Zil 130 Thing

[Tommy R]

Hey y'all,

I've been wanting a King Kong RC ZL-130 for quite some time. The detail looks amazing and it looks like it could be a fun rig that looks like it may fit proportionally with 1/14 trucks, though it claims to be 1/12th scale. So I picked one up and it showed up this afternoon.

They make a version with a 5th wheel and one with a wooden bed. I got the former.


I was surprised that I could find so little info. on these online. So I figured I'd share my thoughts thus far through the assembly process. Overall, I'm pretty darn impressed! There's so much metal and much of it is die cast. And those fuel tanks? Machined aluminum! The wheels are aluminum, as well, and the tires are a much softer material than the standard Tamiya tires. The rear axle has an open diff and while I haven't cracked it open yet, it appears to have a 2.6:1 ratio. The leaf spring packs are plastic and surprisingly compliant. The build quality is certainly not Tamiya quality, but for what you get I wasn't disappointed. Everything hasn't lined up perfectly, but it's been better than I anticipated. Anyway, here's pics of the process thus far.








So my plan for it? Honestly, I'm not yet sure. I'd really like to make it into some sort of vintage US truck. It shares remarkable similarities to a 1956 International so maybe I'll make it into one of those? Maybe I'll leave the body stock? Maybe I'll convert it to a 4x4?

And here's a couple pics to show the scale of the truck and chassis.