The Easyrider Thread. Or, Toyman is working on a mini tank this time.

You may have heard a bought another weird machine from another state. Well, last week I made the 2600 mile trip to go get it. The trip itself was thread deserving and I may post that up after I get done going through all the pictures. 

For now, on with the show.

The item in question is a 1970 Easyrider. From the other thread about this...

What my pile of machinery looks like.

It is really an interesting machine. The throttle is controlled by a thumb lever like many ATVs. Steering is handled by the bars, but what the handle bars do is surprisingly complicated. If you turn left, it disengages the left track through a clutch disk and pressure plate. It also applies a disk brake that is formed into the clutch plate. So, up front you have two clutches with disk brakes on them. One for each track. There is also an additional disk brake that is used to actually stop the machine. It is controlled by a brake lever on the bars. The reason it didn't want to turn in the video posted in the other thread is one of the clutches is out of adjustment. 

Power is provided by a 2 cylinder, 2 stroke, 399cc, 25+-hp, Kohler. It was running when my friend picked it up. He said it was a stone-cold bitch to start and sure enough it is. I haven't figured out the trick yet. It has very weak spark. I did pull the flywheel and go through the points and stator wiring but that didn't help any. I can't even get it to fire on ether. I have done is some studying and some research. The engine is not original to the machine, it is out of an Arctic Cat snowmobile. They came with a Sachs 300cc from the factory. There are exactly zero new parts available for the Kohler. Since I really don't like 2 strokes, there is a good chance it will go away and be replaced with a v twin 4 stroke in the 22-25 hp range. If I go that route, I will have to source a CVT drive pulley that will fit the new engine and still work with the driven pulley on the transmission. The existing pulley is a taper fit and most 4 stroke engine use straight keyed shafts. Looks like a new engine and pulley could be fairly expensive. $$$$. 

Power from the engine is run through a large belt-driven CVT clutch into a transmission of some description. According to the lever the transmission has 2 forward speeds, neutral, and reverse. 

My biggest worry about buying this was the tracks. They are 50+ years old and are showing their age. It looks like the tracks are made out of 12" wide conveyor belt. I can order that from Grainger and I'm smart enough to figure out how to attach them if needed.  If you look in the bottom picture you can see the joint where the belt was lapped and vulcanized. 

The center guides that keep the tracks on the bogies are just bolted through the belt. 

So, for now I'm at the stage of figuring out how deep to get into this thing. Part of me wants to get it running asap and abuse it. Part of me wants to fix it right. I'm still undecided so far and I have a boat to finish first. Don't be surprised if you don't see any updates on this in the near future. 

Till next time...

There actually are adapters available to fit those tapered primary clutches on a 4-stroke industrial engine with a straight shaft. Some changes to the clutch springs/weights may be required. Thank the golf cart modification world:

https://www.amazon.com/Tapered-Drive-Clutch-Adapter-Predator/dp/B079WN534P

A 420cc Predator engine from Harbl Freight would do quite nicely. 

The track is guaranteed for life, so you shouldn't have anything to worry about there...

Woody (Forum Supportum) said:

The track is guaranteed for life, so you shouldn't have anything to worry about there...

Does that mean that there's someone to honor that warranty, or that they should last this long and still be fine? I can't imagine that there's product support for it. 

Well that's super cool.

That current engine looks like a face full of heat, noise, and exhaust.

Floating Doc (Forum Supporter) said:

Woody (Forum Supportum) said:

The track is guaranteed for life, so you shouldn't have anything to worry about there...

Does that mean that there's someone to honor that warranty, or that they should last this long and still be fine? I can't imagine that there's product support for it. 

It means they are counting on the machine to shorten the warranty period.  Cool project.

One thing I had to reteach myself when I was rebuilding the Herter's boat and the Evinrude for it, spark plugs mean a whole helluva lot more for two strokes than they do for four strokes.  Throw some new plugs in and try it again.

I love the fact that this shares a garage with the jet boat. Totally appropriate. 

I am very pleased to see a thread on this thing. I saw it on the trailer in your other one and was dying to know more.

Keith Tanner said:

I love the fact that this shares a garage with the jet boat. Totally appropriate. 

If only the jet boat was big enough to haul it. 

Can the jet boat be converted to a landing craft and carry the Easy Rider so you can storm some beaches?

John Welsh said:

Can the jet boat be converted to a landing craft and carry the Easy Rider so you can storm some beaches?

Please? We need this....

Toyman01 + Sized and said:

You may have heard a bought another weird machine from another state. Well, last week I made the 2600 mile trip to go get it. The trip itself was thread deserving and I may post that up after I get done going through all the pictures. 

For now, on with the show.

The item in question is a 1970 Easyrider. From the other thread about this...

What my pile of machinery looks like.

It is really an interesting machine. The throttle is controlled by a thumb lever like many ATVs. Steering is handled by the bars, but what the handle bars do is surprisingly complicated. If you turn left, it disengages the left track through a clutch disk and pressure plate. It also applies a disk brake that is formed into the clutch plate. So, up front you have two clutches with disk brakes on them. One for each track. There is also an additional disk brake that is used to actually stop the machine. It is controlled by a brake lever on the bars. The reason it didn't want to turn in the video posted in the other thread is one of the clutches is out of adjustment. 

