02-05-2023, 03:59 PM
(This post was last modified: 03-05-2023, 04:44 AM by Terry Bentley.)
Chapter 126
It is now Tuesday and I am going totally crazy. Homework had kept me from doing much of anything last week. This afternoon, I just got home and thought about going and checking up on Frank. I should really stick around here and make some headway on our engines, but....
If Franks kart is not ready to go, then we dont have anyone watching over us when going to the track just soon as a Friday off day happens. There is a teachers meeting coming up in a few days, so I need to get busy just in case this one works out for us.
It is late enough that Frank should be home already. No sooner as I approach on my bike, there he is wacking away on his kart with a big hammer. I ride on up and just stand there watching as he keeps pounding on his frame.
What the heck are you doing there Frank? He was so wrapped up in his precision handy work and with all that noise from the beating, I must have caught him off guard. He just about fell over spinning around so fast. Then I heard the beer bottle crash and explode on the garage floor.
HOLY CRAP! WHO THE WHAT? Frank grabbed something that stopped him from spinning any farther and then zeroed in on me standing right outside of his garage door. He has the hammer raised up in attack mode. Dont do that again. I lost a few years of my life from you intentionally spooking me like that just now.
Do what Frank? I just let you know I was here so you wouldnt get startled like that one time a while back. You almost karate chopped me in two pieces if I remember right. Good thing for your super fast reflexes or I might have ended up with a split personality. Then be stuck in the hospital getting both halves stitched back together. I hear that only people holding in some serious guilt about something usually jump like you did when not paying attention to their surroundings.
Did you get any work done on your kart? Or just mad about something and taking it out on your frame?
I was actually working on my kart before you interrupted my progress. I was just finishing up stress relieving the newly welded in frame sections. I was totally immersed in my work when you strutted yourself in here unannounced. Now you can clean up the mess you caused me.
OK Frank, fair enough. I startled your in depth work causing you to drop the beer bottle while beating up your frame with a hammer. I will clean the mess on your floor. That is the least I can do to help out after being so inconsiderate and not realizing you have a guilty conscience.
I thought humoring Frank for now was not a bad idea. I dont know what the heck he is rambling on with stress relieving his frame is all about. I think it is more likely stress relieving himself beating something down with a hammer.
After doing a clean sweep and throwing away the broken glass, I snagged Frank another beer from the fridge. He grabbed it without any acknowledgement taking a swig, then realized the cap had not yet been removed when banging up against his teeth. Handing it right back to me then on to hammering out his frame. I stood over next to him while he was slamming away.
After checking his frame over, I see he has already managed to cut it down and weld everything back almost the way we had gone over during my last visit. I know Frank does not have a welder, but someone has done the work and welded the modified and new parts in place.
Time for a break. So why are you here bothering me today? I am trying to get my kart back together but hard to do with your distraction and interruptions. I stood there holding out his open beer bottle looking offended as possible.
Gee Frank, you make me feel so unwanted. I am hurt. You remember I mentioned about stopping back over sometime this week, if there was a chance. Just wanting to see if you got things done. I see you have been busy. But if I am in the way, just tell me to get lost.
But before you throw me out, can I ask why you are beating up the frame?
I am not throwing you out. But you interrupted my work. I am stress relieving the newly welded joints. This makes sure the frame will be settled down without all of the problems I had earlier when the kart went pure evil and didnt handle for a while.
I need to tap each welded area in the rear approximately 3347 times according to my calculations so it will take the stress out of the welded unions. I crunched the numbers and realized how simple it would be not having to run in the frame before it can be set up to handle properly.
The other areas dont need to be focused on so intently, since they are not as robust. Those wont take nearly as long. I even factored in the indirect stress relieving for the other areas will suffice enough.
You know Frank, I was just thinking something. It might not be possible for me to get a good college education like yours. You see, my brother is currently in college burning up all of the money my parents have managed to put aside to send us on to a continuing education. So if I am lucky, maybe they wont have any left when I am old enough to go.
The whole time I was talking to Frank, he was just tapping away on the new welds at the back of his kart frame while counting to himself.
You are a right lucky kid. Getting that education will be the best money ever spent. You are fortunate your parents can afford to pay for it. There are so many people not able to do so. Mark my words. Some day you will thank me for encouraging you to take that next step to utilizing your brain.
