VKTechnic

Do you have an example of some pattern that would look good on this model? And I'm adding strips on the side, kind of like this:

Very clean looking model! Great job!

Started work on the front body... ...and now I'm off to school. Slow building process ahead!

That's a nice crawler you got there. And the shocks are fine, Technyk32231. Lego can take some abuse.

Very nice mix of System and Technic for the body!

Can you maybe post some pictures to illustrate your problem a little better?

The shocks are fine, there's not enough suspension travel to severely bend/damage them.

There will be an M-Motor mounted elsewhere for gear shifting. UPDATE All functions tested and working (I guess you could say they're...functional ). Swapped out the steering worm gear and replaced it with a gear train. Takes up more space but you guys were right, worm gears hold no place in crawlers. So now it's time for the bodywork. Always the slowest part for me, and it's gonna be made even slower because of school.

Should be enough, tested it and it can go up a flat wall. Haven't done an outdoor test yet though.

Thanks everyone for the feedback, both positive and negative, rude and polite. I've changed the axles once again, this time they have 1.667:1 reduction instead of a worm gear system. Also added some gearing in the chassis and a 2-speed gearbox. Final gear ratios are 8.333:1 (first gear) and 2.778:1 (second gear). Oh, and yes I did cut an old style differential to get that clutch gear. EDIT: I also made a short video of the new axles, it can be found here.

Only problem with new wheel hubs: I don't have any

Wow, didn't think I'd get so many complaints for using worm gears. I'll go ahead and get rid of them. About portal axles: I don't want to use them because they move the steering pivot point further away from the wheel. I want to limit wheel movement due to steering as much as possible, and I don't want to set up a complex steering setup with kingpin inclination etc. As they are right now, the axles provide decent ground clearance, so moving the driveshaft down won't change much.

Looking good so far! Looking forward to seeing the finished product.

I'm not going for speed here. Remember: this is a crawler. I want a controlled climber, not a dragster

In crawlers I usually like to have low wheel speed -- I'm going for one L-motor and a 24:1 gear reduction. For tires I'm thinking these or these tires.

Added worm gears to the axles and moved the driveshafts up 2 studs.

The rest of the pictures can be found in this Brickshelf folder.

Worm gears will be for the drive, I want to move as much gearing into the axles as possible.

At ride height with steering motor installed. Next step is adding worm gears to the axles and working on the transmission.

I'm keeping the wheelbase a little longer because I plan on buying some third party tires hopefully within the next month, and they're going to be noticeably larger.

I saw this photo on an R/C forum post...and now I'm hooked on crawlers: I've set about building my own crawler based on the above picture, and I'll post WIP photos here. Your feedback is greatly appreciated. To start the WIP photos, here's the chassis as of today:

The only parts I really modify are the pneumatic hoses (cutting them to a better length) and the thin rigid hoses. Those thin hoses have a lot of good uses -- connecting pneumatic tubes, working as connectors in some situations, and, of course, decoration.

Tiny car with this many functions? I approve!

Even if it could fit, it would weight too much for the suspension to function well.

Sadly, I have to end this project here as BrickCon is in 36 days and counting...Gotta get prepping! Looking forward to what you can do with the micro tires.