02-15-2022, 07:52 AM
I won three Brevard County A Super championships in three years, first on Bug Wasps, lastly on the Go kart 1200 all using aluminum axles. When I put one in the GK 800 B Super, I realized it did not work well on a dual. The Brevard County guys were mostly Cape Canaveral space center folk, plus the crowd from the Orlando area and from Miami, so they were not dummies. I admit that I weighed 125 pounds back then, but the single engine kart worked fine. I had the 7075 axle in my current n1ke repop kart with the modified West bend on board. I didn't switch out until I added the center mounted Dyna Drive gearbox. The extra weight directly between the wide-spaced axle bearings told me to go with a steel axle. I no longer weigh 125, and our Tucson track is much longer than the old Rockledge, FL track was, but the 7075 axle worked very well in both instances. On the dual open Mc30,and on the triple GK 1200 (two modified Mc6's with a radical stroker Mc10 in the middle), I used a Reed Eng. tubular 4130 axle. It was the best of both worlds, but I haven't seen one in fifty years. It isn't the rotating mass in this case, the small radius of the axle means the weight doesn't matter, but the 5 or 6 pound overall weight drop means more acceleration. I was running B/C open against Dick Wyatt. He weighed about the same as me, and he had a new Lancer with dual Dick Collier (S&S Oil) 820's on board. Collier's 820's were modified very similar to the manner of Dave Bonbright's 820's, and they were FAST. I wanted every trick I could use to run with Dick W. Whoever drew the front position in our races was always the winner. I could not pass him, he could not pass me. We sure had fun, though, even though he was the better driver. The GK 1200 outhandled the Lancer, and that helped. Ted