my son was frustrated with the remote control of his Dickie Toys Mega Crane: The up/down buttons got stuck all the time which almost resulted in permanent damage on the spool motor. So I bought a nice 4-way joystick and an up/down switch on amazon and built a new upper remote control case for it. It fits on the original lower part of the remote control, so we could keep the battery compartment.
joystick: https://www.amazon.de/-/en/dp/B0BJ1LGL8C
up/down key: https://www.amazon.de/-/en/dp/B0C9KYTHQR
NOTE: the up/down key has a backlight, which i had to remove otherwise it will drain the crane's batteries. to remove the LED, you can pray out the rocker button from the top, then cut out the LED and put the rocker back in place.
you will also need two 3x20 wood screws with countersunk heads for the cable clamp.
last but not least you will need a soldering iron and a little bit of extra wire to solder in between the switches basically to replace the original pcb.
PS: to open up the original remote, i had to cut away the two 2-way joystick knobs. there is a screw in there holding the top to the shaft, but i have no clue how to access them. so once you do that, you are committed :)
The author marked this model as their own original creation.