How To Build A Go Kart: A Crash Course In One Day...
What a bright day it was! The sun was shining, the air was fresh crisp and clean. We had the unfinished subdivision to ourselves. Miles of open road, and we loved every minute of it.
I was riding my modified go kart with high-flow-induction system and my friend was riding his Sears special.
It was a flat, no frills go-kart with a 5 horsepower engine. The go kart flew.
We were safe drivers and frequently checked over our shoulders for anything that was suspicious, bunny rabbits, cats, cougars, bears whatever. You never know in the middle of the Chicago Suburbs...
I Never Was So Scared And Shaking...
My friend looked over his shoulder to see where I was and that is when it happened. I never saw anything so surreal in my life, and I never was so scared and shaking than at that moment...
I was resolved after that day to do something about what happened.
My go kart underwent transformation after transformation until I got it right.
I went to engineering school (Milwaukee School Of Engineering) and used my skills to design go karts that would never let what I saw happen again.
Just what did I see?
What could possibly ruin such a fun day as that?
Not knowing How to Build A Go Kart is what.
The Go Kart I was following was fast and quick that is for sure, but it was not stable.
The question should be:
"Why?"
The answer lies in the resolutions, the discoveries that the How To Build A Go Kart series reveal.
Step by step instructions on How To Build A Go Kart.
I was resolved to help people design, and build go karts that looked cool, were safe, and did everything a go kart was supposed to do: put a smile on your face and corner like a Porche!
Building a Go Kart really involves around 10 different things.
So I put together 10 different courses.
-Saving Yourself Headaches (Big ones that cost you years)
-Building a Go Kart For $200 (Don't spend an arm and a leg on a cart!)
-Drive Train Layout (Rock solid drive systems that endure abuse)
-From LawnMower to Go Kart (Vertical engine systems)
-Frame Design: (That horrid day, I never want to see again!)
-Control Systems (Throttles, Brakes, Shut Offs, Instrumentation)
-Go Kart Fabrication (Major low cost time savers and techniques)
-Steering Design (Proper design for stability, and control)
-Safety Equipment (It was an awful day, but ended well)
-Seat Design (Comfort, control, cost is what it is cracked up to be)
-The Hot Set Ups (The cool items that make a gokart a looker)
-Always More Power (The $50 secret to more power)
So what happened that day?
My friend looked over his shoulder to see where I was, and inadvertantly turned the wheel too.
The turn was so sudden, the center of gravity too high, the speed too great to stop what happened next.
The front wheel grabbed, and the go kart did an end over end flip.
It looked like a Nascar or Indy car wipe out.
The go kart flinging high into the air, dust and debree being thrown, my friend being caught helpless in the tangling, flipping, rotating motion of the go kart.
It was surreal. Had it not been for his helmet, he would have been majorly hurting. But the helmet saved him.
He never rode the gokart again, he was scared of it. I would be too.
I knew why, and I know why today.
My resolve from that day forward was to never let that ever happen again.
A miss-designed go kart can scare you into that mindset.
The How To Build A Go Kart series is not some hodge-podge put together.
It is a series of courses (that will someday become a book) that review all the things you need to know about building a go kart.
From welding, fabricating and frame design. To safety and all the info you need to know about building, riding and fabricating a go kart.
GoKartGuru.com
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