http://www.fandome.com/video/116363/Power-Wheels-on-Ice/?q=c i want one, bad, but i dont know how you would get that much power in a powerwheel. if someone can make these, i say we have an icerace with them. i'd buy one, once i have a job again.
who does that? But as for more power, just throw in a larger electric motor, think like whats in a golf cart and you are in business. i am unsure how safe i would feel in a plastic car at any speed over 5 lol
do you know anyone in MN that could do this though? i'd do it myself, but i have a feeling i'd screw it up and make it kinda dangerous for the driver haha. maybe i should just get my hands on a powerwheel and do some development.
we should get these and hold a mario kart race, dress up, throw shells and bananas at eachother, i'd be down.
Since they use a gas motor and pneumatic tires, I'll venture to guess the bulk of the frame and the rest of it is homemade. It would be sweet to have a dozen of them for the ice races.
if someone makes them, i will definately be interested. if i learn to weld sometime soon ill try to do some development. but anyone that already can weld should definately look into this if they can.
I can weld, but I neither have the time or extra cash to persue it. Maybe next when I'm out of school and don't have a car project going on. Hmmm. Maybe a big weed whip motor, centrifugal clutch for a go cart, and small four wheeler tires. All under a power wheels body. Maybe a Barbie Jeep?
holy crap that was cool, I luaghed my *** of watching that. I could see how that could be a lot of fun!!!
My guess is that they used barstool racers, but didn't use a barstool for the seats and just fabbed their own. Barstool racers are pretty tiny. Or they are custom jobs since the wheel base is likely something that doesn't translate to a standardized kart frame. Best way to do this would be to fab up a barstool kart frame yourself, pick up a 6.5hp motor of some kind, and find a powerwheels that isn't working anymore off eBay. Cut the body off the power wheels, and bolt it on to your barstool kart frame, then fab your own seating on it.
I'd make my own frame, but I don't know how big of a motor I'd want. 50cc or 110cc? The rest wouldn't be too tricky. The larger one (F150?) appears to have some sort of suspension.
Suspension wouldn't really be necessary for something like this, especially for taking them up to ice races and acting like fools. As for fabbing your own frame, there are about 10,000 plans online for barstool racer frames, you'd just have to adjust it for the steering angle and such. And a 50cc motor would be perfect for this, considering we'd run them on snow, and for light use, no sense in going with some big motor setup. I'd be willing to help out on this project a little, I'd definately invest in one.
Since we're not talking racing karts, you can go to this site and buy all the mechanicals you need as far as spindles, steering, axles etc... are concerned: http://www.mfgsupply.com/GoMini.html Then you'd need a motor. Best bet is just to buy the cheap chinese-made 50cc motors off ebay. They will be new, might not be the highest quality, but they're 50cc motors, so who cares. I am almost positive we could find them in bulk lots. Then eBay or craigslist for bodies from powerwheels. Doesn't matter what the car was originally really, a barbie jeep or vette can easily be re-painted to something a little less lame. Or we just get some cheap scrap aluminum and make them look like Mario Kart karts.
I'd be game for next year. I have too much going on right now to get into it. I think it would be fun to have a bunch of these for the ice races. The ensuing mayhem would be priceless.
this would be fun (especially mario kart)... too bad i don't have the time/money to do something like this with my 2 project cars... i'm sure I could pull off making a frame and all that no problem...
Right now, rough estimate from piddster and myself is around 250-300 a piece. That would be a fully turn-key deal. 50cc motor small frame kart no powerwheels body (that's just wasted money on aesthetics) pull start.
That's cool, but the only problem with it is getting more than one . I think with our design, we'd be able to do a "nascar on ice" thing. Everyone runs the same equipment.
We're likely going to build a prototype this winter. I doubt we'd be able to get 6+ made by the ice races. I'm in greenbay all week, and Piddster is busy too. So it would be a weekend thing. But once a jig is made we'd be able to crank the frames out in no time. And the other parts are just sourced bits really.
I made a barstool racer in high school. Used a 110cc pit bike motor. Went about 40mph and sounded like a 250f once I made a custom pipe for it. Here is a video before it had a custom pipe. I also have plans for another one with more power and full suspension. The other barstool got pretty much ruined when my buddy thought it could clear his approach.
Yep, pretty much something like that, only we'd set the seat and steering a bit lower for center of gravity.
High center of gravity adds to the funny factor and having a twist throttle made for a lot of amature crashes. We also had a pretty agressive steering ratio which caught many people off guard. It was almost as much fun watching people ride it for the first time as it was to ride. If you can manage to shift using the design you go with I would recommend using a GPX 150cc pit bike horizontal motor. Simple and cheap and there are some aftermaket heads and cylinders availiable to make more power. I think they put out 10-12 hp or so they say.
I think I have a extra frame exactly like the one in the video. I can check when I go up north but it won't be until probably Xmas time.
I think what we're going for here is price/performance/safety. A 50cc motor can provide around 6hp, and with proper gearing, should have no issue going close to 30mph. The reason for setting the center of gravity a little lower is to facilitate ice driving. I can see driving these around on the dry pavement, but I'm primarily thinking in terms of ice racing silly business. For a little over 100 bucks, we can get a full 50cc motor setup, including chains, sprockets, brake and twist throttle handle, and a fuel tank. From there, brakes, rear axle and wheels/tires would need to be acuired, along with a steering system. We may extend the fronts of the frame a bit to allow the steering column to be slanted back a bit more, and use a regular steering wheel and pedals. But doing it on the super cheap we'd likely scrap that idea. We're still working out the details though, I'm going to continue talking with piddster this week regarding some of the parts choices.
I think if we get a working prototype and the price seems reasonable, we can do a "group buy" on them. But I want to get a working unit to test on the slick surfaces this winter. Correct any issues that we find, then go into a final production run with a groupbuy.
if you get a good prototype before it starts snowing i have a ton of free time and know how to weld if you want help producing them
Brakes would be a nice option. We went without and it led to some mishaps like smashing into the garage at the end of the vid I posted.
brakes, tire sizes, possibly something as extreme as clutch options too. if I get my welder I might have some fun making one down here in Kato too
So is this going to be a stock class full of regulations or is there gunna be a open mod class for racing.
I think if we're going to have races at the ice race with them, it'd be a good idea to have a sanctioned setup. Because if someone wanted to piss away a ton of money and strap a 600cc sportbike motor onto a frame and drive it around the track, it wouldn't necessarily be fair to those of us that just want a cheap fun time.
If there turned out to be enough interest you could possibly run two classes. I would like to see a 100+ hp cart try go around an ice track lol.
how exactly would transportation of these to orr work? i mean would they be small enough to fit in your trunk or would we have to find someone with a trailer to fill with mini karts?
More than likely, you could tuck one into a wagon. It wouldn't be difficult to make the steering column removable and the seat removable to reduce height. Tough to say man, but there is no reason you couldn't transport a few of them in a truck bed.
