UPDATED LINKS: Use for a Broken Trolling Motor

[scarkner]

UPDATED LINKS TO MY OWN SERVER - THEY WORK NOW...

A while ago I posted asking if anyone had an old trolling motor that I could re-purpose into a go-Kart.

Thanks to member David for coming through with a 50lb thrust motor, exactly what I was looking for!

Here are some videos of the resulting kart which is working pretty good. I also thought it was interesting that the rule of thumb is that 25lb thrust is about equivalent to 1hp. So the 50hp motor should be 2hp. I actually measured the horsepower output when used on this kart and it came to 1.98hp. Wow, that is really really close!!!

Crank the volume, it is amazing how quiet electric is!
The kid experimenting - mp4 file
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/653 ... drives.mp4

And then I went for a ride. The kart does about 16km/hr with me on it (230lbs), goes about 12 up hills. Surprisingly, it won't go on grass with me on it, not enough power
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/653 ... drives.mp4


We plan on taking it on the ice this winter around the ice fishing hut (you can see on the videos that I worked hard to give it maximum ground clearance). I may play around with the gearing to see if I can get a bit more "oomph" out of it.

[smitty55]

Links aren't working for me Steve.

Cheers

[scarkner]

Links aren't working for me Steve.

Cheers

Hopefully fixed now. That was my first time trying to use Facebook with the "public" video setting. Sad to see it didn't work. So I went back to my usual method of using a Dropbox public link.

Also an update that the Kart doesn't do well in grass going up hill. Just too much resistance. So I am going to put a second set of gears on it to allow for an on-road and off-road selection. Hopefully that will give it more ooooomph.

[Fishoholic]

That's pretty cool, thanks for sharing. My niece and nephew would love that. Note to self, do not toss old trolling motor. Looking forward to an update on the gears once you do that.

[scarkner]

I changed the gear ratio from 3.75:1 to 6.0:1 on the Kart and am really happy with the result.

The top-speed going downhill dropped a little, about 6%
Top-speed going up a slope (with me on it) went up a little, about 8%

average is around 16km/hr with me on it and about 20km/hr with my son on it.

Way more fun turning in circles because it has so much more torque that it is actually hard to hold on!
Can do a standing-start on grass with me on it.
Actually snaps jon’s head back when he is on it and hits the gas.

The REALLY incredible part…

Power consumption going up a hill with me on it at full throttle, power used to be about 840 watts but it now only uses 480 watts!!! On level ground it will coast at a low 200-250 watts. Incredible. Certainly it is now in the motors sweet spot.