01-16-2022, 06:39 PM
(This post was last modified: 01-16-2022, 06:56 PM by Terry Bentley.)
Chapter 93
As the awards ceremony was taking place, I helped Paul with handing out the trophies. After the presentation was finished, the remaining time was spent going around checking over every one of the karts that were still in the pits. I wanted to look at all of them and get an idea of what was running out here. Also to check out how other kart frames were built.
What I found odd is seeing all of these karts on the grid earlier. But that is all I did, was see them. There was no time I could stop and take a good look at any of the karts. That would have been too much distraction for the reason I was out here tonight.
I wanted to make sure Chris had everything perfect on his kart when we got finished with the conversion. So far there was nothing out of the ordinary to look at tonight. Most of the karts were older models compared to what I had seen at our first race and the first time I came out here last spring.
There were a few obviously home made karts running to night. These all had dead axles and looked like a hardware store raid on parts. Two of them didnt even make it to the third heat. The other one did finish all three heats, but was in no hurry to take the checkered flag.in any of those heat races.
With all of the focus on pretending to be a grid steward, never gave me the chance to watch any of the races. I got plenty of glances of karts as they zoomed by the track entrance, but had no idea of who won or what took place from lap to lap.
The only part of every race I did see was the start. Paul did a great job starting most of the classes. Some of the drivers never seemed to line up for a decent start, so he ended up waving the green flag anyway.
There was no complaints from any of the drivers after the races either. This is a lot different than the time me and Steve raced here. I guess it all depends on who runs the race for it to be a good night or not.
It was late and Paul was closing up the track for the night. Practice went one for an hour or so, before he turned off the lights. I looked around and noticed Chris was nowhere to be seen.
I had been preoccupied after the races were finished to check out as many of the karts that were still out here. The whole time I didnt remember seeing Chris around anywhere. Finally I followed Paul back to his work truck. It was a International Travelall. In the back seat I found Chris curled up sound asleep.
Paul dropped me off at home and I thanked him for the invite to the track. Chris was still asleep when they drove off. It was now way past midnight. No sooner than I sat down on my bed it seemed the sun was blaring in my eyes. It was already Sunday morning. I dont remember even getting ready for bed.
I was still dressed from last night just laying on top of my bed. Man what a night. That was a lot more work that I thought it would be. Running the races is not at all like I thought it might have been either. It is actually like having a real job. Bleh!
Another odd thing is I am up early on a Sunday morning. I was excused from church this morning since being out so late last night working at the track. But I didnt expect to get up this early. Especially since I did get up so early yesterday.
Out in the garage, I went over everything we did so far on the Simplex. Right now there were no surprises. Since we are far enough along, now just waiting on parts, I thought about yanking the axle off my kart and use it to set up the Simplex for a trial fit.
If everything works as planned, go ahead and weld those bearing hangers on for good. Or at least tack them in place. So all that was needed to take my axle off is remove the four bolts holding the bearings. It was not a big deal and didnt even take much time to get this done.
After prefitting everything together, measuring a dozen times, I decided to go ahead and tack weld the Dart copied bearing hangers to the Simplex frame. These worked perfectly like Steve had thought they might. They put the axle at the right height keeping the frame level.
The only thing critical here, besides the wheelbase measurement, is getting the left bearing hanger square to the axle. I figured out a simple way by using a larger piece of tubing bolted between two axle bearings. This worked out perfect.
The original brake linkage was way too short since it actuated a piece of tubing that went across to the other side of frame. So I ended up cutting another piece of rod, then threaded both ends to the 1/4-28 size for the clevice to screw on. One thing less to worry about now the Bendix brake will bolt up just fine.
I didnt even think about letting Chris cut and thread the linkage. I bet he would have liked to do that. But there are a lot of small jobs that end up taking way too much time just so he can learn how to do the work. That can make this job take forever and might not get finished quick enough like we are hoping for.
The next thing was to make the short arm for the steering shaft. Azusa steering kits have two small arms, exactly the same like used on the Go-Kart 800. But I decided to make a single arm slightly thicker and longer that will be welded to end of the shaft. This way everything lines back up close to the way it was originally. So there would be no surprises to hassle with later.
When I stuck a 5/8 inch piece of round stock thru to check for fit, the first thing obvious now is the spindle arms were sitting up slightly higher since we put caster in the front axle. This put the tierods up higher too. Now they interfere with the brake and gas pedals.
