A good while ago we had attempted to play with this Coleman go kart that we picked up from a friend. We were able to ride around for a short while, going through the grass and over the gravel, despite its apparent slow speed, all things considered. After a while, we started smelling rubber burning and before we knew it, the drive belt shredded and fell apart. That ended the fun for that day, and for the next year almost.
I finally decided to start getting the parts needed to get this machine back online so we can be able to use it for both recreation and utility, since having a motor vehicle can be useful for going up and down between the house and the garage or even down to the main road if need be. I started off with the drive belt. After trying to put the belt on and run the machine we ended up finding out that part of the torque converter assembly, which consists of two separate clutches, was failing. The portion on the motor, which changes RPM obviously, has a variable width pulley that closes in on the belt as the RPM's ramp up, putting pressure on the belt, giving it the grip to drive the go kart forward. This clutch was not moving in and out like it was supposed to, it needed replacing. So back to the drawing board. I ordered the two clutches, so just in case the other one turns out to be faulty, at least I can say I have both parts to the torque converter system so we won't have any delays again. Installation of the clutch was pretty straightforward. The clutch comes apart into several pieces but the main pieces that I needed to focus on were the two halves that squeeze against the belt on either side. The inner half of the clutch looks like a simple half of a pulley with a standard hub with integrated key. This was slid on the engine shaft first. From there I placed the belt on the gearbox clutch and over the engine shaft, onto the stubby shaft of the inner portion of the clutch. From there I put the whole outer half, which consists of the spring/weights inside a drum that push out to move the other half of the pulley against the outside of the belt to engage it. Lastly there was a thick retaining washer piece with a key end to engage the keyway on the engine shaft and go into the hub of the clutch, mating to the end of the engine shaft. A simple bolt held the washer against the end of the engine shaft. With the whole torque converter assembly put back together on the go kart it was time to fire the engine up. After setting the choke and turning the ignition switch on, I fired the engine up. After letting the engine warm up a bit, I worked the throttle real quick to see how the clutch worked and it quickly grabbed the belt, wanting to launch the go kart forward. With that apparent success I moved some stuff out of the way and staged the go kart at the driveway to do a test ride. I hopped in and hit the throttle and the torque converter did its job, engaging the belt tightly and dragging the go kart forward. The speed wasn't really the best in my opinion, I felt it had more to it but I remember the friend who had it said he did something to the throttle to govern it to a slower speed for his kids to use, this was never addressed but either way, I just continued driving along the driveway at a cruising speed, letting the go kart pull along. After passing the ole lady who was just coming back from doing a tire run for me, and the dog who was eager to see her, I continued on down to the beginning of the main driveway. It was around this point the engine started surging then sputtering before it completely petered out. I got out and tried to restart to no avail. I worked the choke and the throttle and could not get the damn thing to stay running. I ended up putting the thing on 3/4 choke to get it to where it would start up and stay running and by that time the ole lady came down saying I was too heavy for the go kart because it appeared to have been dragging ass the whole way down. Well whatever, I still feel there's an issue with the carburetor on this engine that is main problem. Either way she forced herself into the go kart's driver seat and took off, if you can call it that, going back up to the garage. As stated the carburetor was acting goofy in that it sputtered out, whether from not getting proper fuel flow or because there's bad gas in the unit or even water in the unit. I had problems with this carb before when we tried to use the machine but after it sat this long I'm sure its even more compromised, despite the go kart sitting in the garage for a long time. The biggest thing I have to look at is the fact that the torque converter did indeed work. It grabbed and it drove the go kart, even with my big ass, down the driveway and took the ole lady back up the driveway. The only thing is the carburetor. Just like the generators that we recently repaired, the carburetors aren't too ridiculously expensive so I will be able to get one more sooner than later and at this time I can also address whatever it was our friend did with the throttle and/or carb to slow down the maximum engine RPM in order to tap into this engine's full potential and be able to really ride this thing when we get it back on the road. In the meantime the go kart is parked right back where we had it, still needing just a little more work.
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