The more Frank makes a big deal about going to college, the more I am sure it isnt going to happen for me. If he is a shining example of the outcome, I will take my chances and rely on my lowly high school diploma when that time comes.
After standing here for a half hour, Frank finally finished beating up his frame. My ears were still ringing from the constant pinging and echoing inside his garage. I cant imagine his neighbors are very happy with him right now.
So Frank, I see you got everything welded together. Who did the work? Those welds on your bearing hangers sure are beefy compared to all of the other ones. But otherwise look really good.
Around those flat bearing hangers the weld was built up and filled in almost flush. More like what it would look like smearing clay all over the welds and then blending smooth in to the frame like one piece instead of two different parts welded together.
I had my welder at work do exactly as I instructed. He argued plenty trying to tell me it was not necessary to do it that way. But again, it didnt take me long to realize he was just a grunt that was lucky to finish high school. He could lay down some decent welds, but it was obvious to me he had no understanding at all of structural integrity relating to welded components.
I was specific about using short arc G-M-A-W with a CO2 shield. Frank actually spelled it out that way too. But once again the welder thinking I was an idiot and didnt know anything, he went into explaining to me that there was several types of welds for this application that would work fine. After complaining to his superior, he was more accommodating to my expectations of his work.
My work at Texas Instruments is all inclusive to different types of construction and fabrication techniques. Just because I dont do much welding myself, doesnt mean I am going to just rely on his recommendations for the work I was needing.
Gee Frank, that is cool. I didnt know big companies like that let employees do personal projects at work? Doesnt that get expensive for the company to do side jobs with no benefit for them?
Actually we do testing all the time like this. I mean a lot of it is on the down-low. Those bean counters try to mess with expenses on anything they can. If they only knew about how things are in the real world. I just have to be able to classify some of my personal work to a given project. How I achieve the needed information is up to me. The engineering I accomplished on this frame resulted is a lot of information for finalization on a current project.
This way I am applying the actual testing to real world application. No guessing or just crunching only the numbers. Real world test results is what I now have that confirms all of my calculations. In the long run it can save the company thousands of dollars, if not more. Being able to have confirmed results before investing all of the capital based on just a set of complex equations. Proven results matter.
So why did you decide to fill in all of this around the frame where these bearing hangers are welded on? Wont it make that spot a lot more rigid than everything else around there? Gee Frank, there is no where else on your frame that has welds like this.
Guess I sure have a lot to learn about those kind of things. Maybe my brain is not big enough to learn so much of that engineering stuff. College seems like something that is getting farther and farther from ever happening the more I become aware of all these things.
Frank went on rambling about technical jargon that went so far over my head. I am not sure if he even believed what sounded like hogwash being spewed out to me. I might have to make a trip to the library just to confirm some of the things he was spouting off about.
Frank finally shut up, sat down and held his hammer hand in his lap. Then started complaining about how sore he was after all that work de-stressing his frame. His beer was gone in a few swallows, then motioning to me with a wilted flicker of his sore hand for another one.
I walked back from the fridge and told Frank to catch, while tossing his next beer in the air. With those lightning reflexes he has managed to snap the beer right out of mid-air. I was almost impressed.
Well Frank, your arms must just be allergic to working, because those super fast reflexes work fine. That was very talented how well you caught your beer. You must work out a lot.
Well kid, I did it so you wouldnt be cleaning up another mess. Then being responsible for the cost of two beers instead of just one. So be sure to leave the money on my desk before you head out of here in a few minutes.
So did you stop by to set up another practice day or to bore me to death? I am not too far away from having my kart set up more perfect than was the last trip out to the track. It should drive itself this time.
Gee Frank, I remember your kart did a pretty good job of driving itself the last time. Since you had no control over making it do anything you were wanting.
Frank gave me the usual reverse hand gesture he has been good flashing at me more and more in recent weeks. I guess he was too tired to blow in to his thumb and inflate that finger Frank likes to display too.
I walked over to his kart and studied it closely looking at all of the things that he actually changed. I see the wheelbase was shortened like we talked about. The pedal mounts were added, new bushings for his steering shaft, and the rear cross member almost looks factory installed.
The only thing I dont understand is how much the welds are filled in where bearing hangers are fitted. The one big surprise is noticing the front axle was also welded. What happened here, Frank? Whats the deal on your front axle?
