It was suggested by several that I start a thread of the necessary repairs and upgrades to the recently acquired triple E I came across recently!
After 1 lap the thing just seemed to fall apart! What I first thought was a blown
motor ((
Internal Combustion Engine ? )) was actually a pipe that was welded to the manifold and hard mounted to the frame that had cracked, thus dropping the clutch guard down onto the moving clutch... man what a racket!! Being as I was out of town, and sceduled some racing, and riding with Hoser this Month, I took it to a shop in Fountain Hills. Some might have heaerd of Jay, who used to do a lot of Fab work for ATV Racing! Jay used to race the MT and Pace series and owns DESERT DOG OFFROAD! He is a real nice guy and IMO very knowledgable about these old cars! He knew his way around Ricks Briggsbuilt today when rick came to pick me up for a ride!
In an attempt to help Jay (and myself) i offered to take the car apart today to provide access to the Engine compartment for jay to "fix" my pipe... Once I got this all apart... Basically removed the panels, the seat, and the heat shield here is what I found...
The seat was just installed by Jay... Very professional done and well thought out! He didn't have much time or room to work with but he did a great job doing it! I then found the heat shield had been ZIP TIED in place... Jay explained to me that this was how he found it when he pulled the old seat out... he did rivit the two pieces togeter so they would not rattle... He told me about this last week, but since I was ready to go race I forgot about this??? What happenend to the original mounting points of the heat shield???
Next was to remove the Clutch Gaurd, and this was where MY heart SANK... I delved into this and found that the clutch gaurd was directly mounted to the PIPE??? No wonder the pipe broke!!! Jay then came over to see what he had in store for him... This is when he "taught" me that the pipe should have NEVER been welded directly to the manifold! Instead it should have been done like the PIlot or Odyssey... He then pointed out that the motor (( Internal Combustion Engine ? )) was way loose, but that will have to get fixed later... He pointed out that as the motor (( Internal Combustion Engine ? )) vibrates, the pipe should be loose... BUT We found where these pipes were hard mounted to several places in the frame, and only found ONE pilot style muffler mount/hanger...
After seeing all this it was suggested I drag this to PowerPro's in California and get this issue fixed once and for all! He told me he could PATCH this but wouldn't gaurantee it for obvious reasons...
Upon further inspection I discovered the other pipe had a big ass crack in it as well... So California here I come!!!
He is trying to find replacement buttons for the clutch, and has already ordered the seals for the tranny...