Wheels
I did my first mod to increase the speed on one car and followed the directions from the main part of the site.
I took the wheels off of a FTE Fast Fish and added them along with weight to 2008 Dodge Challenger. I noticed that the wheels from the Charger are too narrow for the Fast Fish body and the wheels seem to be too wide for the Charger as there is too much side to side play and it slows it down---but it is still faster.
I assume there is no way to fix this except find wheels that are also the same size both in length and circumfrance? If so, is there an easy way to figure out which wheels will work before you tear apart a car---is it just eyeballing it?
Thanks.
Discussion
I too am buying cars just for the wheels/axles sometimes!
You have to find another car with the same distance between the wheels so they will fit without modifying the axles.
It's not too hard, they are pretty close on most of the cars.
I need to get back to work on a few project cars and get back to racing!
Large FTE rears won't work on a Gravitywerx car. I attempted to swap the wheels/axles from an FTE Fast Fish that did not perform well on my track (crashing) to a nineties Racing Champions Lumina with wasted wheels. The fronts fit fine but the large rears rubbed no matter how much I shaved the fender wells. They were filed up into the trunk. They also would have raised the center of gravity which is death to a Gravitywerx car. I might end up with several sets of unused rears if anyone wants them. George
Dealing with axles has always been a problem for me. I have yet to find an easy way to cut long axles and have them work, and vice versa. I would just say experiment and see what you get. I think a few guys around here have suggested using metal tubing to make short axles into long axles.
The size of the wheels themselves is a little easier. If you're not concern with what wheel design your car has (spokes), the you can pretty much just eyeball the wheels. There's only a few different sizes in normal mainline models. But if you have some wheels and find they're too big for the body you have, grinding out the wheel wells to make room is pretty easy. That's what I had to do with the modded Mustang.
If you ask me, modifying your car body and/or chassis is a lot easier than trying to mod the actual wheels and axles.
Oh, and welcome to world of modding Hot Wheels. You'll quickly find you that you'll start shopping for cars in terms of the parts they offer and less about collecting them. And I've pretty much made policy for myself that if I see an FTE on the pegs I grab it even if for nothing more than parting out the wheels.
I might also suggest to take photos while you're customizing and stuff. Not only would all of us here like to see your work, I can tell you from my experience that looking back on the in-progress photos is a lot of fun once you end up with a final mod.