drifting gokarts

joekd

Active Member
#6
not too hard to do, just need a decent racing frame to begin with so it's got a decent balance and a live axle then put on cheap rear tires and overinflate them
 

joekd

Active Member
#8
Yes and no, hard tires = easier to spin, this is why cheap drift cars use cheap tires and overinflate, just putting in more PSI will not give you a drift kart

You also need enough power to spin tires and biggest issue is working on balance to keep it drifting and not just spin in a circle

Last issue you will run into is a lot of older frames cannot adjust the suspension angles so you can't set it up perfectly. One thing most karts do have working in your favor is they are rear brake only (drift cars use handbrake to lock up rears only to start the spin)

I assume all you want is something to goof around the streets on anyway
 
#12
It is pretty easy to drift an old kart because the tires are usually hardened from too many heat cycles and even though the back tires may look wide, the contact patch is small because the tire is so short.
 

joekd

Active Member
#14
Again, don't need an e-brake since karts are only rear wheel (drive axle) brake only

All you need to do is get your skills up so you don't spin in circles everytime you try to slide
 
#15
Again, don't need an e-brake since karts are only rear wheel (drive axle) brake only

All you need to do is get your skills up so you don't spin in circles everytime you try to slide
Word. :thumbsup: Kinda ironic, since what most karters attempt to do is reduce the spinouts.

With a short wheel base, drifting a kart would be extremely difficult. Probably better to stick with the fast and furious box collection set, or score an old Hatchi-roku with a 4AC in it and collect traffic tickets.
 
#16
usually people just put some pvc pipe on the wheels when they want to do that...
I was on the train the other day when a group of zoobombers got on headed back to the top of the hill. One guy was carrying his drifter trike. It was a custom trike w/kart wheels and slicks on the back, and sections of PVC pipe fitted over the slicks. It didn't have any pedals. He just had a pair of sawed-off ski poles for forward thrust. Only the front wheel had a brake. It looked fun and scary at the same time. :thumbsup:

Zoobomb - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 
#17
hey here somethin i might no a little about ..
i have been collecting ., riding and racing vintage old school karts for yrs ..
last i looked i have over 60 vintage karts and way over 125 motors ..

lot of truth already been said and a few things that might wanna think about ..
first a vintage kart more or less has to be drifted just to get around the corners .. its the way there built super rigid .
big horsepower motors help but not big sized motors .. like a 10hp briggs you wouldnt stand a chance of drifting to heavy on rear tires .. but slap on a 8 or 10 hp two smoker and drift away ..


i realize this is mini bike forum but if anybody in the rochester ny area wants to see alot of super nice old school racing rear engine karts and old mini bikes come to AVON N.Y. july 28-29 2013 its a super nice track and super nice crowed ..



anybody wanna see few old karts go on photobucket type in mxtwister177@yahoo.com
 
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#18
building a drifting kart is both easy and complicated.
first you need to get an older racing kart frame the older the better.
Steve is right.
the original racing karts pre 1976 were designed to "rear steer" which is what drifters do.
Racing karters tend to use that function only a little since you also scrub speed.
but if you wanted to keep drifting its no real problem at all.

The tires also were different.
they don't have to be old just the Correct rubber compound.
modern kart tires are designed to 'stick" and are extremely soft,with rounded corners and wide.
they are exactly the wrong tire to use if you want a kart to slide in a corner.
Correct vintage racing tires are made differently.
they have square shoulders are NARROW and hard.

the kart frames are also different.
pre 1976 frames were made with straight dropped front axles.
the frames weren't all stiff as steve said but they flex differently.
Modern frames with the y shaped front axle are designed to flex so the inside Rear tire lifts in a corner.
pre 1976 racing frames were designed to lift the FRONt inside wheel.

Actually the very best frames for drifting would be the historic racing karts with the dead rear axle.
those karts were the so called one wheel peels because the engine is connected to just one wheel.
there were racers back in the day who would install dual engines and have a different throttle for each.
theyed put the hammer to the correct tire in the corner while lifting on the inside engine.
if you were to make a kart like that with sqaure hard tires like the chen shens or vintage racer's you'd have a machine that could do a serious job.
of course using a boat anchor of a four stroke would stop the fun so you'd need something in the way of a vintage racing two stroke too.

my finger is tired.
if you're interested enough to read more about this post this question on Vintage Karts and i'll be happy to go further.
plus just about everybody there has experience and insight on that subject so you may get more than you want.

dave
 
#20
building a drifting kart is both easy and complicated. first you need to get an older racing kart frame the older the better.
Steve is right. the original racing karts pre 1976 were designed to "rear steer" which is what drifters do. Racing karters tend to use that function only a little since you also scrub speed. but if you wanted to keep drifting its no real problem at all.
Dave, good description. I built a 62 Fox 2100 with a WB 580 on it and kept is dead axle and scrub. Granted, it has soft slicks all the way around, and we only "drive" it around the neighborhood, as there are no tracks here. Well, my son drives it, because I can't fit in the damn thing. It's on rails, full speed around street corners, nice G.

To make a long story short, my son and I have built several Japanese race cars, both in the US and in Japan. None of them, or my kart, would be "drift" machines in the current terminology, but Touge machines. (Rear steer, known drift angle on the slide done with POWER not E brake)

The axle to axle ratio on a kart is so tight, it would take a bit of speed, skinny, hard, rear tires as you said, and would end in a spin, if the drift angle exceeded a couple of degrees. This is not the terminology for "drift" amongst the current fan base.

I good example is the AE86 (Toyota) where no more than 1 or 2 degrees of angle is possible without a gross reduction in speed, and eventual slide out. What these drift guys want, is to set a high angle, and keep it. PVC type of non traction. Mom's old tires, kind of non traction.

Maybe on that Fox, we could install a solenoid operated armor all sprayer for the rears. :wink: In Japan, drifting is long dead as a viable motorsport, and living in Japan for nearly 30 years, I never saw it. Just street and hill racing, with rear steer. Thank God we got to watch Fast and Furious movies to learn about how to race slow and eat tires.

Ae86- 20V "Silver Top"
GTS-T RB25DET
180SX SR20 modified
Cresta 1JZ modified
240SX SR20 highly modified (current)
62 Fox Go Kart :laugh:
 
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