Next came upholstery (thanks to a Steve Shaw and Chet Yashuk referral), and a whole bunch of work to move the steering to behind the front axle. And 4”/5” Tri Stars.
I thought the "rear steer" conversion came out quite nicely, and almost looks "factory". The spindles are original, as is all the steering hardware except where we get to the steering shaft. The "ackerman" plate was of my fabrication, and the mounting was a tricky bit of work for the Azusa steering shaft and hardware. By dropping the floor pan in the front porch, and undoing the (low-height aircraft "AN" shear castle) nut at the bottom of the shaft and removing the steering wheel hub at the top, the steering shaft can be removed from the chassis. As I'm sure you'll all realize, most of the early karts had all this welded, so that disassembly was not possible.
Here it is as it appeared at the Turkey Trot at Dixon, CA, in November of 2015 as a roller with no brakes, no throttle linkage and no drive stuff at all......
I thought the "rear steer" conversion came out quite nicely, and almost looks "factory". The spindles are original, as is all the steering hardware except where we get to the steering shaft. The "ackerman" plate was of my fabrication, and the mounting was a tricky bit of work for the Azusa steering shaft and hardware. By dropping the floor pan in the front porch, and undoing the (low-height aircraft "AN" shear castle) nut at the bottom of the shaft and removing the steering wheel hub at the top, the steering shaft can be removed from the chassis. As I'm sure you'll all realize, most of the early karts had all this welded, so that disassembly was not possible.
Here it is as it appeared at the Turkey Trot at Dixon, CA, in November of 2015 as a roller with no brakes, no throttle linkage and no drive stuff at all......
Jim Waltz, West Sacramento, CA