Dirtbox Venom Texas build!

[smack911]

yeppers wide is the way to ride ....getting some nice progress ...

 

[mysteryboy28]

roof and hood bars notched and welded in place.

hacked out the passenger side rails, and set it up like the drivers side - ready for a latching door bar!

 

[greaser]

Looking good man when you get enough done we will have to have a venom meet lol

 

[mysteryboy28]

that would be bad a$$! lol.

 

[mysteryboy28]

seats and quick release steering adapter arrived today.

 

[n1kogr]

what kind of quick release did you get? seats look nice! Are they heavy?

 

[mysteryboy28]

Summit Racing Part Number: AAF-ALL52302 3/4" shaft 3-bolt aftermarket quick release.

seats heavy? eh, weigh about the same as a regular car seat, maybe a LITTLE lighter. they're definetely made in china, as i could see some minor manufacturing defects right away. lol. but overall they're pretty nice. they're a little narrow for my fat a$$, but should work great for smack911 at keeping him centered in the seat.

 

[mysteryboy28]

gotta hit the hardware store for bolts n stuff tomorrow, then i'll be welding in the seat mounting bars.

thought i had 4 bungs to weld onto the a-arms, but i only had 3 (apparently i used one on a kart repair job i did a while back). so ordered the 4th one, which should be here by the weekend. normally i've been just welding on a 1/2" fine thread nut to thread the heims into, but bungs are a bit more heavy duty. it also means that i gotta round up some bigger tubing to accomodate the outter sleeve of the bungs. fun stuff.

tonight i slapped the new predator motor in the mini-bike for the dude. the baja warrior type mini-bikes have a fake gas tank on them (for that cool chopper look), which gets in the way of accessing the tank on the predator. so i'm going to round up a butterfly nut to hold the fake tank in place, for easy removal to access the gas cap on the predator tank. the one thing the guy has to give up for now is having a working headlight, as the predator motors don't have the power circuit to power lights.

 

[smack911]

you would think that seats made from flammable corrosive materials by 6 year old workers paid with rice chex. Well you would think they would be somewhat lighter than conventional auto seats. I bet they got lead or some kind of heavy weight, it could have a small china person that pops out of the bottom in a day or two. you never know, check carefully!

 

[mysteryboy28]

Lol! I did see some creepy little legs crawling in the crease of one of the seats. Thought it was some weird foreign bug or something. Turned out to be a common spider. I was poking at it, getting a little freaked out (all I could see was wiggly legs at first).

Meanwhile, gotta hit the retail metal store tomorrow for some tubing that'll fit the bungs for the heims on the a-arms. And I lost the darn key to the sled. The key ring hole was busted off on the key, so it was floating around in my pocket for a few days. Musta fell out when I pulled my keychain out or something. So I'm just gonna order a new ignition switch and key. They're pretty cheap.

 

[mysteryboy28]

$20 for a 4ft piece of .065 wall 1" tube. Crazy. But I had to have it if I'm gonna use the bungs for the a-arms. I'll get creative and find a way to use like a 6" piece on each a-arm.

The polaris sportsman rear hubs (with 156x4 bolt pattern) are coming in the mail today, which means I will finally be able to determine what size rear axle and bearings I will be using. In the past I've used some common honda rear hubs that I bored out to 1". But these polaris hubs look bigger in the pictures, so that means bigger axle, bearings, and sprocket and rotor hubs. That also will mean a more heavy duty rear end that should be able to take more abuse (like slamming sideways into sand banks and curbs without bending the axle. Lol)

 

[mysteryboy28]

got started on the a-arms. after ending up with questionable angles, i have decided i'm going to make a jig so that i can guarantee that all 4 of my a-arms are uniform. i tried sketching out the outline on a board, but it just wasn't cutting it. tomorrow i will pick up some 1x1 lumber and do it right.

 

[fowler]

Go with steel jigs

Rock solid
Also you won't have to rebuild it each time u do a weld and it catches fire

 

[mysteryboy28]

but i like fire. lol. i'd need a big chunk of steel plate, and a bunch of pricey square tubing to make the steel jig (i like the sound of it though). i'll start with the wooden one for now. i only plan to tack-weld on the jig, so hopefully nothing will really catch on fire!

 

[smack911]

cant and find some angle iron and hack up with a few movable bolts to hold her all square.
at least it will hold the angle, wood just gives too much screws and angle iron would be inexpensive and hold, just an idea...

 

[mysteryboy28]

jig made, a-arms tacked together.

 

[fowler]

Very nice
Good choice of material
Although now u have made it

What u usually do is make the jig so it takes all the mounts

So u have the two frame mounts
The spindle mounts
The shock mount

As long as they are in the same place then u are good
It doesn't mater how the arms differ inbetween the mounts

Looks like it works anyway

 

[mysteryboy28]

i'm going to be cutting out like a 17" section from the center of the horizontal bar on the a-arms, so each a-arm will be quadruple sheared, rather than the double sheared you see now. i just wanted to make sure they were 100% straight for final welding. i haven't determined where i want to place shock mounts yet, and will add 1' square tubing to the a-arms to support the shock mount brackets.

 

[mysteryboy28]

more work done on the a-arms. a-arm mounting tab plates cut, ready for boring 16 3/4" holes.

the wife found the snowmobile key while we were deep-cleaning the bedroom. she rocks. i drilled a hole in it and stuck a key ring on it. hung it up in a safe place in the garage.

couple of mock-up pics for your viewing pleasure.

 

[xXPhasemanXx]

Great progress on the cart! You have some good talent there!

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