I remember Chris complaining about having to reach for the pedals, since he is not so tall yet. There is some decent length in front of the seat. My legs just reach the pedals comfortably.
I always wondered, well since I have been more serious about racing, why some steering hoops are so wide. There are a lot of karts that have very narrow hoops like the Simplex Challenger. All on the Bug karts I saw in the magazines have a narrow steering hoop too. This way your legs dont have to wrap around it.
When Chris first told me his kart was a Simplex with a dead axle, I thought it must be the Challenger. But after arriving with his kart Friday afternoon, I realized it was not that model.
Chris went on to explain his dad had bought this kart from Simplex in New Orleans when driving thru on a business trip. It was not brand new and he thought it was a model that came out before the Challenger.
After looking it over, me and Steve did recognize most of the parts were what we thought to be Simplex, but could not make heads nor tales of what model it might be. The kart is very well made and should work great after we finish converting it over to a live axle.
My Cates kart has a sheetmetal steering upright. There is no problem at all with my legs reaching forward. On Franks Dart proto special wannabe, wish it was an Abone kart, it has the wide steering hoop. There is plenty of leg room on his kart, so much that I had to stretch my legs to get a good reach on those pedals.
I remember having some bruises on the insides of my legs after that practice day. I didnt give it much thought, since there were cuts scrapes and brusies all over me afterwards. Getting thrown over Franks kart in the pits was the pits and left most of the damage, so didnt think so much about it.
But those bruises were the same place my legs would have hit the wide hoop. Changing to a narrow hoop on the Simplex makes more sense. Maybe even do some alterations by moving the pedals back a little bit so Chris can reach them better.
The steering hoop on this Simplex model is wide, but not as bad like most others. I dont see a simple way of converting it to a narrow hoop. Moving the pedals farther back may be our best option.
The steering hoop on this frame does have a lot smaller radius bend than on most any of the other frames I have seen. I can think of McCullouch and Bonanza karts that have wide hoops, but using a smaller radius bend.
I am not positive but think both of these karts use two small bends close together than one large radius bend. Way too many details to worry about something that doesnt make any difference. Except they are different.
As the awards ceremony was taking place, I helped Paul with handing out the trophies. After the presentation was finished, the remaining time was spent going around checking over every one of the karts that were still in the pits. I wanted to look at all of them and get an idea of what was running out here. Also to check out how other kart frames were built.
What I found odd is seeing all of these karts on the grid earlier. But that is all I did, was see them. There was no time I could stop and take a good look at any of the karts. That would have been too much distraction for the reason I was out here tonight.
I wanted to make sure Chris had everything perfect on his kart when we got finished with the conversion. So far there was nothing out of the ordinary to look at tonight. Most of the karts were older models compared to what I had seen at our first race and the first time I came out here last spring.
There were a few obviously home made karts running to night. These all had dead axles and looked like a hardware store raid on parts. Two of them didnt even make it to the third heat. The other one did finish all three heats, but was in no hurry to take the checkered flag.in any of those heat races.
With all of the focus on pretending to be a grid steward, never gave me the chance to watch any of the races. I got plenty of glances of karts as they zoomed by the track entrance, but had no idea of who won or what took place from lap to lap.
The only part of every race I did see was the start. Paul did a great job starting most of the classes. Some of the drivers never seemed to line up for a decent start, so he ended up waving the green flag anyway.
There was no complaints from any of the drivers after the races either. This is a lot different than the time me and Steve raced here. I guess it all depends on who runs the race for it to be a good night or not.
It was late and Paul was closing up the track for the night. Practice went one for an hour or so, before he turned off the lights. I looked around and noticed Chris was nowhere to be seen.
I had been preoccupied after the races were finished to check out as many of the karts that were still out here. The whole time I didnt remember seeing Chris around anywhere. Finally I followed Paul back to his work truck. It was a International Travelall. In the back seat I found Chris curled up sound asleep.
Paul dropped me off at home and I thanked him for the invite to the track. Chris was still asleep when they drove off. It was now way past midnight. No sooner than I sat down on my bed it seemed the sun was blaring in my eyes. It was already Sunday morning. I dont remember even getting ready for bed.
