Kimjon

Paints done. I've done better...but it's rough enough. Now it's literally a matter of watching paint dry, then onto final assembly.

Etch primer: Waiting on it to dry, then final paint to come.

Few more brackets to hold stuff:

Okay, smashed it out today...non-stop from 9:00 to 16:40 which goes to show how a stupid amount of time can go into a toy! Exhaust done: Then a bumper:

Fit a waste gate bypass eh? Liking your style!

Thanks Muncie - I'm using #35 chain/sprocket on this one as I had some already, but your offer was much appreciated. Exhaust: The factory exhaust just had a round hole, cheap to manufacturer I guess...but we can do better than that! So I scribed the exhaust port shape onto the flange and tickled it into submission. Finished up by draw-filing to make sure it mates up flat (it was miles out, most likely warped from factory welding). I then cut the expansion chamber up like I did in the gokart build, with the plan to wrap it around the immovable parts but still make a nice flow...okay; its all about looks, but hey.

Thanks. It's working great, holds about 70% air pressure in the tank overnight (for 15hrs its turned off, on an automatic timer from 7:00pm to 10:00am the following morning). That's heaps of air to open/close the gates many times. The cylinders are choked right down, this has resulted in the gates staying put even with no air, which wasn't planned...but a cool spin off. I was thinking about locking cylinders, but they really aren't required as the gates don't move. I painted the cylinders in 2K paint to try hide them as the silver contrast stuck out. I think they look much better now. Overall I'm stoked with them.

Then I ran out of mig gas. This wasn't really a surprise...i knew the bottle was close to empty, but been a tight arse I decided to run it completely empty. Just sucks that its a weekend. Anyway, all fabrication is done, just gotta stick it together with the "metal hot glue gun"

Then I made this engine mount...once again I over complicated it. I wanted to shift the engine rearward hopefully preventing burning my arse on the exhaust.

Okay, no bender jokes please: yes, this is the world's most complicated bracket to hold a simple plastic fuel tank.

Some minor butchery and voila!

Going to use this rear end from a kids quad. I brought it off trademe, someone scavenged all the good bits for a project of their own... but all I wanted was the axle. These old school gokart rims bolt straight on too, awesomeness!

Do it, it will be badass!

Be rude not to... More to come. Kj

Great result in all regards! Well done.

Haha...I kind of skipped all the safety features, so to ease my conscience I'm running 6mm lines and heavily choked exhaust side flow controllers to slow it right down. The cylinders do have air cushions so I can speed them up a bit more...I'll play around and find the sweet spot. Locking cylinders are a good idea, I have some that would work...I'll have to think about that one and test if I really need them? I have a spring open/air to close cylinder here...hmmmm that could be a nice fail safe solution????? I've got a 1/2" dump valve (solenoid 230v ac) that I'm going to hookup to the compressor tank on a timer. The compressor itself will also go on a timer too. This way I can automate the entire system i.e. - Compressor purges water from tank once a day, with timer set at say 10:00am for a 5 second burst. - Then the compressor timer allows recharging between say 10:01am to 7:00pm. Then it will turn itself off overnight so it won't wake me up during the night. As long as my system holds air, it will be sweet as to run like this. The tank has plenty of reserve to open/close the gates many times even when the compressor is turned off.

So here's the solution to a true first world problem. I need to play around with the flow controllers to set the speeds at which the gates open etc...to "time" them. Warning, you'll lose a minute of your life you'll never get back if you watch this!

Maybe. Hopefully just a run flat system that lasts about a year? Only one way to find out?

I made up this control cabinet. Battery (not pictured) slots into this cabinet behind the valve. The cabinet works great, however my cylinders had worn piston seals and were leaking a lot of air out the exhaust. Going to replace the leaking piston seals and then we'll be in action!

Trademe. I looked at eBay, but it wasn't any cheaper. I'll use it on other projects too, so I kind of justify its cost to myself that way...But I did feel the pain when paying for it.

Pneumatic cylinders fitted up. The one on the left has a dummy barrel added to try balance the symmetry better, as it only had a 190mm stroke. They swing and stop perfectly, which was fantastic as all that maths paid off big time. Just got to get a few pneumatic fittings and some air line and it will be all go.

Got some black 2K paint onto the mounting brackets I welded up yesterday.They can dry over the day/night (its a bit cold today) and that should be one of many steps closer towards getting it finished. I tested the solenoid valve and that's all go too. This stuff is getting so cheap these days, $10 for a brand new solenoid valve! I brought myself a spare one just in case it fails at an inopportune time.

Funny thing is I can see an error on that diagram 298+298 = 598??? It's a "typo", but more reason to learn how to add

Fyi; here's the vector diagram for the pivot points. I did it on an old school tech drawing board first, then did it mathematically afterwards to get better numbers using trigonometry. I then made a 1:1 template which I used to guild my drill when drilling the anchor points. The brackets received a coat of etch primer and I'll hopefully paint and install it all tomorrow

I ordered a cheap wireless remote, that controls some relays. Here it is boggied up to see if it works Which it did. I'll use it to control a 5/2 solenoid valve via a 12vdc battery as a power supply. I calculated that a 7Ahr battery would last about 420 days of use, so I'll just run with that. The solenoid will operate two pneumatic cylinders. I made this up this morning from a 1300mm stroke cylinder that i got for free, which I shortened to 598mm That's it test fitted. It took me all week to figure out the vectors, as it moves the gate 133° of arc. 90° is easy, but anything beyond that took a little figuring out. Although, now I understand the principal it would only take a minute to do next time