Well, I talked to my favorite brother and he had talked to Mic about this very frame. I find out it was one of the earliest models with a live axle. This frame is one of the first built over the winter last year. Well actually getting closer to two years now.
After the initial frame design was tested in California at the Go-Kart Raceway, they had some serious suggestions for improvements. His next batch of frames were then tested locally in Ohio at the Dart Speedway and they broke all previous records due to those changes.
I got all of the newest specs, which are considered top secret. So no reason I could think of not to do a proper upgrade on my kart. Your suggestions were sub-standard and incomplete compared to the amount of work that went into this now fine racing machine.
I was adamant about these changes and my fabricator at work did exactly what I wanted. He knew his job would be on the line if deciding to take shortcuts or changes on his own. This chassis is better than the latest model Mic builds himself right now.
So you didnt actually do any of the work yourself I take it.
Yes kid, I did the hard part. I crunched all of the numbers and spent plenty of time calculating weight transfers, load factors, horsepower requirements, and other things you would not understand. So yes I did the major portion of work.
My fabricator just cut and welded what I had already worked out. I even had the drafting department draw up a blueprint. He had the easy job. Any useful idiot with a sixth grade education that can read a tape measure and use a file could do the hands on work. I did the hard part.
Without engineers, not much chance of things ever becoming a reality. There are just too many variables that are so more complex than most peoples brains can comprehend. Thats where I come in. That is how important I am in the scheme of things.
Wow Frank I had no idea that much work went into building a kart frame. I bet Duffy Livingston must me super smart. All this time I thought he ran a muffler shop. I would be lost trying to keep up with those guys talking about karts. Man do I have a lot to learn. My brain just isnt set up for that much knowledge.
It is a good thing my brother thinks he is so smart. Maybe I can learn just a little bit from him when he gets finished with his college. Of course he might be so smarted up by then I wont be able to understand anything he is talking about.
Oh well, guess I will just have to make do with what I have to work with. My brain already feels so overloaded, I dont know how much more will fit in there. Good thing you are so educated Frank. You can watch over me when at the track and racing. Make sure I dont do anything that might be dangerous and hurt me.
You know kid, sometimes I think you are mocking me, but what you are saying makes me think you are almost using your smarts. Maybe you are just too honest or naive for your own good.
Well Frank, glad to see you got someone else to build your kart. That might save me a lot of my time fixing it at the track next practice day. I let out a big laugh after saying this. Even tho being serious, I didnt think Frank would figure out that I was.
This Friday, I am off from school. But spending the whole day working on our karts. So dont know what will be happening this weekend. If your kart is ready, maybe I can be pit crew and you can make your first race this Saturday night. That would be so cool Frank. What do you think?
There is a possibility I could be ready for racing this weekend. I have more than enough track time. That track is not nearly difficult to drive as where I raced in Ohio. I can spend some time following one of the local fast guys in my class making sure the kart is perfect. Then show those guys what fast really is. Yea that is something I might be able to do.
Well I need to jet out of here Frank. Lots of things to do before this weekend. Chris is going to be helping out on Friday so we can hopefully get close to being all finished on our karts.
Who is Chris? Is he somebody I should know? I dont know anybody named Chris. Why do you keep mentioning him when I dont know that person.
Gee Frank, he came over here a while back with me. We copied your bearing hanger so I could make a pair for his kart. I already told you about that the last time over here.
Oh thats right, the kart you did all of those custom changes on without any forethought. Just chopping it up and changing it from the way it was originally designed. Like a Frankenkart. An impossible task if expecting that project to even having a remote chance of working out.
I am sure you spent a lot of time cutting and welding. Might have even gotten some limited experience. But without the correct calculations, is likely a complete waste of your time. I hope you dont expect too much out of your little failed endeavor. You should have checked with me before spending all of that energy going in circles.
Glad you have so much faith in me Frank. I will remember that. But right now, got to take leave. If possible will let you know what we do this weekend. Otherwise will check you later.
I headed back home on my trusty bike. It has been a good one. I found it thrown out and broken. Originally it was a three speed, but the hub was trashed. I swapped out to a single speed and no trouble since then. Schwinn sure makes good bikes. Of all the different brands I have ridden, nothing comes close to how this one rides.
