King Of Crushers 2.0

Round 2 for the Ultimate Solid-Axle Comp Monster Build

- Kevin Hetmanski

I am passionate about solid-axle monster trucks and have been that way since the release of the Tamiya Clod Buster in 1987. As a kid, I spent many days modifying and tweaking the Clod Buster to get the best possible performance out of Tamiya’s iconic monster. Since then, I’ve driven every solid axle truck to hit hobby-store shelves—some were better than others, but none were as good as I felt a solid-axle MT could be. In 2007, I designed my own truck using a 2D CAD program and built it from the ground up. I learned a lot since that build and have been wanting to build a 2.0 version. This time, I used a 3D CAD program to bring my design to life, and even tested components virtually before committing to the final designs. It took more than a year and a half, but my truck went from a dream to a thing that I can touch and drive thanks to a skilled machinist friend, 3D printing, and some parts that I machined myself.

Twin Vertical Plate Chassis

I designed the KOC 2.0 carbon-fiber chassis to hold the speed control and battery as close as possible to the truck’s centerline to centralize weight and make the truck as responsive as it can be. On many trucks, the battery is mounted along the center of the chassis and that was the direction that I was going to go, but I found that, by doing this, about only a third of the pack was as low as possible. By turning the battery and mounting it across the chassis, I was able to get about half of the battery weight as low as possible. The battery plate is carbon fibre and mounted to two square aluminum cross-members. Having 3D-printed stops at each end allow me to adjust the width for any battery that I put in the chassis, and a Velcro strap keeps it tight to the plate.