Howdy. New to the forum. I bought 3 x TaoTao GK110 karts. For the official record I just wanted to get a thread started so others may learn from my experience, for better for worse. The experience is still early, more will be posted as this plays out.
For context, I wanted to find a USA-made kart but my research led me to sites like this one which indicated that they no longer exist. For whatever reason, he American companies called it quits and it's literally nothing but the Chinese-made stuff now. Lots of people making dirt bikes (KTM, Kawasaki, Yamaha, etc.) but if you want a go kart / buggie, companies like TaoTao and HammerHead is all there is. If I'm wrong about this please feel free to correct me, but that's my understanding. You can get parts for the old American karts, but the whole thing turns into a CraigsList / DIY operation.
Anyway, long story short, I didn't want to go down that road for 3 karts. I tried to find reviews about TaoTao and other Chinese-made karts but there really wasn't much. Lots of perfect 5-star reviews that are worthless ("my kid loved it!") and scream fake. And then also a fair number of negative reviews that convey zero useful information ("the bolts came loose") and indicate some soccer mom/dad driving a minivan that has zero understanding of mechanical things. I also saw some reviews indicating people like to start out with the Chinese karts and then over time swap parts out with better quality as things go wrong. I'm an engineer, and plan on getting my hands dirty, so figured I'd give it a shot. How bad can the Chinese karts be anyway? Seems like all these places selling them would go under in a hurry if they literally just didn't work. They gotta run, at least for a while, right?
Anyway, that's my thinking, here we go.
This is the fleet.
Got three of the 110cc (GK110) model: Pink, Green, and Black. I had to make some mods to two of them to bring the seats in closer. I bought them from a new outfit called Hunter Road Power Sports in San Marcos, TX. Just putting that out there for information sake. I wanted to get them from a dealer, some place local, so I had a realistic way to see my 1 year engine/power warranty honored. Shipping stuff back/forth to an online dealer just isn't going to happen. The owner seems like a do right fellow, I don't anticipate any problems there. With time I guess we'll see
Ok, so Christmas day. Kids are crazy excited. Things started out great. I used the accelerator bolt to limit the speed. I'm running kids through stopping drills to train them how to use the things. We're just going back and forth down a very low-traffic high-visibility caliche/country road in front of our property. All is going well so far.
Per instructions I did the break-in oil change at around the 45 minute mark. Seems a bit early for the break-in change, but whatever, these are the instructions I was given. Oil changed.
Things continue on, doing our stopping drills. I had my own little drivers ed course going. Then our first problem. Suddenly this happened.
On the green kart the steering column cracked at the point where the cog at the end of the column connects to the shaft that connects with the wheels. Help me out please, what is this called? So when turning right the teeth would slip and the wheel would just spin. This thing cracked seemingly for no reason. The kart didn't crash, nothing happened at all. Suddenly the crack was just there. Looking at it the crack traces back to one of those bolts you see in the plastic housing. I'm thinking the manufacturer just tightened it too much and cracked it? So now the kart only turns left and just gets stuck in that position. I get this kart hauled back to the house and it's now out of commission. At first glance this doesn't seem like a terribly huge problem so I'm not that worried, but a bit miffed that this thing would break at all. And also find it disconcerting now that I realize this critical component is constructed of plastic instead of metal.
About 3 hrs after this the pink kart goes down. Again nothing happened to cause the problem, it just stopped working. In the case of the pink kart the problem seems to be the transmission. I can shift gears (L/N/R). The LED indicator changes, I can hear the transmission click into gear, but when accelerating nothing much happens. It acts like it's in N, except, you can feel it push just a little. If nobody is in the kart and I push the pedal from a standing position the kart will move (both forward and backwards) but slowly with very little force. I can easily hold it and keep it from moving.
So pink kart is down hard. And whatever the problem is seems a big one and it's internal, definitely a warranty issue, I'm headed back to the shop with this one. I'll report on how that goes. Not a good sign if the transmission blows out on the first day. And bear in mind these things are all governed to very slow speeds too.
Only the black kart remains. So far no problems with it at all. Since the pink kart is now down with a pretty severe problem, I decided to swap its steering parts with the green kart and get two back and running again. Then I only have one to take back to the shop.
At first I figured on the green kart all I needed to swap out was that small plastic component that was cracked. Upon inspection though I couldn't figure a way to remove it, so end up removing the whole steering apparatus, whatever it's called (help?). This...
From what I can tell there is no way to get that plastic part off. Even after removing this entire part, then metal pieces on the end seem to be welded or something and there is no way to get at the plastic parts to swap them out. At any rate I swapped the whole part and got green kart going again. So for today (12/26/16) two karts were running for a solid 6+ hours spread out through the afternoon.
Then in the evening just as it was about time to call it a day the black kart goes down. Another steering problem.
