Last night was a good night for kart construction.  we got a tie rod stretched between the wheels.  it is just a bunch of allthread with some dethreaded sections on the end.  these dethreaded sections make it easier to adjust, since we can just chuck it up in a drill and spin the rod rapidly to get it on or off the car.  It works well enough to connect the two sides together, but needs some tweaking.  Tie rod ends are nuts welded to coupling nuts.

Also related to steering (and throttle, and brakes), someone at the space had the bright idea to cannibalize a razor electric scooter which had a throttle grip, a brake lever, its own self-contained ball-bearing mount, and a telescoping/folding mechanism.  This scooter was a dumpster find but can be found on craigslist for $50, and it also includes a battery, motor, motor controller, wheels, charger, etc which we didn’t use.  I think next year we may see more of these used for steering because when we want to change drivers or if we get in a frontal collision, the steering system just sort of folds away from the driver without actually becoming disconnected.  it’s perfect for us.

Perhaps most importantly, we got all our drive components finally.  we were able to weld the motor mount pods onto the frame and get the motors hooked up.  The pictures don’t show a whole lot, but that’s OK since the mounts need a bit of tweaking and reinforcing at this point anyway.

finally, we turned the original front bumper into a foot rest.  we ran a piece of metal up through it to make it more robust, then welded that piece of metal to the frame.

Here’s a test video.  Next up: iron out the kinks, and add power.

PPPRS test run 1 from Jeremy Ashinghurst on Vimeo.