After making it back home safely, Steve walked up. I still dont understand how he does that. Way too many times, he just shows up no sooner than I step off my bike.
Hey man, whats up? Any chance of things happening this weekend? I am clear and available. Dont have much time this evening, but lets doing something while I am here.
Sure Steve, we need to get the karts checked over so one less thing to bother with when the engines are put back together. I have everything just about ready to assemble them. I have about given up on all of the high tech ideas and just leaving them alone for the time being.
If we can get some track time soon then finally plan out next race day. Chris is supposed to come over Thursday night or Friday morning. Dont know which day yet.
So is motor mouth going to help out or hinder our progress?
No Steve, we got a lot done when he was here learning how to work on his kart. After you left we got a ton of work done. I was very impressed. He is going to keep busy with anything not too critical. All you need to do is help me keep an eye on whatever he works on to make sure it is done right. If you want him just to do grunt work helping out, he will be more than happy to do that.
OK, I will try to keep him busy. What can I do tonight to speed things up for Friday?
Great Steve, I need all of the pieces here washed up for the engines. Everything needs to be cleaned and wiped down. I have some more things to do on other parts before bolting them together.
After that you can look over things and figure out some linkage for the throttle like done on the first engine. All three manifolds are different, so one for each of them. On your engine make two just a like. I want to put the stock manifolds that were modified on our two engines.
Chris will be using his new Go-Power intake and four petal reed cage. I am not sure if that linkage will be the same as that modified one for the Palmini manifold. But that manifold is going of the backup engine. I want to find out if these old stock ones are going to work out. No reason they should run any different than either Go-Power or Palmini.
I dont know if there is enough time to get all four engines together, but is possible. My original engine is mostly complete anyway, so maybe I can make it happen.
Chris is going to change out my tires. So long as you keep tabs on him, I will stay totally focused on just the engines. I am hoping to have everything finished by Friday night. Then we can try planning what to do next.
For the rest of the evening, well while Steve was here, we didnt talk so much. Just kept pushing forward on the karts. By the time Steve had to go home, just about everything trivial was taken care of. It was up to me getting the engines finally assembled. I was thinking it was possible to do and might have spare time left over Friday.
It is now Tuesday and I am going totally crazy. Homework had kept me from doing much of anything last week. This afternoon, I just got home and thought about going and checking up on Frank. I should really stick around here and make some headway on our engines, but....
If Franks kart is not ready to go, then we dont have anyone watching over us when going to the track just soon as a Friday off day happens. There is a teachers meeting coming up in a few days, so I need to get busy just in case this one works out for us.
It is late enough that Frank should be home already. No sooner as I approach on my bike, there he is wacking away on his kart with a big hammer. I ride on up and just stand there watching as he keeps pounding on his frame.
What the heck are you doing there Frank? He was so wrapped up in his precision handy work and with all that noise from the beating, I must have caught him off guard. He just about fell over spinning around so fast. Then I heard the beer bottle crash and explode on the garage floor.
HOLY CRAP! WHO THE WHAT? Frank grabbed something that stopped him from spinning any farther and then zeroed in on me standing right outside of his garage door. He has the hammer raised up in attack mode. Dont do that again. I lost a few years of my life from you intentionally spooking me like that just now.
Do what Frank? I just let you know I was here so you wouldnt get startled like that one time a while back. You almost karate chopped me in two pieces if I remember right. Good thing for your super fast reflexes or I might have ended up with a split personality. Then be stuck in the hospital getting both halves stitched back together. I hear that only people holding in some serious guilt about something usually jump like you did when not paying attention to their surroundings.
Did you get any work done on your kart? Or just mad about something and taking it out on your frame?
I was actually working on my kart before you interrupted my progress. I was just finishing up stress relieving the newly welded in frame sections. I was totally immersed in my work when you strutted yourself in here unannounced. Now you can clean up the mess you caused me.
OK Frank, fair enough. I startled your in depth work causing you to drop the beer bottle while beating up your frame with a hammer. I will clean the mess on your floor. That is the least I can do to help out after being so inconsiderate and not realizing you have a guilty conscience.
I thought humoring Frank for now was not a bad idea. I dont know what the heck he is rambling on with stress relieving his frame is all about. I think it is more likely stress relieving himself beating something down with a hammer.