I was still dressed from last night just laying on top of my bed. Man what a night. That was a lot more work that I thought it would be. Running the races is not at all like I thought it might have been either. It is actually like having a real job. Bleh!
Another odd thing is I am up early on a Sunday morning. I was excused from church this morning since being out so late last night working at the track. But I didnt expect to get up this early. Especially since I did get up so early yesterday.
Out in the garage, I went over everything we did so far on the Simplex. Right now there were no surprises. Since we are far enough along, now just waiting on parts, I thought about yanking the axle off my kart and use it to set up the Simplex for a trial fit.
If everything works as planned, go ahead and weld those bearing hangers on for good. Or at least tack them in place. So all that was needed to take my axle off is remove the four bolts holding the bearings. It was not a big deal and didnt even take much time to get this done.
After prefitting everything together, measuring a dozen times, I decided to go ahead and tack weld the Dart copied bearing hangers to the Simplex frame. These worked perfectly like Steve had thought they might. They put the axle at the right height keeping the frame level.
The only thing critical here, besides the wheelbase measurement, is getting the left bearing hanger square to the axle. I figured out a simple way by using a larger piece of tubing bolted between two axle bearings. This worked out perfect.
The original brake linkage was way too short since it actuated a piece of tubing that went across to the other side of frame. So I ended up cutting another piece of rod, then threaded both ends to the 1/4-28 size for the clevice to screw on. One thing less to worry about now the Bendix brake will bolt up just fine.
I didnt even think about letting Chris cut and thread the linkage. I bet he would have liked to do that. But there are a lot of small jobs that end up taking way too much time just so he can learn how to do the work. That can make this job take forever and might not get finished quick enough like we are hoping for.
The next thing was to make the short arm for the steering shaft. Azusa steering kits have two small arms, exactly the same like used on the Go-Kart 800. But I decided to make a single arm slightly thicker and longer that will be welded to end of the shaft. This way everything lines back up close to the way it was originally. So there would be no surprises to hassle with later.
When I stuck a 5/8 inch piece of round stock thru to check for fit, the first thing obvious now is the spindle arms were sitting up slightly higher since we put caster in the front axle. This put the tierods up higher too. Now they interfere with the brake and gas pedals.
I remember Chris complaining about having to reach for the pedals, since he is not so tall yet. There is some decent length in front of the seat. My legs just reach the pedals comfortably.
I always wondered, well since I have been more serious about racing, why some steering hoops are so wide. There are a lot of karts that have very narrow hoops like the Simplex Challenger. All on the Bug karts I saw in the magazines have a narrow steering hoop too. This way your legs dont have to wrap around it.
When Chris first told me his kart was a Simplex with a dead axle, I thought it must be the Challenger. But after arriving with his kart Friday afternoon, I realized it was not that model.
Chris went on to explain his dad had bought this kart from Simplex in New Orleans when driving thru on a business trip. It was not brand new and he thought it was a model that came out before the Challenger.
After looking it over, me and Steve did recognize most of the parts were what we thought to be Simplex, but could not make heads nor tales of what model it might be. The kart is very well made and should work great after we finish converting it over to a live axle.
My Cates kart has a sheetmetal steering upright. There is no problem at all with my legs reaching forward. On Franks Dart proto special wannabe, wish it was an Abone kart, it has the wide steering hoop. There is plenty of leg room on his kart, so much that I had to stretch my legs to get a good reach on those pedals.
I remember having some bruises on the insides of my legs after that practice day. I didnt give it much thought, since there were cuts scrapes and brusies all over me afterwards. Getting thrown over Franks kart in the pits was the pits and left most of the damage, so didnt think so much about it.
But those bruises were the same place my legs would have hit the wide hoop. Changing to a narrow hoop on the Simplex makes more sense. Maybe even do some alterations by moving the pedals back a little bit so Chris can reach them better.
The steering hoop on this Simplex model is wide, but not as bad like most others. I dont see a simple way of converting it to a narrow hoop. Moving the pedals farther back may be our best option.
The steering hoop on this frame does have a lot smaller radius bend than on most any of the other frames I have seen. I can think of McCullouch and Bonanza karts that have wide hoops, but using a smaller radius bend.
I am not positive but think both of these karts use two small bends close together than one large radius bend. Way too many details to worry about something that doesnt make any difference. Except they are different.