I took the buggy to some land (TONS of sand and hills) and had loads of fun on the buggy. No issues whatsoever.
There are a couple open items.
1) The slop in the control arms between the control arm bushings and the bulkhead. There is at least 1/16" gap on each of the four. I'm assuming nylon washers would work great but I don't know the OD of the steel rod (or ID of the bushings) without pulling the front end apart. Anyone got washer dimensions or recommendations?
2) Need to finalize wiring. There is a voltage wire going to the regulator 100% of the time. Color is Y/R. During some testing I removed the battery from this wire while the engine was running and I heard a clicking coming from the engine area. Arcing? What was I hearing and what is the consequence of this happening? I did weld in a new tab for the key switch.
3) When I trailer the buggy it won't restart when I get to my final destination.
A) The bouncing on the trailer is making the carb float flood the engine. I'm fairly certain it actually got into the crank as the oil after the remote ride was runny. I put a (home plumbing) valve on but this only helped a little as I put it upstream of the filter. I'm considering putting vacuum petcock just before the carb.
B) The battery is weak. I put a new larger-than-stock battery in the buggy but it is sitting at a fairly extreme angle. It will turn the buggy over maybe 5 rotations before it just dies. Not sure if it is just a bad battery or other.
4) Power.. I am yet to play with the jetting (I have a main jet assortment). This thing needs about twice the HP it currently has. It won't spin the wheels in loose sand from dead stop. Has a fairly slow top end. If I do an engine swap it has to have sequential gears. Can you guys make a couple suggestions for me to do some research on? A 3 speed with a clutch would be really cool.. I doubt I'd go through the trouble to do a swap unless it added manual gear selection (with reverse a big plus).
LOL I need some type of brush guard or windshield.
The big mantis (shoulder strap on the left of pic) rode for at least 30 minutes.
It is tons of fun, though. The kids (15yr old girls) love it. My 4yr old likes cruising around, too.