After doing a clean sweep and throwing away the broken glass, I snagged Frank another beer from the fridge. He grabbed it without any acknowledgement taking a swig, then realized the cap had not yet been removed when banging up against his teeth. Handing it right back to me then on to hammering out his frame. I stood over next to him while he was slamming away.
After checking his frame over, I see he has already managed to cut it down and weld everything back almost the way we had gone over during my last visit. I know Frank does not have a welder, but someone has done the work and welded the modified and new parts in place.
Time for a break. So why are you here bothering me today? I am trying to get my kart back together but hard to do with your distraction and interruptions. I stood there holding out his open beer bottle looking offended as possible.
Gee Frank, you make me feel so unwanted. I am hurt. You remember I mentioned about stopping back over sometime this week, if there was a chance. Just wanting to see if you got things done. I see you have been busy. But if I am in the way, just tell me to get lost.
But before you throw me out, can I ask why you are beating up the frame?
I am not throwing you out. But you interrupted my work. I am stress relieving the newly welded joints. This makes sure the frame will be settled down without all of the problems I had earlier when the kart went pure evil and didnt handle for a while.
I need to tap each welded area in the rear approximately 3347 times according to my calculations so it will take the stress out of the welded unions. I crunched the numbers and realized how simple it would be not having to run in the frame before it can be set up to handle properly.
The other areas dont need to be focused on so intently, since they are not as robust. Those wont take nearly as long. I even factored in the indirect stress relieving for the other areas will suffice enough.
You know Frank, I was just thinking something. It might not be possible for me to get a good college education like yours. You see, my brother is currently in college burning up all of the money my parents have managed to put aside to send us on to a continuing education. So if I am lucky, maybe they wont have any left when I am old enough to go.
The whole time I was talking to Frank, he was just tapping away on the new welds at the back of his kart frame while counting to himself.
You are a right lucky kid. Getting that education will be the best money ever spent. You are fortunate your parents can afford to pay for it. There are so many people not able to do so. Mark my words. Some day you will thank me for encouraging you to take that next step to utilizing your brain.
The more Frank makes a big deal about going to college, the more I am sure it isnt going to happen for me. If he is a shining example of the outcome, I will take my chances and rely on my lowly high school diploma when that time comes.
After standing here for a half hour, Frank finally finished beating up his frame. My ears were still ringing from the constant pinging and echoing inside his garage. I cant imagine his neighbors are very happy with him right now.
So Frank, I see you got everything welded together. Who did the work? Those welds on your bearing hangers sure are beefy compared to all of the other ones. But otherwise look really good.
Around those flat bearing hangers the weld was built up and filled in almost flush. More like what it would look like smearing clay all over the welds and then blending smooth in to the frame like one piece instead of two different parts welded together.
I had my welder at work do exactly as I instructed. He argued plenty trying to tell me it was not necessary to do it that way. But again, it didnt take me long to realize he was just a grunt that was lucky to finish high school. He could lay down some decent welds, but it was obvious to me he had no understanding at all of structural integrity relating to welded components.
I was specific about using short arc G-M-A-W with a CO2 shield. Frank actually spelled it out that way too. But once again the welder thinking I was an idiot and didnt know anything, he went into explaining to me that there was several types of welds for this application that would work fine. After complaining to his superior, he was more accommodating to my expectations of his work.
My work at Texas Instruments is all inclusive to different types of construction and fabrication techniques. Just because I dont do much welding myself, doesnt mean I am going to just rely on his recommendations for the work I was needing.
Gee Frank, that is cool. I didnt know big companies like that let employees do personal projects at work? Doesnt that get expensive for the company to do side jobs with no benefit for them?
Actually we do testing all the time like this. I mean a lot of it is on the down-low. Those bean counters try to mess with expenses on anything they can. If they only knew about how things are in the real world. I just have to be able to classify some of my personal work to a given project. How I achieve the needed information is up to me. The engineering I accomplished on this frame resulted is a lot of information for finalization on a current project.
This way I am applying the actual testing to real world application. No guessing or just crunching only the numbers. Real world test results is what I now have that confirms all of my calculations. In the long run it can save the company thousands of dollars, if not more. Being able to have confirmed results before investing all of the capital based on just a set of complex equations. Proven results matter.
