The Radio Shack Wild Horse, also sold as the Nikko Crazy Horse, is a huge 1/12 scale (sometimes quoted as 1/10 scale) 4x4 radio controlled truck manufactured in Japan on behalf of Radio Shack for sale within Radio Shack and Tandy stores worldwide from 1989.
Is it a Taiyo Road King 4x4 in Disguise? No, wait, it's a Nikko!
There are many similar looking trucks from this era, and the Wild Horse / Wild Pony range between Radio Shack and Nikko are especially confusing. Although at first glance they may look similar to the 1990 Taiyo Road King 4x4, Mad Rat, Sound Racer, or 1990 Tyco Big Rig trucks, upon closer inspection it becomes becomes immediately obvious these are entirely different.
Also known as...
I've documented hundreds of R/C cars of many brands, and while it's common to market the same product under different names in different regions, I've never come across one that's quite as confusing as this truck. Known as the Radio Shack Wild Horse but manufactured by Nikko, yet Nikko also has a Nikko Wild Horse which looks strikingly similar in photos but is quite different, and is also sold as the Radio Shack Wild Pony. Got it? Yeah...
It's known as:
- Radio Shack Wild Horse
- Nikko Crazy Horse 4WD
- Nikko Mustang (Germany)
Then to add to the conversion there's the Nikko Wild Horse, which may look similar at first, but is actually much smaller, and also sold as the Radio Shack Wild Pony.
Got it? Me neither. The cool thing about the smaller Nikko Wild Pony is that has onboard engine noises, it actually makes use of the speaker grille we see on all these 'Wild' Equine models.
Features and Performance
With a Mabuchi 380 motor and 7.2V 'Hobby Grade' battery pack (plus 9V onboard the car for radio, plus another in the transmitter), the Wild Horse should have plenty of guts, though as I don't own one myself it's difficult to assess directly - so we must rely on the many videos and commentaries available for this car.
And the verdict is? Well, you can see from the video below that it's quick enough on a flat surface, but once it's put on rough or hilly terrain you can start to hear it struggle. This is common with early-mid 80s R/C truck designs, which I suspect this may have originally been based on.
Of course the Wild Horse is also a bit of a show pony - just look at all that bling! And is that a speaker grille at the back?
Sound effects and a speaker or controls at the rear of short 4WD trucks like this were a common design in the late 80s to early 90s. For example, below we have the Taiyo Mad Rat and the Road King which both have a speaker at the rear. Yet there is no speaker on the Wild Horse despite there being an obvious placement for it. Why is that?
No doubt there is another Nikko model using this same body which does include a speaker and sound effect perhaps, and for whatever reason the folk at Radio Shack simply deemed it unnecessary for their home version.
Collectability and Availability
The Radio Shack Wild Horse is still widely available online in various conditions, mostly standalone, with two for sale on eBay USA at the time of writing this article. So if you want one, go and get one!
Personally I could not believe the prices these were going for - far lower than what I expected, similar to how Tyco / Taiyo were priced before the 2020s. Will these Radio Shacks boom in the same way? No idea, maybe.
Is it worth collecting? Based on the responses I saw in our Facebook Group when this car was posted, I suspect there are a few Wild Horse fans out there who owned this car as a child, and would love to get their hands on it again. So yes, I personally think it's a worthy addition to a Radio Shack collection, an 80s/90s Toy R/C collector such as myself, or for someone who owned one in their younger years.
