From shifter to KA

Im looking into the making the switch from shifter to KA this year. This last weekend made a lot of my new physical issues from my motocross accident apparent, and I feel like i would have a lot more enjoyable time with my limited time at the track if I’m not just trying to to survive 3/4 of my seat time.

I have a total of about 15 laps in a TaG kart. 10 years of driving shifters and zero experience even wrenching on anything else.

I guess I’m mostly just looking for any advice that is going to make starting out a little smoother. The plan is to pull the front brakes off of my Praga Dragon and start there. I’ll be running shifter hubs at first but I can swap those out after a bit.

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Advice: send it.

The 100s are a hoot and not too bad on the body. It’s like x30, lite.

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Pretty much everything about the experience will get easier. Having recently moved back into single-speed karting after a decade of shifters the one thing that is going to be difficult, and of utmost importance will be momentum conservation. You don’t realize how much you can depend on the HP to cover up small mistakes until you take all that power away. As they say, be smooth!

Driving is 10x less physical than the shifter, so your body will thank you.

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That’s definitely what I’m hoping. Fast is fun. Not being capable of fast without being able to do tons of training is not. Living as far away from the tracks as I do make seat time difficult unless I can go camp out at the track for the weekend.

I’m a bit older than you, so maybe my experience won’t apply. After running single speed karts for 15 year I started shifters at 63-64 YO and ran them for 3 years. It wasn’t so bad during the winter but during the 100F plus days, I wouldn’t have been disappointed if the race was cut in half, as I was exhausted and just surviving. Bottomline, it wasn’t fun and why kill myself if it’s not. Some that have just raced shifters might consider the KA100 a real let down but the competition is tight and you’re rewarded through skillful driving, race tactics and setting up the kart.

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I can completely understand that. I live on the Oregon coast and my local tracks are along I5. There’s easily a possibility of a 20° difference at any time of the year.

I’m 38, and I severely broke my femur and hip 3 years ago, complete with a fungal infection. The trauma and the medication I was on to control the infection so my bone would heal has definitely had an effect on my temperature regulation.

Another thing I have to deal with is the internal pounding my hip can take from having hardware in it. I really need a seat that opens up a little more in that area.

I look forward to the challenge of the KA and learning some new skills.

I have seen people cut holes in the hip area of a seat to relieve pressure, doesn’t seem to be huge stressed portion of the seat. :man_shrugging:

I’ll have to look into it. I managed to gain 20 lbs over the winter and probably need to put the #2 back in and pad it a bit.

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I can has engine!

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You don’t need to pull the breaks off, you can simply connect the brake rod to the rear master only, effectively deactivating the fronts. Then when you have the other hubs, remove the whole system as a unit.

Second thing to do is loosen the third bearing cassette. Take the bolts off, use zip ties to hold in place.

I will have hubs tomorrow. Fortunately IPKs aren’t that bad to disassemble.

Noted on the bearing.

Do I need to worry about an airbox mount?

I think some might use them, a lot do not. You can usually get them to rest on the frame, sometimes use a zip-tie to help keep it from bouncing around too much. Also depends on what kind of mount and what angle mount.

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Yeah not necessary. The boot and box are pretty tough. The old Yamaha airboxes had a tendency to tear at the boot so we used a cradle for that. But hasn’t been an issue for KA.

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Try a NEK/Jecko/IMAF modular seat. They are cut out around the hip section a little bit more than the conventional Tillet style, and they extend a little further forward that you can use you thighs some. I use the seat for my daughter and since she has hips, it helps her fit in the seat better.

We don’t use an airbox mount, and have not had a single issue in the 4 years we’ve been running the KA.

Finally got it all together. I’m going to take it to work Friday so I can talk to my students about alignment and then first drive Saturday. As always I’m jumping right into a race weekend with something new.

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Nice looking kart!

Now tell us about that pup.

Lol. Pupper’s name is Ruckus. He’s 12 weeks old, either a house shark or a cuddle bug, and makes it really hard to leave the house in the morning. He also doesn’t like it when I’m on the other side of the kart as him.

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14/10, would give seat. Those paws are :heart_eyes:.