Hello from Scotland!

[grahamk]

Hello everyone, looking forward to viewing the site. Looking at building a simple kart for my son. He is 5 years old and is autistic and hates the noise of petrol engines so looking at building a small simple electric kart out of scrap/cheap materials.

Was looking at using some kind of motor like a starter or electric window/wiper motor to start with but would need to fit some kind of speed control/potentiometer?

Any help or basic plans appreciated

 

[Flyinhillbilly]

Welcome, it sounds like you should search posts by functional artist who's a member here. He does more electric stuff than anyone on here I think.

 

[OzFab]

Electric window/wiper motors may be a bit weak for this application; ever notice how electric windows go up slower than they go down? That's due to load, being the weight of the window plus a little friction; can you imagine what would happen on a go kart? Correct, NOTHING...

I've seen karts powered with a 12v starter motor but, they need some modification to make them suitable, the most difficult part being cutting a keyway into the hardened shaft...

Honestly, by the time you spend the time & money on a starter motor setup, you could buy a kit which includes motor, controller, potentiometer, wiring, etc, even batteries in some cases, & it all plugs together...

How do I know? I'm planning a very similar build so, I've done the research...

 

[bob58o]

I don't know jack about electric, but this thread got likes in bunches. So maybe it is worth a read? I'm about to read it myself. Maybe you know some of this already? Maybe it can be helpful?
http://www.diygokarts.com/vb/showthread.php?t=9700