I tried a few RC off-road vehicles and a lot of them are generally good, a few a really good. But they always tend to be OK in one area and not always very multi-purposed.

When you want to have fun and play with your kids you either have the choice of letting them use their toys which are not always very good -and you end up frustrated because these ones are really not good- or to let them use your own "toy" and you end up being scared that they will trash them.

Background

The HPI Crawler King is based on the very well known and proven Wheely King, the "king of the park", the one that you used to impress your friends with jumps and wheelies and always very strong.

The crawler community started to use the WK parts to make the early rock crawlers and HPI saw the business opportunity to release an hop-up kit to transform your WK into a crawler. But the business did not stop there, as people were asking for a ready to run vehicle. Et Voila, the Crawler King was born.

Frank McKinney (HPI Europe's Marketing Editor) says:
"HPI felt the time was right to release a cool-looking scale crawler to the market because that segment of the RC hobby has been growing rapidly in some areas over the past few years. With our already existing scale monster truck bodies like the Defender, Jeep and Bronco, these were a perfect fit on the 1/12th scale Wheely King chassis to turn that into a realistic 1/10th scale crawler. All we had to do was design the wheels and tyres, which have been an HPI specialty since the company's debut in the late 80's, and we were able to provide a complete HPI ready-to-run kit that anyone can have fun with, just about anywhere.

The Wheely King chassis was used as the base because it looks cool with the ladder frame style chassis, plus it's already a popular kit so the shops can easily get spares for it. Overall, it's a low-cost and easy entry to RC for off-road fans of any age and any skill level, and we're really proud it's had a very good reception by the public."

The recipe they followed is actually very simple. Your start with a good and solid base vehicle with the WK, you mix with the conversion kit that has been sold for a little while, you add a good 55t motor, some grippy tyres on beadlock wheels, a great bodyshell and you have a winning combination.

As a Land Rover enthusiast I really like the Defender 90 Pickup bodyshell prepainted in silver. The color scheme is very similar to real like Land Rover and will certainly attract the Land Rover crowd. The kit is also available with a Jeep body (if you have been attracted by the dark side of the force... only joking... I like Jeeps as well... a little bit at least... don't shot me... please...).

Testing it

Battery fully charged and we are out for the first test run. The CK is quite fast for a crawler and will require some attention in technical section, but it also means that you can take it on a trail or park and use it whilst walking (great trick to get your kids out of the house and the TV set). On a side note, I have used the HPI 7.2v 3300mah stick, and they worked very well, 45min later it still had some juice.

The first axle twister are showing that the articulation is massive for an RTR (so called "entry model") crawler. The shocks and springs are very soft and a little bit prone to torque twist, but you can live with that with such a "toy". This massive articulation means that the tyres are rubbing of the shell but that can be cured by a little bit of trimming around the arches.

Without the shell, the following picture shows you it full potential...

The speed controler is not bad at all for an RTR vehicle, and should not require any changes.

The only drawback with this crawler is the the weak steering and its position. The servo is chassis mounted and required numerous links to turn the wheels. So associated with a very entry model servo, it means that turning the wheels can sometime be a struggle. You have to remember that most of this kit is based on the original WK.

It also means that the centre of gravity is quite high and it is easy to roll it on side slope. However, as the battery is front monted (in a neat compartment), the CK climbs quite well. You can always add some weight in the front wheels to make it very good.

Note where the battery slides in and position of the key components (servo in under the rx on the right) in this picture.

Improving the Kit

The main change I have done very quickly was to swap the servo for a better one from the HPI accessories range (no need to look very far).

I chose the HPI SF-5 servo (ref #80595 - rrp £38.99) which a high torque servo with metal gears and ball bearing. It only takes 5min for a swap and the result is very good. You still have the same amount of linkage, but the servo does not struggle anymore

The other easy upgrade would be to add some weights on the wheels as mentioned earlier on. I recommend you to find some stick-on wheel balance weights either from your local tyre-fitting place or just do a search on eBay.

Finally, a bit of trimming around the wheels arches will help the axle articulation without too much rubbing and damaging the overall appearance.

Conclusion

So, who is it for? The way I look at it, this is the perfect vehicle for the older child who wants to move away from toy RC and get into a more serious business or for the adult who is looking for a starter kit. With a rrp of £264.99 you cannot really go wrong with this sort of kit.