At AtomicMods.com, we are always looking to push the envelope and see how we can improve our cars. Everybody knows XMODs are great fun and a blast to upgrade, but they do lack a little bit in the electronics department. This is most apparent in the remote that comes with the car. But what would happen if you could upgrade the electronics and run a high grade remote such as the KO Propo Helios? Would the performance of your XMOD increase? Would it be faster, more controllable? Would it keep up around a track with say, a Mini-Z?

To answer these questions, we embarked on the journey to retro-fit Mini-Z electronics on an XMOD Evo. What were the results you ask? MUCH IMPROVED control over steering and throttle, better range, and (obviously) MUCH FASTER lap times.

The following tutorial teaches you how to do your own Mini-Z electronic conversion to your XMOD, or as we call it...Project X-Z.

• XMOD Evo
• Kyosho Mini-Z MR02/015 Stock R/C Unit MainBoard Servo
• Solder
• Soldering Iron
• Side Cut Nippers
• Phillips Screwdriver

First, start by removing the motor wire and motor hold down screws.

Pull the motor out of the mount and set it aside. You won't need it until the project is done.

Move to the screws on the top deck, we will need to remove the top deck in order to reach the original factory board.

Pull the top deck off and this is what you should see.

We are now going to start removing the wires to the main board. First to go are the power wires. Remember to do both positive and negative wires.

Now remove the servo motor wires. These are located on the left side of the car, there are two of them, a black one and a white one.

Next remove your potentiometer wires from the board. These are the three wires directly behind the left front tire.

Once you have unsoldered all the wires, you can remove the screw holding down the board and pull it out. The picture on the left shows what you should be left with.

Now turn your attention to your Mini-Z board. The first thing to do is unsolder the servo motor from the steering FETs towards the front of the Mini-Z board.

Once done, unsolder the wires from the servo motor as well. We will use these to wire up the Mini-Z board to the XMOD potentiometer.

This is the secret to making it work! You must wire the brown/orange wire together with the black wire coming from the XMOD potentiometer to the red wire we got from the Mini-Z servo motor.

In the case of the white wire coming from the XMOD potentiometer, solder it directly to the black wire we got from the Mini-Z servo motor.

Slide some shrink tubing over your new potentiometer wire connections.

Shrink it! In this case we are using a Solderpro 100 butane soldering iron with a heat shrinking attachment tip.

Back to the Mini-Z board! This time remove the power wires, these are located towards the motor connections on the back of the Mini-Z board.

The orange and green wires found towards the front of the Mini-Z board are the potentiometer wires. Remove these, you will not be needing them later.

Installation begins! Where you removed the green and orange wires, solder the new wires coming from your XMOD's potentiometer. The red wire will go where the orange used to be and the black where the green was.

Take the power wires coming from the battery box and solder them to the power inputs on the Mini-Z board. Red to the inside, black to the outside.

Use one of the screws from the top deck to secure your Mini-Z board onto the chassis. It almost seems like it was manufactured to fit this way!

Solder the servo motor wires onto your steering FETs. Attach the white wire on the inside FET and the black one on the outside FET.

Screw in your antenna in the same hole it was previously. You might need to cut the original screw a bit or use a shorter machine screw here.

Re-install the motor.

Solder the red motor wire on the motor output towards the front of the car and the black wire to the one towards the rear of the car.

Be patient! We are almost there. Take the longer screws left over from the original top deck and secure the front end with them. If you don't do this, your car will flex too much and it won't handle consistently.

Lastly, secure the power switch. The location on the left is our personal favorite. Use some double sided super stick tape to hold it down.

Done! Looks clean doesn't it? It drives even better.

Trust us, this may be the single best upgrade you can do to to your XMOD. Try it out and you won't be disappointed.

Written by Cristian Tabush
Edited by John Shanklin