So why did you decide to fill in all of this around the frame where these bearing hangers are welded on? Wont it make that spot a lot more rigid than everything else around there? Gee Frank, there is no where else on your frame that has welds like this.
Guess I sure have a lot to learn about those kind of things. Maybe my brain is not big enough to learn so much of that engineering stuff. College seems like something that is getting farther and farther from ever happening the more I become aware of all these things.
Frank went on rambling about technical jargon that went so far over my head. I am not sure if he even believed what sounded like hogwash being spewed out to me. I might have to make a trip to the library just to confirm some of the things he was spouting off about.
Frank finally shut up, sat down and held his hammer hand in his lap. Then started complaining about how sore he was after all that work de-stressing his frame. His beer was gone in a few swallows, then motioning to me with a wilted flicker of his sore hand for another one.
I walked back from the fridge and told Frank to catch, while tossing his next beer in the air. With those lightning reflexes he has managed to snap the beer right out of mid-air. I was almost impressed.
Well Frank, your arms must just be allergic to working, because those super fast reflexes work fine. That was very talented how well you caught your beer. You must work out a lot.
Well kid, I did it so you wouldnt be cleaning up another mess. Then being responsible for the cost of two beers instead of just one. So be sure to leave the money on my desk before you head out of here in a few minutes.
So did you stop by to set up another practice day or to bore me to death? I am not too far away from having my kart set up more perfect than was the last trip out to the track. It should drive itself this time.
Gee Frank, I remember your kart did a pretty good job of driving itself the last time. Since you had no control over making it do anything you were wanting.
Frank gave me the usual reverse hand gesture he has been good flashing at me more and more in recent weeks. I guess he was too tired to blow in to his thumb and inflate that finger Frank likes to display too.
I walked over to his kart and studied it closely looking at all of the things that he actually changed. I see the wheelbase was shortened like we talked about. The pedal mounts were added, new bushings for his steering shaft, and the rear cross member almost looks factory installed.
The only thing I dont understand is how much the welds are filled in where bearing hangers are fitted. The one big surprise is noticing the front axle was also welded. What happened here, Frank? Whats the deal on your front axle?
Well, I talked to my favorite brother and he had talked to Mic about this very frame. I find out it was one of the earliest models with a live axle. This frame is one of the first built over the winter last year. Well actually getting closer to two years now.
After the initial frame design was tested in California at the Go-Kart Raceway, they had some serious suggestions for improvements. His next batch of frames were then tested locally in Ohio at the Dart Speedway and they broke all previous records due to those changes.
I got all of the newest specs, which are considered top secret. So no reason I could think of not to do a proper upgrade on my kart. Your suggestions were sub-standard and incomplete compared to the amount of work that went into this now fine racing machine.
I was adamant about these changes and my fabricator at work did exactly what I wanted. He knew his job would be on the line if deciding to take shortcuts or changes on his own. This chassis is better than the latest model Mic builds himself right now.
So you didnt actually do any of the work yourself I take it.
Yes kid, I did the hard part. I crunched all of the numbers and spent plenty of time calculating weight transfers, load factors, horsepower requirements, and other things you would not understand. So yes I did the major portion of work.
My fabricator just cut and welded what I had already worked out. I even had the drafting department draw up a blueprint. He had the easy job. Any useful idiot with a sixth grade education that can read a tape measure and use a file could do the hands on work. I did the hard part.
Without engineers, not much chance of things ever becoming a reality. There are just too many variables that are so more complex than most peoples brains can comprehend. Thats where I come in. That is how important I am in the scheme of things.
Wow Frank I had no idea that much work went into building a kart frame. I bet Duffy Livingston must me super smart. All this time I thought he ran a muffler shop. I would be lost trying to keep up with those guys talking about karts. Man do I have a lot to learn. My brain just isnt set up for that much knowledge.
It is a good thing my brother thinks he is so smart. Maybe I can learn just a little bit from him when he gets finished with his college. Of course he might be so smarted up by then I wont be able to understand anything he is talking about.
Oh well, guess I will just have to make do with what I have to work with. My brain already feels so overloaded, I dont know how much more will fit in there. Good thing you are so educated Frank. You can watch over me when at the track and racing. Make sure I dont do anything that might be dangerous and hurt me.
