Lasers are great..... but totally excessive. You don't need one.
Roughly, you are looking to get the front wheels pointing dead-ahead while she's sitting in the kart, ready to go. That usually requires that you make the front wheels point a fraction OUTWARD while it's on the stand. Usually 1mm outward is the sort of target area.
All you need is:-
A piece of chalk
A builders tape measure
and that's it!
So....
1) make a chalk mark in the middle of each front tyre. The smaller the better BUT you must be able to see them!.
2) Set the steering dead ahead
3) Rotate BOTH chalk marks backward until the are as far backward as they can go.
4) Now, get your tape measure and measure the distance between the chalk marks. You may need to rotate the wheels a fraction forward as the chassis rails may be in the way if the chalk marks are as far back as possible.
5) Make a note of the measurement accurate to 1mm
6) Now rotate the wheels until the chalk marks are as far FORWARD as you can get them.
7) Fiddle the tape measure though the various bumpers, foot pedals, steering column until you can get it to line up, WITHOUT BENDING, with the chalk marks. Once again you may have to rotate the wheels backward a small amount to get it to line-up. Obviously, the ideal is to get the wheel rotated all the way back and all the way forward but you'll need to compromise..... but as little as possible.
8) write down that measurement, too.
9) Subtract one form the other and you'll have the toe-in/toe-out of your current settings.
Now..... the toe-in/out is controlled by the threaded pieces of rod: your track rods. Normally, one end is left thread and the other is right thread on EACH end of EACH track rod.
Undo the 'nut' at each end of one track rod: remembering there one is a left hand thread!!! Once both ends are no longer 'locked' by the nut, you can rotate the track rod. One rotation direction will give ,more toe-in and the other direction will give you more toe-out.
You now adjust that rod (by rotating it in the 'right' direction) and re-measuring and then re-subtracting one form the other.
You are aiming to have (VERY ROUGHLY!!!) 1mm of toe OUT on the stand. That should give roughly 0 to 1mm toe-IN when she sits in her kart. The thing which controls the amount of change of toe-in/out change is her weight an the flexibility of the chassis. The heavier and more flexible the chassis, the more the toe-in/out will change.
So, you simply adjust that track rod until you measure the correct 1mm toe-out! It's that easy!
Don't forget to tighten the lock nut you loosened. Then,for extra certainly, re-measure the toe in/out once you have it readied to perfection. You want to end-up with roughly 1mm toe-out on the stand!
Things to note!
*****************
Obviously, do not leave ANY track rod with less than (let's guess) 5 turns of thread embedded into the ball joint. If you do, it can simply pull out and she'll have no steering!
If the steering wheel sits at an angle when she's sat into it.... it does NOT matter..... much. I won't explain why here as it's too dull. However, you can re-set it to sit dead straight while pointing forward simply by adjusting both track rods until the steering wheel is 'straight'. Now, re-check the toe-in/out as before and it's be perfect.
Hope this helps
Ian
|
|
stub axle by 'SGracing' (06 Jul 2015 @ 21:30)
