Road Rat Motors wants your input!

[justin jackrel]

Hey everyone,

So obviously most of you know about us by now. We want to design a new chassis that gives you, the racing community, what you're looking for. So, now is your time to help out! Our goal remains the same... produce a kart that is competitive in the clone classes but for an affordable price. Many of you have seen or driven one of our karts, and over the last few years we've made several major improvements, but we know there is tons of room for even more growth. If you could make changes to our kart to make it a kart that you'd be interested in racing, what kind of things would you want? What size axle? What size front spindles? What kind of features do you wish we provided standard?

We also will be looking for a few experienced racers who would be willing to work hand in hand with our team to improve our chassis. Those who are selected will be sent one of the new karts for testing and feedback once they have been produced. I look forward to hearing from you all.
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www.RoadRatMotors.com
America's Leader in Affordable Karting

[Matt Skaggs]

I have been in karting since 1988 and raced every form and went to cars and now back to karts. I currently run SEKA, The South East Karting Alliance in TN. I have seen the Road Rats and even had one show up and race at one of my events.
If your goal is to have a Clone Model, which is def. The #1 growing and most affordable form of karting these days, you need to keep the axle small like 1"1/4 like most 4 cycle karts have. WKA isn't even allowing the 50mm axle in Clone this year. Front spindles should also be small. These built Clones are around 12-13 HP. So rotating weight and making the kart free as possible are the keys to success. CLONE is by far the biggest thing in dirt racing as well. To be competitive, you have to have an offset kart but with that market being so big, you may want to explore making an offset as well.
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Matt Skaggs ,SEKA karting series, Zamp Helmets

[Keith Bridgeman]

Sorry but I hate to say this but the first thing is change your name. Road rat just sounds to corny. It's hard to take that name seriously
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http://bridgemanbroskarting.blogspot.com/
Merlin / Maxter KZ

[Dan Schlosser]

To be seriously considered as a viable racing product better steel sourcing and skilled labor are mandatory. I'm all for anything that makes karting more accesible to more people but there are minimum acceptable standards IMO.

[John Wehrheim]

Justin,
I have not seen one of your karts recently, but if you want to sell more karts you will need to do the following at a minimum.
1. Better welds and better butt joints. also possibly better steel.
2. Better brakes. I believe the kart I saw had cable brakes and not hydraulic.
3. Get rid of that massive ugly bumper.

I would also look at the top 4 cycle chassis' to see what the use and have done.

[Todd Kageals]

How about building an affordable shifter with decent brakes????? I'd be intersted in that!

[Britt Robinson]

[justin jackrel]

Thanks for the input so far. We are already planning on using adjustable front ends, adjustable rear axle cassettes, and chrome moly steel. The welding over the last year has also improved dramatically. In fact, all of our concession karts are already switched over to the new chrome moly frame. Our new body kit is almost finished and will be released shortly as well. We currently use a 1 1/4 axle on our full body and oval karts, but we use a 40mm axle on our sprint kart.

What are your thoughts to the axle size that should be used for the Sprint kart?
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www.RoadRatMotors.com
America's Leader in Affordable Karting

[paul hir]

[Walt Gifford]

Are you still mounting the motor on rubber shock mounts? I'd like to see a side winder motor mount system and MCP brakes. I wouldn't drive one with the single puck yard kart brakes I've seen on them.

Thanks,
Gif
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FAA certified jet engine and aircraft technician
Nicholson Speedway class champion 2001
Yamaha KT100 Service Center
40 years karting experience

[Russell Stevens]

Just looking at the pictures from your website I have a couple of suggestions.

Your mounting points for the side pods look different from anyone else. You may want to consider changing these mounts closer to where everyone else is putting them.

Extend the rear frame tubes, put cross tubes on it for a rear bar, even if you only offer the removable bar as an optional add-on it will add to the (perception?) of tunability.

Slip fit the rear bumper within the frame tubes. Cross pins and a rubber bushing, or an expanding friction bushing (like most of the rest of the karting industry) would be preferrable to the flat plates and bolts you currently use. It would also appear that you have a few too many cross bars in the rear hoop. It needs to be able to take a hit from the sides and rear, not the top and bottom (although those paralell bars are not adding as much top to bottom as diagonal bars would in that respect).

[Ryen Miller]

first step for road rat..... DONT HAVE THE CHINESE BUILD IT. poor guy had a brake line come apart on him at the track. and all my normal gokart parts wouldnt work, too bad i left my china pitbike at home cuz it had the right fitting he needed......

road rat karts are bassicaly knock offs of real karts so its kind of a lost cause..
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d3funct@gmail.com

[Greg Dingess]

[John Matthews]

Like this from 2007?

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Hi Dan,

I called you guys earlier this week but didn't hear
back. Give me a call when you can at 480-641-0398

As far as the rolling chassis thing I don't see any
reason you couldn't use your current kart. As you've
probably figured out getting new classes started is
pretty tough since most clubs already have too many
classes for the number of drivers. Both IKF and WKA
have stock briggs classes and shops like them because
we can make a profit building the engines.

The biggest thing you need to change on your chassis
is removing the motor mount (keep the international
spacing). If you could provide an adjustable aluminum
mount it would be great but the steel plate makes it
look like a fun kart.

Also, you could ship without tires and I don't think
anyone would mind since most tracks have a spec tire
rule anyway.

As for pricing, the chassis you have now with a list
price of $699 would work. That would allow shops to
install a stock briggs and sell the package for about
$1500. It would be even better if it sold for $499 but
I don't have any idea how much it costs you to build
and import them.

If you're interested we may be able to work together
on marketing this product. I might be able to get a 4
time IKF Duffy winner and legendary engine builder to
endorse them....

Give me a call when you can.

Thanks,

John Matthews

--- Gator Imports - Dan <dan@gatorimports.com> wrote:

> Hi John,
>
> How are things going? Justin wanted me to contact
> you because he saw one of your postings on
> ekartingnews. You had mentioned that it would be
> good if we just sold a chasis with no motor. We are
> interested in doing this, but wanted to get some
> feedback from you especially. If you could give me
> an idea of what you think would work that would be
> great. Should it be our kart just without the motor?
> Or do you have some ideas of things we can change to
> make it better. You have seen our karts and with
> your background and experience any help you can
> offer would be great. Also what price range do think
> would be appropriate (both retail and dealer costs)?
> Thanks for all your help.
>
> Daniel Borcher
> Gator Imports
> 1-866-3GATORS
> www.GatorImports.com

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I think you had your chance.
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John Matthews
Heartbeat Power, LLC.

[Walt Gifford]

so, is this thread just cheap ad space?