most of the stock shocks in these type karts (yard karts with horiz. shaft engines) are purely mechanical--just a spring inside the cylinder with with no oil or air pressure and are pretty much nothing more than a pogo stick. Some do have oil filled ones that are mediocre, tough to say what you have.
However, just about any atv shock will be a vast improvement just as long as the coil spring on it is close to correct spring rate. kart and buggy front ends are typically much lighter and see less direct load than an atv does.
An eye-to-eye length increase can give more ride height, but may also cause front end geometry issues and even bind up some of the components by forcing the ball joints/tie rods to and beyond their travel range.
A quick way to determine what would work length wise is to jack up the front, remove a shock and cycle the front suspension top to bottom and measure the distances between the mounts through the travel extremes. as you do that, watch for any changes in tire position beyond the stock travel limits.
as far as shock eye width goes, excess play can be taken up with washers--most atv shock widths will fit. if the steel sleeve is too wide and extends beyond the eye width, it can be ground down.
|