Land Rover Defender 90 Bio:

The D90 Rover was featured in Readers Rides in the July 2013 edition of RC Car Action Mag!

I wanted to do an extremely detailed crawler with all the bells and whistles, so I started with a an apx. 1/8 scale Land Rover top from Aoshima/Skynet - due to the interior and that it's a hard top.

For the chassis, we chose to go with the RC4WD Bruiser Classic Edition Chassis (ours is an older version without the Yota axles so the axles are bigger and beefier...back when RC4WD only had a handful of vehicles.

The rig was built over approximately 6 months and has undergone many modifiations/upgrades along the way:

• Flipped transmission
• Different placement of servo for 2-speed transmission
• Modified mount for steering servo for better placement
• Early Bruiser Classic edition axles have been hand-notched to angle the drivelines upward
• Rims and tires have been changed to Interco Super Swamper Irok's and 1.9 Pro-10 beadlocks 
• Front leaf springs have been replaced with the red, super-soft version; a modified second set of red leaves, serve as the extra leaf
• Bulldog winches in both front and rear
• Rear shackles have been changed to shooter shackles for easier flex
• 4:1 gear reduction unit on the transmission
• All suspension parts have custom fuel tubing grommets to make it a completely solid vehicle
• For scale realism brake lines, axle breather tubes, disc brakes, matching steering strut, and exhaust made from aluminum tubing, mini disposable lighter cases were added
• Features one of the first generations of hand-made valve stems (early version mounted with JB Weld)
• Custom skid-plate made from old Kyosho chassis plate
• The original U-bolt system for the leaf springs was upgraded (with some modification) so that all hardware is sticking upward for clearance
• Gas tank (in rear) houses electronics for rear Bulldog winch
• Inner fender wells made from thin acrylic laminated with black vinyl
• Fiber optics ran from ESC light to the exhaust giving a red or green glow at exhaust tip according to ESC function
• For easy mounting rear chassis cross-member was used as a "pinch-tab" in conjunction with Delrin L-tabs mounted firmly to the bumper of the body
• Bumper has been notched out to accommodate the frame rails and also to sit lower on the chassis; rear cross-member of chassis doubles as the rear bumper/step/rear winch mount
• Bumper has been modified to fit the chassis and look of the rig
• The front winch is mounted via HPI battery plate converted into winch-mount and holding the vehicle's only two body posts
• Existing mounts were repurposed into body mounts, meaning there are no pins on the outside of the body
• The existing running boards were modified and detailed to keep the overall look
• Body houses 18 LED lights (including license plate light) - 4 of which are on a separate switch and are interior lights powered by single 9-volt battery - a completely separate system from chassis itself
• Body also received the Axial fender flares, an RC4WD cargo carrier and RC4WD snorkel
• Custom headliner and seatbelts were installed
• Windows modified to be partially open
• Stainless steel emblems
• And a whole slew of other minor modifications!

Still one of our favorite builds!

~Scale Ultimate Crawlers, Models & Electronics