Hi All,
Originally I bought this go cart with just a direct chain drive. It looked so cool with it's oversized tires that I never considered how little power it would have. After learning some about it, I opted to go with a jack shaft; thus changing my gear ratio from 5:1 to 10:1 (where there is a 12 tooth sprocket on the clutch, a 20 tooth jack shaft sprocket, then on to a 10 tooth sprocket which is tiny, and then on to a 60 tooth sprocket on the wheel).
I had to move the engine, which involved cutting that white plate that you see pictured, and then welding up a jack-shaft assembly (yes, I know, I'm a sucko welder
) which bolts to the white plate, and which I cut slots in. The engine also bolts to the white plate with slots, and between all the slots, I can tension the chains. I was never able to bolt everything tight enough to keep the chain on the wheel sprocket from coming right off when I drive it (I'm too big for it, and I'm taking it up 10 degree hills, but I never get a chance to even smoke the clutch before it pops off!). So last weekend I welded a piece of angle iron to the white plate, sent a couple bolts through the jack shaft assembly in order to control the tensioning better, and to hold it in place to prevent the assembly from shifting and popping off the chain. Well, that worked for a few minutes, but then the set screws on the 10 tooth jack shaft sprocket fell out and the chain fell off again.
So, my question is: any suggestions to keep the chain on? When it works, it still has little power, and it is too fast in my opinion for my kids, so I'm all for increasing the gear ratio (which would likely result in less stress on that little sprocket), but I can't find reasonably priced sprockets. I mean, you can get an 80 tooth sprocket for the wheel for like $26, but above that the price goes way up. And I didn't see a wider selection of jack-shaft sprockets (for example, it would probably be better to have a 15 tooth and 30 tooth sprocket on the jack shaft). I could always go with a torque converter, which is why I went with the jack shaft because I figured it would be easier to add the torque converter later if I had to, but that's a last resort.
Any suggestions would be appreciated. I'm off to add hose clamps around the sprocket to see if that helps
