I've received some more ideas from folks and am now starting out with a Hall Effect Sensor, specifically used to count gear teeth - ordered it today. I plan to disconnect the throttle linkage tomorrow and get a feel for both the force required and also confirm the full travel distance needed to manage the RPM's. I agree that hobby level servo not good. I am looking at better servos that can take the abuse. One recommendation was Savox, which looks pretty durable. Thanks for the input and I'm looking forward to giving this a try!