At the ends of the metal bar in the middle that holds the shaft with the gear teeth are these plastic stoppers. The purpose seems to be to stop the travel at that point. What happened here is there was a little bit of a crash. Not really a crash per se, the boy driving turned hard on a path and went hard into some tall grass. The wheels hit essentially a wall of packed tight grass, kind of like hay. They jammed to one side and this plastic stopper got cracked. Steering shot. Other than that the kart is fine, there is no external damage whatsoever. No scratches, nothing. And because of that this damage is silly to me. Am I wrong? Is it reasonable for this thing to break so easily? There is no bent metal. No ruptured tires. No cracked plastic on the flimsy headlights. No discernible damage whatsoever except this stupid plastic stopper on the steering thingamajig. And upon inspection there is no way to replace just that part either. I have to swap out the entire thingamajig.
Ok, so drum roll, this steering thing, whatever it's properly called, feels like a source of long-term problems. It seems to be a cheaply made piece of junk. Can anybody recommend a good off-brand (not TaoTao) version of this part that I can swamp in that will be tougher and more agreeable to long-term repairs. Like allowing me to swap out the plastic insert if it gets cracked rather than buying the whole component?
Here is my next problem.
Also please help me out on what this is called. This hose that feeds air from the engine through the air filter into the carburetor. That **** hose will not stay on for anything. I even tried some clamp hoses I had laying around, the kind with teeth that you screw tight. In fact, the tighter I make it, it helps to pull the hose OFF the nozzle on the engine. It's very frustrating. First, can someone explain to me exactly what this is and how important it is? I keep putting it back on, but it always comes off, but the engine doesn't seem to have any trouble without it. Am I losing engine power without it? Is it going to get my filter dirty quicker? Next, any recommendations to fix it? The only thing I can figure to try next is a smaller hose. The fat hose that's on there now is seems too large. The hose just doesn't fit tight enough, but more than that, the external diameter is so large that it doesn't fit flush against the engine. From the pic you can see the space creates a wedge. Well the hose doesn't like being squeezed in there and this pressure pushes the hose right back off the nozzle. And then the clamp just doesn't hold it tight enough. Maybe the right clamp will do the trick. The pinch clamps aren't working. The screw clamps pull it off even faster. The space used by the screw causes the clamp to be too large and it can't fit into that wedge space, so it ends up pulling the hose off the nozzle instead of keeping it on. A really high strength pinch clamp might do the trick. This isn't a huge thing, I'm sure I can get it solved on my own, mostly just putting it out there as part of my review. On literally all three karts this is a problem. Just drive down the road and back and by the time you're back that hose will have popped off. Driving me nuts. But more than that this is just bad engineering. It's asinine that a core component like this would so consistently not work. Is the nozzle not large enough? Did the kart come with the wrong size hose? The wrong clamps? Did the dealer that assembled them screw this up? I just don't get it.
So, not even two days in, this is my experience so far.
For context, I wanted to find a USA-made kart but my research led me to sites like this one which indicated that they no longer exist. For whatever reason, he American companies called it quits and it's literally nothing but the Chinese-made stuff now. Lots of people making dirt bikes (KTM, Kawasaki, Yamaha, etc.) but if you want a go kart / buggie, companies like TaoTao and HammerHead is all there is. If I'm wrong about this please feel free to correct me, but that's my understanding. You can get parts for the old American karts, but the whole thing turns into a CraigsList / DIY operation.
Anyway, long story short, I didn't want to go down that road for 3 karts. I tried to find reviews about TaoTao and other Chinese-made karts but there really wasn't much. Lots of perfect 5-star reviews that are worthless ("my kid loved it!") and scream fake. And then also a fair number of negative reviews that convey zero useful information ("the bolts came loose") and indicate some soccer mom/dad driving a minivan that has zero understanding of mechanical things. I also saw some reviews indicating people like to start out with the Chinese karts and then over time swap parts out with better quality as things go wrong. I'm an engineer, and plan on getting my hands dirty, so figured I'd give it a shot. How bad can the Chinese karts be anyway? Seems like all these places selling them would go under in a hurry if they literally just didn't work. They gotta run, at least for a while, right?
Anyway, that's my thinking, here we go.
This is the fleet.
Got three of the 110cc (GK110) model: Pink, Green, and Black. I had to make some mods to two of them to bring the seats in closer. I bought them from a new outfit called Hunter Road Power Sports in San Marcos, TX. Just putting that out there for information sake. I wanted to get them from a dealer, some place local, so I had a realistic way to see my 1 year engine/power warranty honored. Shipping stuff back/forth to an online dealer just isn't going to happen. The owner seems like a do right fellow, I don't anticipate any problems there. With time I guess we'll see
Ok, so Christmas day. Kids are crazy excited. Things started out great. I used the accelerator bolt to limit the speed. I'm running kids through stopping drills to train them how to use the things. We're just going back and forth down a very low-traffic high-visibility caliche/country road in front of our property. All is going well so far.
Per instructions I did the break-in oil change at around the 45 minute mark. Seems a bit early for the break-in change, but whatever, these are the instructions I was given. Oil changed.
Things continue on, doing our stopping drills. I had my own little drivers ed course going. Then our first problem. Suddenly this happened.