Power is provided by a 2 cylinder, 2 stroke, 399cc, 25+-hp, Kohler. It was running when my friend picked it up. He said it was a stone-cold bitch to start and sure enough it is. I haven't figured out the trick yet. It has very weak spark. I did pull the flywheel and go through the points and stator wiring but that didn't help any. I can't even get it to fire on ether. I have done is some studying and some research. The engine is not original to the machine, it is out of an Arctic Cat snowmobile. They came with a Sachs 300cc from the factory. There are exactly zero new parts available for the Kohler. Since I really don't like 2 strokes, there is a good chance it will go away and be replaced with a v twin 4 stroke in the 22-25 hp range. If I go that route, I will have to source a CVT drive pulley that will fit the new engine and still work with the driven pulley on the transmission. The existing pulley is a taper fit and most 4 stroke engine use straight keyed shafts. Looks like a new engine and pulley could be fairly expensive. $$$$. 

Power from the engine is run through a large belt-driven CVT clutch into a transmission of some description. According to the lever the transmission has 2 forward speeds, neutral, and reverse. 

My biggest worry about buying this was the tracks. They are 50+ years old and are showing their age. It looks like the tracks are made out of 12" wide conveyor belt. I can order that from Grainger and I'm smart enough to figure out how to attach them if needed.  If you look in the bottom picture you can see the joint where the belt was lapped and vulcanized. 

The center guides that keep the tracks on the bogies are just bolted through the belt. 

So, for now I'm at the stage of figuring out how deep to get into this thing. Part of me wants to get it running asap and abuse it. Part of me wants to fix it right. I'm still undecided so far and I have a boat to finish first. Don't be surprised if you don't see any updates on this in the near future. 

Till next time...

Lemme see if I can get you some 12 inch wide conveyor belt.  I probably can.  Or, I can get you some full width conveyor belt and you can figure out a way to cut it...

Rabenr45 at g mail dot com

Rather than Vulcanizing look at Flexco fasteners.  

In reply to wvumtnbkr:

I'll give you a shout if I need them. They are down the list a bit. I did find them on Grainger as well. 

In reply to Datsun310Guy :

Those are in my Grainger shopping cart now so I can find them if needed.

Those sure look like old VW Pressure plates to me. Probably 180MM disks as well. 58ish to 67ish beetle/bus setup

One 20 hp zero-turn acquired for the princely sum of $300. 

There is a pretty fair chance I will be using the engine and the transmissions out of it. 

More to come as things happen. 

In university a team of four of us built an amphibious all-terrain vehicle. Rather than tracks it had four tires, but it was skid steer. The fully enclosed transmission was controlled by two levers so you could control either side independently, one side in forward and the other in reverse. It steered by disengaging the side you wanted to turn toward.  It was built for a competition that eventually evolved into the FSAE. A bunch of college kids out racing self built vehicles in a lake......what could possibly go wrong. This build is giving me flashbacks.......

Got the mower off the trailer this morning. 

The battery took a charge last night. The starter solenoid is bad, but jumping it with a screwdriver got the engine turning over. It will fire on ether, but it looks like the fuel pump is dead. The zon has the pump for $12 so I ordered one. It should be here tomorrow. Then I can get it fired up and see what does and doesn't work. 

The drive system on the mower is pretty simple. I assumed it was a hydrostatic transmission but it's basically two belt-driven hydraulic pumps, two variable forward and reverse valves, and two hydraulic motors on the wheels. It's tempting to use those parts but I bet it would be very slow. The mower only runs 7 mph with the motors direct driving the wheels. I'm not sure the motors would have enough power to drive the tracks if I geared it for speed. 

More to come. 

Success! Might be the best $300 I've spent. 

Now to tear it apart. 

10 months and a couple of other projects later... 

The Easy Rider has been languishing in the shop, buried under a pile of boat parts, and mostly cursed when I had to walk around it to find something. 

I had stripped the more for parts months ago. The engine and everything I thought I might use was also piled on the machine. Getting the Bentley in the shop required an excavation project and getting the Easy Rider mobile. With that in mind, I bought 4 large furniture dollies and set the machine on them. They not only let me shove the machine off in a corner, out of the way, but they also let me drag it back to the middle of the shop to work on it. Lo and behold, that actually happened today. 

I made the command decision a couple of weeks ago to keep the transmission and clutches instead of changing everything out to hydrostatic when I dropped the hydrostatic parts in the scrap trailer. We are moving on toward installing the newsed engine. 

Step one. Remove the old engine. Done. That also gives me a better look at the transmission. Knowing y'all like pictures, I took one. IIRC this gives me 2 forward speeds and reverse. CVT input to two clutches and then chain drive to the front sprockets for the tracks. I'm probably going to pull the top off of it before I get the new engine installed to service it. I'll take pictures for you guys when I do. 

The existing engine mounts are flat bar. I'm pretty sure the 4-stroke is going to stress them more than the 2-stroke so I'm going to change them out for something a little stronger.

The 4-stroke V4 is also a good bit bigger and heavier than the 2-stroke I2. 

The new engine was temporarily set in place to get ideas for mounts and belt clearances. The old clutch is taper mounted. The new engine has a straight shaft. I took some measurements of the old clutch and found a clutch I'm 95% certain will work. It's on the way and should be here this week. I need it on hand to figure out the final placement of the engine.

More to come as it happens.  

I didn't know new stuff like this was available.

Datsun310Guy said:

I didn't know new stuff like this was available.

 

I drive past the ARGO plant in New Hamburg on my way to work, they're made by Ontario Drive & Gear (ODG).