How to Relocate the Motor on a Wheely King

As its name implies, the HPI Wheely King is designed to pop wheelies on demand. But with its beefy straight axles, multilink suspension and dual vertical plate chassis, the Wheely King can become a great rock-crawling rig with just a few modifications. The truck gets its wheely-popping prowess from its reward-mounted motor and a battery pack that places the weight of these components on its tail end to allow it to easily pop wheelies. The steps below show you how to relocate the motor and battery pack to the front of the truck for improved rock-crawling weight distribution.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• • Philips head screwdriver
• • 1.5 Allen wrench
• • 7mm cross wrench
• • Needle-nose pliers

Disassembly

1. Relocating the motor and battery pack will require a major tear-down and approximately two hours to complete. Keep the instruction manual handy to help you with the rebuilding process, and find a few plastic bowls in which to organize the screws and other parts so nothing gets lost. Start off by removing the body and tires to gain access to the chassis.

2. Remove the three 15mm screws that secure the shocks to the shock towers. Next, remove the four 2-by-12mm screw shafts from the drive shafts that attach to each end of the transmission. With these items removed, you can proceed to Step 3.

3. Remove nine 3-by-10mm screws from each of the chassis plates but leave the upper and lower suspension links attached each of the chassis plates. Once you remove these screws, you'll be able to partially separate the chassis plates. Remove the front and rear bumpers, shock towers, carrying handle, battery box, servo tray and transmission. You'll also need to remove the steering bell crank and bushing from the transmission and the 2.6-by-12mm flanged screw that secures the servo saver to the servo. Finally, remove the servo saver from the servo.

Reassembly

4. Now it's time to relocate the battery box, motor and servo tray. Rotate the transmission 180 degrees so the motor faces the front of the truck. Attach the steering bell crank (with bushing intact) onto the transmission, but make sure that the steering arm (with the servo saver on the end) is routed toward the rear because the servo tray must be repositioned to the back end of the truck. Reattach the transmission to the chassis plates with six 3-by-10mm screws, but do not tighten the screws all the way yet. Next, attach the battery box to the front end of the chassis with three six 3-by-10mm screws. While you're at it install the servo tray to the new location on the rear of the chassis with four 3-by-10mm screws.

5. Install the bumpers, shock towers and carrying handle with the remaining 3-by-10mm screws. Tighten up the screws that secure the transmission to the chassis plates that you left loose in Step 1. You can also reattach the drive shafts to the transmission, the shocks to the shock towers and reinstall the tires. Do not install the servo saver on the servo yet, though. You are going to need to make some final radio-system adjustments as outlined in the next step.

6. 
    
   My Wheelie King is highly modified, but the best mod was to position the motor and battery pack to the front of the truck to improve its rock-crawling prowess.

   We're almost done. The last step is to flip the servo-reversing switches on your radio because the motor and servo have been relocated. If you skip this step, the truck will roll backwards when you apply the throttle, and it will steer left when you turn right. After you flip the switches, center the radio's steering and throttle trims, and install the servo saver on the steering servo. The electronic speed control will recalibrate when you turn on the radio and turn the switch harness to the "on" position.

References

• HPI Racing
• RC Nitro Talk.com