On the green kart the steering column cracked at the point where the cog at the end of the column connects to the shaft that connects with the wheels. Help me out please, what is this called? So when turning right the teeth would slip and the wheel would just spin. This thing cracked seemingly for no reason. The kart didn't crash, nothing happened at all. Suddenly the crack was just there. Looking at it the crack traces back to one of those bolts you see in the plastic housing. I'm thinking the manufacturer just tightened it too much and cracked it? So now the kart only turns left and just gets stuck in that position. I get this kart hauled back to the house and it's now out of commission. At first glance this doesn't seem like a terribly huge problem so I'm not that worried, but a bit miffed that this thing would break at all. And also find it disconcerting now that I realize this critical component is constructed of plastic instead of metal.
About 3 hrs after this the pink kart goes down. Again nothing happened to cause the problem, it just stopped working. In the case of the pink kart the problem seems to be the transmission. I can shift gears (L/N/R). The LED indicator changes, I can hear the transmission click into gear, but when accelerating nothing much happens. It acts like it's in N, except, you can feel it push just a little. If nobody is in the kart and I push the pedal from a standing position the kart will move (both forward and backwards) but slowly with very little force. I can easily hold it and keep it from moving.
So pink kart is down hard. And whatever the problem is seems a big one and it's internal, definitely a warranty issue, I'm headed back to the shop with this one. I'll report on how that goes. Not a good sign if the transmission blows out on the first day. And bear in mind these things are all governed to very slow speeds too.
Only the black kart remains. So far no problems with it at all. Since the pink kart is now down with a pretty severe problem, I decided to swap its steering parts with the green kart and get two back and running again. Then I only have one to take back to the shop.
At first I figured on the green kart all I needed to swap out was that small plastic component that was cracked. Upon inspection though I couldn't figure a way to remove it, so end up removing the whole steering apparatus, whatever it's called (help?). This...
From what I can tell there is no way to get that plastic part off. Even after removing this entire part, then metal pieces on the end seem to be welded or something and there is no way to get at the plastic parts to swap them out. At any rate I swapped the whole part and got green kart going again. So for today (12/26/16) two karts were running for a solid 6+ hours spread out through the afternoon.
Then in the evening just as it was about time to call it a day the black kart goes down. Another steering problem.
At the ends of the metal bar in the middle that holds the shaft with the gear teeth are these plastic stoppers. The purpose seems to be to stop the travel at that point. What happened here is there was a little bit of a crash. Not really a crash per se, the boy driving turned hard on a path and went hard into some tall grass. The wheels hit essentially a wall of packed tight grass, kind of like hay. They jammed to one side and this plastic stopper got cracked. Steering shot. Other than that the kart is fine, there is no external damage whatsoever. No scratches, nothing. And because of that this damage is silly to me. Am I wrong? Is it reasonable for this thing to break so easily? There is no bent metal. No ruptured tires. No cracked plastic on the flimsy headlights. No discernible damage whatsoever except this stupid plastic stopper on the steering thingamajig. And upon inspection there is no way to replace just that part either. I have to swap out the entire thingamajig.
Ok, so drum roll, this steering thing, whatever it's properly called, feels like a source of long-term problems. It seems to be a cheaply made piece of junk. Can anybody recommend a good off-brand (not TaoTao) version of this part that I can swamp in that will be tougher and more agreeable to long-term repairs. Like allowing me to swap out the plastic insert if it gets cracked rather than buying the whole component?
Here is my next problem.
Also please help me out on what this is called. This hose that feeds air from the engine through the air filter into the carburetor. That **** hose will not stay on for anything. I even tried some clamp hoses I had laying around, the kind with teeth that you screw tight. In fact, the tighter I make it, it helps to pull the hose OFF the nozzle on the engine. It's very frustrating. First, can someone explain to me exactly what this is and how important it is? I keep putting it back on, but it always comes off, but the engine doesn't seem to have any trouble without it. Am I losing engine power without it? Is it going to get my filter dirty quicker? Next, any recommendations to fix it? The only thing I can figure to try next is a smaller hose. The fat hose that's on there now is seems too large. The hose just doesn't fit tight enough, but more than that, the external diameter is so large that it doesn't fit flush against the engine. From the pic you can see the space creates a wedge. Well the hose doesn't like being squeezed in there and this pressure pushes the hose right back off the nozzle. And then the clamp just doesn't hold it tight enough. Maybe the right clamp will do the trick. The pinch clamps aren't working. The screw clamps pull it off even faster. The space used by the screw causes the clamp to be too large and it can't fit into that wedge space, so it ends up pulling the hose off the nozzle instead of keeping it on. A really high strength pinch clamp might do the trick. This isn't a huge thing, I'm sure I can get it solved on my own, mostly just putting it out there as part of my review. On literally all three karts this is a problem. Just drive down the road and back and by the time you're back that hose will have popped off. Driving me nuts. But more than that this is just bad engineering. It's asinine that a core component like this would so consistently not work. Is the nozzle not large enough? Did the kart come with the wrong size hose? The wrong clamps? Did the dealer that assembled them screw this up? I just don't get it.
So, not even two days in, this is my experience so far.
