[Alan Sheidler]

Most karts have a plastic piece that holds the top of the steering column at the steering uprights.  I feel that it is not ideal, but I have seen a couple of people take a large vice grip and squeeze the plastic to hold the steering shaft in place during alignment.

There are devices sold which lock the steering via insertion of a pin.  Most of the ones for sale are for “American” karts, but some advertise as being for the 20mm steering shaft common to Euro karts.  There is one listed on eBay that attaches to the pan, and locks the shaft by holding the tie-rod flange.

Note that the position of the steering wheel itself is not a good indicator of Centered Steering, which is essential to a proper alignment.  The inner tie-rod attachment heim joint locating bolts should be equally spaced from the center line of the steering shaft when viewed from a front/overhead position.  Many (most) karts have a steering shaft position which has an axis that is not parallel to the center line of the chassis, going from center at the bottom to left at the top for obvious reasons of driver placement.  Centering the inner rod ends to the shaft instead of to the chassis is important, IMO.

Critical from a functional standpoint is understanding that the inner rod ends are moved in an arc, and one with a much shorter radius than the spindle arms are similarly moved.  If those short arcs are not equal side-to-side, then the kart will behave differently in right and left steering events.

A note about your tire wear:  Depending on the number and severity of turns in each direction per lap, one front tire can see more friction load than the other.  The single most damaging (tire wear inducing) adjustment is toe.  Combine that with a slight mis-adjustment of camber, and a front tire can wear really unevenly.

One thing to check: Pull the kingpin bolt on the “bad” side to see whether it is still straight.  Even a slight bend or wave will cause the problem you describe.  Of course, observe the kingpin bearings too.

[Alan Sheidler]

The lead Mike bought was sheet style.  He used a spray glue to attach fabric, and just pushed it into the seat so that it formed the proper contour.

[Alan Sheidler]

[quote quote=4112]Me and my co-driver who is currently not registered will there. Got to find him roughly 50 pounds of ballast to be legal.[/quote]

Let me know if you need help with ballast.  I’m sure Mike would not mind bringing along the lead seat liner that my son Colin has been using.  I’ll check on how much it adds up to….

[Alan Sheidler]

A follow-on to my first post, and this applies to those who alre already on the list, as well as those who have not yet registered:  In order to be in line for the contingency payout offered by Honda (and you know we ALL expect to get to the front of the finishing order) you need to have Honda as a part of the “Make” for your kart.  Note that mine says “Honda Renspeed”.

Of course, the Kawi, Yammy, and ICC folks can ignore this note, but for the rest of you….  Get in and edit your entry to reflect Honda power, and be sure to register for the contingency by signing on via Member Login and going to your member page.  You’ll find the contingency signup under the Events button.

[Alan Sheidler]

I’m happy that Scott was able to get Kieran’s problem solved.  And, the clutch was where I was going to suggest looking as well, when I heard of the issue with slow launches and spin recoveries.

The clutch we got with our WF had Yellow springs.  I bought another clutch without checking what was in it, only because it was CHEAP.  Since we run the sprocket inboard, I took the unit apart and swapped the direction of the pucks, noting that it had orange springs, which are supposed to be the stiffest?

Colin immediately noticed the improvement in launches, and it got better as the clutch wore in.  Yes, we also did several track days for him and brother Connor.  I’d suggest reading up on the expected engagement RPM for the various springs.  If the clutch is engaging shortly off idle, and/or locking well before the designated engine speed, then there is an issue.

FWIW, the only time we experienced the issue both of you described was when an outrageous gear was selected for an event in Oscoda.  Colin was in charge of choosing his own gears, and I let him put the 56 rear on (16 or 17 front, I forget…) although I knew it was not going to work.  Was it slow to get going?  Ouch!  Tight corners meant it took way too long to get up to speed again.  After the event, we devised a method of checking for his actual top speed capability with a run down the long taxiway.  67 mph when the limiter kicked in.  After that, I handed him a calculator and had him first estimate his actual top speed potential, based on course design, then choose the gear based on what we knew the other one could achieve.  That is when the wins began.  Good times……

[Alan Sheidler]

Eh…  James,   Did you look at how that post wound up on the EKN site?  Not readable.

Sometimes creating a text ad in WORD or some other document editor will not transfer well when copy/pasted.  You might want to give it a try using a plain text editor, or even pasting to an email and re-copying might work.

[Alan Sheidler]

email sent.

[Alan Sheidler]

Well, I’ll be danged…

Since the new forum specified that no spaces could be used in the username, I thought that the old forum was the same, and left it out. Add a space, and Bingo!

Thanks for the help, I have access to what I was looking for.

[Alan Sheidler]

Rob, Congratulations on the new launch!

I do have questions: Is there any way to PM/contact a user of the old forum? Many less-frequent users of EKN may not sign on here for a while, and for some of those, it was the only way we communicated. It could be months before they sign on to the new one.

Second, it appears as though I can’t even open my own old PM sections, and some of those had contact information I thought I’d not be needing. The old forum is still available to read, but there is no way to log on to it and retrieve anything that was in personal files, that I can find.

[Author]

Posts