Cool short kart story's from your past

[Mammoth]

I know most of us have cool short story's about karts from when we were younger that would probably be interesting to here.
So please share If you got one.

One I'm thinking of is when I was about 12 and we realized my friends landlord had an Invader chained to a pillar that was supporting the roof of a barn.

This was just a shame to see this cool kart being neglected, so with 4 kids all grabbing ahold of this pillar we were able to lift it up off the ground totally flexing the roof just enough to slide the chain out from under it and set it free.

With the chain tied around the front bumper we burnt a track in right next to the barn with nonstop driver rotation.
So much dust, dirt in your eyes, power sliding, bump hitting fun was had.

We maintained the kart prety well keeping the air filter clean, gas, oil, putting new tires on which were $8.50 back then.

All this went on for about two weeks until one day when the landlord showed up, and boy was he mad. He loaded the kart in his truck and we never saw it again.

I always new karts were cool, but after this karts would always be a part of my life.

 

[anickode]

I wouldn't exactly call trespassing and stealing a go kart and ragging on it till you got caught a cool story... The cool part would be that he was only mad and didn't prosecute you guys.

When I was a kid I built a go kart out of an old snapper mower that was rusting behind our shed and had long since been replaced. The motor was shot, but the axle had a 60t 41p sprocket on it, so I bought a 5 hp Briggs at a yard sale for 15 bucks took all the original drive pieces off, slapped a centrifugal clutch on it, lined the sprockets up, drilled 4 holes for the engine, and attached a bicycle handbrake lever to the steering wheel for a throttle. The original brake was on the transmission, so it had no brakes. The drive axle was on bronze bushings, the front wheels had bronze bushings, the steering spindles were just bent pieces of 1/2" bar stock. I had to take the front wheels off, put a pipe on the spindles, and bend them back straight every couple hours of ride time. It would top out around 30mph, and take about 100 yards to roll to a stop. I drove that thing around the farm till the axle bushings wore through to the steel and the axle was just flopping around. Couldn't replace them because I had welded the wheels to the axle after snapping dozens of thru-bolts. Never flipped it, which was nothing short of a miracle since the it had no brakes, the steering sucked, the CG was probably as high as the thing was wide, and the back wheels frequently fell off up till the point I welded them on using an acetylene torch and coat hanger wire. Fun times.

 

[Mammoth]

We were guilty of using it without permission for sure.
No trespassing, no stealing or ragging.
In the end it was in alot better shape than we found it. We took care of that kart.

Thanks for sharing your story.

 

[Kansaskart]

We were guilty of using it without permission for sure.
No trespassing, no stealing or ragging.
In the end it was in alot better shape than we found it. We took care of that kart.

Thanks for sharing your story.

I cant think of one single kid I knew that wouldn't had done that, including me.

My friend had the worlds fastest 3.5hp briggs kart. Super small sprocket, took a mile to reach top end lol. Throttle just happened to stick on my brother . Flew across 4 lanes of traffic, fishtailing entire way trying to slow down as brakes barely worked, crashed into a dumpster headon at probably 25mph+,flew off the kart and bounced onto the sidewalk. Got up and walked away. The kart was still running.

Time I chased a dog thru tall grass and didnt notice the tractors sickle mower blade laying down sucked super bad.

 

[Mammoth]

When I young the only engine around was the all mighty Briggs and nothing elce.
No clones or harbor freight predators or Super Rotoderps to even think of.

Most everybody ran 5hp briggs because that was the common modle, but every once and a while somone would show up with a Briggs 8hp, and they would be king of the neighborhood.

If you had one of those there was no way you could be beat. It was lIke a v8 vs a 4 cylinder.

Always wished I could have gotten one, but was never lucky to get ahold of one.

 

[David Ham]

When I young the only engine around was the all mighty Briggs and nothing elce.
No clones or harbor freight predators or Super Rotoderps to even think of.

Most everybody ran 5hp briggs because that was the common modle, but every once and a while somone would show up with a Briggs 8hp, and they would be king of the neighborhood.

If you had one of those there was no way you could be beat. It was lIke a v8 vs a 4 cylinder.

Always wished I could have gotten one, but was never lucky to get ahold of one.

and now you build race karts with insanely powerful engines