surprised to realize that I'll need to put a limit on the shocks.

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...ssisMock03.jpg

I got the chassis a little more refined and body mounts figured out. Since the chassis is the same width as the stock setup I went ahead reused the shock towers.

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...isRunner01.jpg

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...isRunner02.jpg

I got the Maxx sized Pro-Line Escalade EXT body rough trimmed and mounted. It's always hard to see these before painted but that should be done here in the next couple days.

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...Escalade01.jpg

You did a really nice job with the chassis, looks sharp

Finished up the body. Not my best but I still don't want to put it rocks just yet. That will last a day or 2 then I'll destroy it on the rocks just because it's a caddy.

Borrowed the Mashers from my TLT until I figure out if I want the offset and which rubber. I'm thinking about narrowing the track width with some Traxxas rims.

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...ose01Front.jpg

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...Pose02Rear.jpg

Nice build man. I really dig the body choice, and the rear lockout is pretty sweet too.

Thanks. I wasn't sure I would like it. I needed the Cadillac name to go with the rig's name and I'm surprised that I'm actually digging the lines.

As for updates, I don't got anything yet. I hope to get it dirty this weekend with some other rigs. I haven't had it out other than rocks in my garage. So far I want to narrow up the track width a tad or come up with some thin axle skid plates. It side hills pretty good right now but I'm getting hung up more compared to my narrower TLT and grinding down the bottom of the axles pretty good. The outer width is sitting right on 11 inches but I think I'm gonna try some Traxxas electric rear rims in the near future. We'll see what this weekend brings. I want to get out and try and see if I can break this thing.

Ya man...the Caddy lines look great on the rig, especially since you kept most of the body there. Is that the Maxx sized version, or the LST/MGT sized version?

As for the width, I run 'Pede rears on my WK and I love it. It can get a little tippy...but it's not too bad because I've got everything mounted pretty low.

Good luck breaking the thing...I've tried and haven't been able to. I let it cartwheel 50 feet down the mountain when it rolls, I'll stand on the throttle when it binds until the motor stalls, nothing has budged. No broken knuckles, no clicks from the diffs, nothing but more crawling. It's AWESOME. That said, after driving my Scorpion a bit, I do notice the relative lack of steering. I plan on picking up RCP's Max Steer knuckles, 2 position C's, and CVD's as soon as I can afford them...the extra durability is completely unnecessary for me, but the extra steering will be nice.

JIC you're curious what a WK looks like on 'Pede rears, check out my pics section here.

It's the Maxx size body. I setup the wheelbase at 12-1/2 inch with the links level and trimmed along the body lines for the most part. I basically got rid of the bumpers and opened up the fender wells just enough to clear the stock WK wheels.

VERY NICE Mriswith! :)

very nice job on the king, I especially like how you mounted the steering servo. Dave down at hobbytown said you might be interested in working on my wheely king. I don't know much about crawlers, I have a brushless stampede, a drifter, an RC18R, and Im in the process of building one mean rustler. the crawler that you traded to Dave was the first one i drove and it was alot of fun. to me crawlin didnt seem like it would be that cool but Dave couldnt get me to stop. I really want to add a decent crawler to my collection and any help would be appreciated.