Garage Hangout

The engine riser kit for my minibike arrived and I got everything mounted up square and torqued down properly with no real trouble.
I had to cut off the bar that the chain guard mounts to which I had already suspected, and I had to modify the plastic cover that came with the torque converter to get it to fit.
With the Go Power Sports stage 1 upgrade kit ( performance exhaust and air filter / intake) that I had on the original engine it was running pretty lean, so I swapped in the jet out of the GPS carb supplied with that upgrade kit and it's running great now.

Originally it got about 18mph if I was lucky, that upgrade kit boosted it up to 21mph, and with the engine swap & CVT I guessed that it had to be up to about 30mph.
Well I used the free GPS app on my phone and was surprised to see that my average top speed was 36mph.
This thing will wheelie if you're not careful which is surprising for these hefty big tube Colemans because they're more of a utility bike that was built for durability over speed.

Now all that is left to do is figure out the headlight situation since there's no plug on these predator 212's, it'll probably need a battery now and in that case I might as well upgrade to something much brighter.

Starting to work on the carriage.

I was hoping to have a 7/8-14 tap to clean up some of the threads, but no. I did have an 1/2"NPT tap with 14tpi and that did most of the work needed.



Lead screw back on, and everything works well, except the apron. Because when you buy a pile of parts, you don't know what you are missing until you needed it. And I was missing the front gib and carriage lock. So, while I am waiting on those to show up, I got as much else as I can working. Took a while for the cross slide gibs, as they were pretty beat up, but they work. I might have to pull out the unimat and make my own. We will see.

While I wait on parts, I will get the banjo cleaned up.

Oh ya, seriously, no way a shop would have touched that one Ray, and many guys including me would have no clue how to repair that. Honestly, the best I could have hoped to accomplish facing an issue like that would be tracking down and replacing the entire control panel and praying I could still find an old tired one still working to replace the original!

Ya, skills Ray, well beyond my abilities! Congrats on the diagnosis and repair!

I don't know what misfortune found you in 24, but I am very pleased to hear you are nearer your old self now! Like everyone else here we love it when you check in, and never tire of ogling your sweet rolling fleet! I hope we hear from you frequently as you are getting back up to full power!

Terribly sad hearing this news about one of our tight knit community here. While not unexpected, it is still sad news.I feel this news lands harder due to the modest volume of frequently posting members, which he was involved, active and engaged. I am sure everyone will miss Randy's posts, thoughts and ideas.

Goodfellow said it well, Godspeed Randy's! I will echo that sentiment as I can think of nothing more fitting!

Well, ain't that a bitch.

Missing another good one.

A true loss to our site (and many other as well). He was a straight up guy and we'll miss him.

Godspeed Randy!

Just saw this post on Garage Journal

Hello, I am wantedabiggergarage's brother (Jeff Stevenson). I wanted to post as I saw Ryan's email while I was wrapping up his affairs and as you all were thinking about him, figured I would go ahead and post here. His name was Randal Stevenson and he passed away on 10/28. Here is his Obit: https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/name/randal-stevenson-obituary?id=59926104

Ryan, thank you for reaching out. I am sure it is a breach of protocol, but he wanted me to clean up the last of his affairs and as you had emailed him, I figured you would be ok with me logging in to advise of what happened. Randal had been dealing with colon cancer the last 2 years that metastasized to his liver and that was what ultimately got him. He was 100% convinced he was going to beat it until the last 2-3 months of his life, but the chemo just didn't have any effect other than making him more sick. It is funny that the first 25 years of our lives we never really got along that well but that changed considerably over the last 30....and I so truly miss him now. If you have any questions or need to reach out, you can email me at greymane@hotmail.com as his email will be closed shortly and we won't have further access to the account. I also probably won't be checking back here so if you need anything you can email me directly....just advise in the header that it is about Randal if you send anything as I don't want to mark something as spam by accident.

Thank you for all your concern though....Randal had a number of passions (too many for his time unfortunately) and I am sure this was one of them.

Jeff Stevenson

Thanks Tim! ...and you're correct, these relatively simple fixes would cost a quite a lot to have done at a shop that still repairs things (if you can find one). Dealers won't even touch it because the parts are not available anymore.

Even good shops will only install a used unit and not attempt to properly repair the thing. A used unit is VERY expensive these days, and since it's not upgraded, the same issue will likely occur in the near future.

We folks on the GG are a dying breed. No one wants to repair any components in the automotive field anymore, and manufacturers are happy to oblige. They make more money by not making anything repairable == just throw it away.

Nice work ray! You saved yourself a bunch of money on that repair I'm sure.