You know kid, sometimes I think you are mocking me, but what you are saying makes me think you are almost using your smarts. Maybe you are just too honest or naive for your own good.
Well Frank, glad to see you got someone else to build your kart. That might save me a lot of my time fixing it at the track next practice day. I let out a big laugh after saying this. Even tho being serious, I didnt think Frank would figure out that I was.
This Friday, I am off from school. But spending the whole day working on our karts. So dont know what will be happening this weekend. If your kart is ready, maybe I can be pit crew and you can make your first race this Saturday night. That would be so cool Frank. What do you think?
There is a possibility I could be ready for racing this weekend. I have more than enough track time. That track is not nearly difficult to drive as where I raced in Ohio. I can spend some time following one of the local fast guys in my class making sure the kart is perfect. Then show those guys what fast really is. Yea that is something I might be able to do.
Well I need to jet out of here Frank. Lots of things to do before this weekend. Chris is going to be helping out on Friday so we can hopefully get close to being all finished on our karts.
Who is Chris? Is he somebody I should know? I dont know anybody named Chris. Why do you keep mentioning him when I dont know that person.
Gee Frank, he came over here a while back with me. We copied your bearing hanger so I could make a pair for his kart. I already told you about that the last time over here.
Oh thats right, the kart you did all of those custom changes on without any forethought. Just chopping it up and changing it from the way it was originally designed. Like a Frankenkart. An impossible task if expecting that project to even having a remote chance of working out.
I am sure you spent a lot of time cutting and welding. Might have even gotten some limited experience. But without the correct calculations, is likely a complete waste of your time. I hope you dont expect too much out of your little failed endeavor. You should have checked with me before spending all of that energy going in circles.
Glad you have so much faith in me Frank. I will remember that. But right now, got to take leave. If possible will let you know what we do this weekend. Otherwise will check you later.
I headed back home on my trusty bike. It has been a good one. I found it thrown out and broken. Originally it was a three speed, but the hub was trashed. I swapped out to a single speed and no trouble since then. Schwinn sure makes good bikes. Of all the different brands I have ridden, nothing comes close to how this one rides.
After making it back home safely, Steve walked up. I still dont understand how he does that. Way too many times, he just shows up no sooner than I step off my bike.
Hey man, whats up? Any chance of things happening this weekend? I am clear and available. Dont have much time this evening, but lets doing something while I am here.
Sure Steve, we need to get the karts checked over so one less thing to bother with when the engines are put back together. I have everything just about ready to assemble them. I have about given up on all of the high tech ideas and just leaving them alone for the time being.
If we can get some track time soon then finally plan out next race day. Chris is supposed to come over Thursday night or Friday morning. Dont know which day yet.
So is motor mouth going to help out or hinder our progress?
No Steve, we got a lot done when he was here learning how to work on his kart. After you left we got a ton of work done. I was very impressed. He is going to keep busy with anything not too critical. All you need to do is help me keep an eye on whatever he works on to make sure it is done right. If you want him just to do grunt work helping out, he will be more than happy to do that.
OK, I will try to keep him busy. What can I do tonight to speed things up for Friday?
Great Steve, I need all of the pieces here washed up for the engines. Everything needs to be cleaned and wiped down. I have some more things to do on other parts before bolting them together.
After that you can look over things and figure out some linkage for the throttle like done on the first engine. All three manifolds are different, so one for each of them. On your engine make two just a like. I want to put the stock manifolds that were modified on our two engines.
Chris will be using his new Go-Power intake and four petal reed cage. I am not sure if that linkage will be the same as that modified one for the Palmini manifold. But that manifold is going of the backup engine. I want to find out if these old stock ones are going to work out. No reason they should run any different than either Go-Power or Palmini.
I dont know if there is enough time to get all four engines together, but is possible. My original engine is mostly complete anyway, so maybe I can make it happen.
Chris is going to change out my tires. So long as you keep tabs on him, I will stay totally focused on just the engines. I am hoping to have everything finished by Friday night. Then we can try planning what to do next.
For the rest of the evening, well while Steve was here, we didnt talk so much. Just kept pushing forward on the karts. By the time Steve had to go home, just about everything trivial was taken care of. It was up to me getting the engines finally assembled. I was thinking it was possible to do and might have spare time left over Friday.