Help for Treadwell base

[Bobby Bourgoin]

Greetings;
I want to build a treadwell (apx 3/4 or 2/3 scale) with a base of apx 24"x 20-24".
Besides building everything from scratch, anyone have ideas on something I could use as a base.
I found the Agent 390 Tracked Robot Kit (w/ Motors) on Roborshop for a really good price (+/-500 can$) but it's only 18x16. I asked Robotshop if it was available or if I was able to build it bigger and they said; No it would put to much strain on the componants...
I also found the Dr. Robot Jaguar Lite Tracked Mobile Platform that is the right size, but at 10k can$ it's WAY over my means...
There is the WT-500 Tracked Robot Platform, but only 12" or so wide, and at close to 2000$ it's stretching my budget....

Any help / ideas would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks

[kresty]

Unless you wanted the robotics stuff I'd say even the smaller one seems pricy. Lots of people have scratch built the wood bottom, which isn't gonna cost much. A scooter motor or two could drive it. The belts/tracks would be the tricky bit of that, but it seems like you could get a moving base for only a little bit.

Savage may have a lot of ideas, he makes schoolkids build robots for competition