I just had this article and pictures emailed to me I thought it was WAY too cool to not publish and let everyone check it out. Not only is it the first RCCrawler we know of at the south pole, it was the first radio controlled vehicle to complete the 2 mile Race Around the World! -Jason
I started expressing an interest in 4X4 rock crawling in mid 2005 but the cost building a full size rig was prohibitive. One day while doing so research on the web I came across a website that featured RC rock crawlers(RCCrawler.com). I was impressed by what these little machines could do.
It wasn’t until mid 2007 that I purchased my first RC crawler to get a taste of the hobby. It was a modified 1/18 scale Nylint Scorpion that I bought on eBay. I ran it for about 4 months finding that it would run about 2 times & then need some level of repair. The one thing I did know, I was hooked, I loved maneuvering the rocks & I wanted something more durable. Back on the auction block went the Nylint & then I bought a mid-conversion Clodbuster. I choose a CPE Claw 60/40 chassis due to the shockless design knowing I was about to deploy to Antarctica for the fourth time & that the wide range of summer cold temperatures (-60F/-7F) at the South Pole would make shock oil performance a nightmare. I purchased an early 50s Chevy PU body & had it custom painted with an Antarctic landscape based on pictures from my previous visits to McMurdo station on Ross Island.
I disassembled the truck to the point of removing the wheels & axels from the chassis & packing them in my check on baggage. I hand carried the body in my backpack from Redding, CA to Christchurch, NZ & then to McMurdo Station where I assembled the truck in my dorm room & then hiked up above the station to what is known as Hut Ridge It was there that the truck made it’s maiden voyage with the newly painted Chevy body. The temperature that evening was -5F & a 20 Knot wind breaking over the ridge. I found the truck did surprisingly well on the volcanic basalt despite the firm tires due to the cold.
I packed the truck in a box & shipped it from McMurdo station to South Pole. I ran the truck on the snow at South Pole finding that a slow high torque vehicle tends to dig in allot so bumping the pinion gear from 9T to 13T helped. The radio electronics tend to get a little stupid in the sub zero temps, so wrapping them with hand warmers keeps things running reliably. On Christmas day I drove the truck in an event called the Race Around the World. It is a 3 lap 2 mile event that ranges from serious runners to people dressed in crazy costumes, tractors decorated & a fire truck on mat tracks blaring music from the PA speaker. I beefed up the battery array to a little over 7,000 MAh to handle the distance & cold. The truck completed the course with a time of 38:02 & was limited by me trying to keep up.
Yes it’s true that here at the South Pole the nearest rocks are about 3,000 ft below the near 10,000 ft elevation of snow & ice, but when it comes to an RC vehicle that can transverse in these harsh conditions, a crawler is the one to do it.
