ROPER Utility\Trail Build

Yea 7hp might be a bit small, alternators make a lot of drag.

Doug Fackler wrote:

Yea 7hp might be a bit small, alternators make a lot of drag.

yep i noticed that... and with the new pulley swap i did its even worse... also its not even a true 7hp its a 6.5clone. i might try to get a 8hp flathead but i dont know i thats going to be enough, mr modified seems to get away with 8hp on his new machine.

Mr.Modified has a jackshaft to alleviate the stress on the engine.

Is it a Predator series?

no its not a predator.. i live in canada... but its just another 6.5hp honda clone. how would a jackshaft help with the stress on the engine ?

It allows you to go pretty low with the pulley sizes. I think Mr. Modified's Simplicity runs at about 10mph

sadeoo7 wrote:

no its not a predator.. i live in canada... but its just another 6.5hp honda clone. how would a jackshaft help with the stress on the engine ?

Ah. Its probably pretty similar though. Removing the governor might help, as well as getting an intake adapter and pod filter and adjustable jet to help with intake flow. And of course a new exhaust.

A jackshaft makes it so the engine just has to focus on turning the jackshaft and alternator. Then you can change the gearing between jackshaft and trans till you find a good ratio. Think of overhead pulley systems. After enough of the other pulleys/ shafts take up the stress its easier for the engine/ person to lift/ move things.

Doug Fackler wrote:

Ah. Its probably pretty similar though. Removing the governor might help, as well as getting an intake adapter and pod filter and adjustable jet to help with intake flow. And of course a new exhaust.

ya i was planning to do a better exhaust and removing the governor but i might just try and get a bigger motor i just dont know if its worth putting time and money into making the current engine more powerfull.

If its anything like the Loncin (Predator) 212cc engines, taking the governor out only takes some basic tools. First one I did took about an hour, second one I did took about half that time.

last week i got the 212cc clone off. i started to put the 8hp briggs on but i dont know what im going to do with the starter generator yet. i might ditch it and go back to pull start only...
im keeping the alternator for sure tho.

heres some pics.

i was messing around with a giant pulley for the starter.

getting back on this build tommorow. gonna get a new pulley and a new belt, and fix the recoil.

i got this for the roper. im gonna put the light on the rear so i can see stuff behind me when i backup in the woods.

the brake light is gonna be a taillight.

i call BS on the jackshaft thing, All the engine knows is gear ratio. you could run 5 jackshafts, but if the complete drive system ratio is 10:1, that is what it sees

ya i think the only thing a jackshaft would do is add some innertia. ill just go with a bigger motor.

i gave up on the starter ill just have a pullstart..

this is the part on the tractor. you can see the pedal pivot point, the hole is treaded for a 1/4in bolt to hold the pedal assembly on. theres a spring tap too out of the pic.

thats my reinforced pedal with the pring tab and the wire stop braket.






so the throttle pedal is done

what i want to get done this week:
finish pullstart
mount the taillight
mount the worklight
make a holder for a gast tank on the rear bumper
finish the rear bumper
and wire up the new lights.
i also want to make a metal carry box kinda like the original mule had but much smaller, i need some storage on this thing.

ohh also mount a gas tank somewhere...

now ill probably not get all of this done this week but ill try.

today i finished the pullstart, did the choke linkage and started to mount the rear light.

the light i just bolted up to where i want it. i still have to wire it up to its own switch on the dash.





what i want to get done this week:

finish pullstart
mount the taillight
mount the worklight
make a holder for a gast tank on the rear bumper
finish the rear bumper
and wire up the new lights.
i also want to make a metal carry box kinda like the original mule had but much smaller, i need some storage on this thing.

ohh also mount a gas tank somewhere...

i forgot that i had to do an exhaust because now it dumps under the hood and i dont like that at all.

so thats what i did tonight.

i did it in two parts, the first part come out of the engine to a 1and 1/4 inch tube that serve as a resonation chamber.
i got the resonation chamber idea from fearlessfront.
the only thing left to do on the exhaust is mounting tab to attach the pipes to the chassis.






also the gas tank holder is perfet the tank fits in tight to i wont even have to strap it in.

Looking good. I want to add a reverse light to the simplicity soon. True the alternator is a lot of drag on stuff, with the 8hp flat head on the simplicity if the battery is dead it pulls so much load on the alternator you almost can't keep the engine running. Under normal conditions though it's not too bad. The 8hp flat head is definitely as low as you want to go as far as power goes. The 7-8hp engines are supposed to have the same mounting bolt pattern as the 10-11hp flat heads, so you could always upgrade later if you can find one. Engine might be slightly larger of course.

mr.modified wrote:

Looking good. I want to add a reverse light to the simplicity soon. True the alternator is a lot of drag on stuff, with the 8hp flat head on the simplicity if the battery is dead it pulls so much load on the alternator you almost can't keep the engine running. Under normal conditions though it's not too bad. The 8hp flat head is definitely as low as you want to go as far as power goes. The 7-8hp engines are supposed to have the same mounting bolt pattern as the 10-11hp flat heads, so you could always upgrade later if you can find one. Engine might be slightly larger of course.

im still looking for a more powerfull engine but horizontal shaft engines are super rare here. the only ones i can get easily and cheaply are the 10-11hp tecumseh from snowblowers, but im still looking, the other day i saw a nice briggs 12hp flathead that would have been perfect but it was 3 hours away, and 250$... also i installed a switch that disables the alternator this way if it bogs down the engine too much i can just shut the alternator off.



What i want to get done this week:

finish pullstart
mount the worklight
make a holder for a gas tank on the rear bumper
mount the taillight
finish the rear bumper
and wire up the new lights.
i also want to make a metal carry box kinda like the original mule had but much smaller, i need some storage on this thing.

ohh also mount a gas tank somewhere...

Finally remembered to check this thread out from home. I can't see images on the site at work. The tractor is looking good. Lots of cool features going on there.

It'd be cool if you could find an old Kohler for it, like a K321 or something. It'd be a good engine for a utility tractor.

AllisKidD21 wrote:

It'd be cool if you could find an old Kohler for it, like a K321 or something. It'd be a good engine for a utility tractor.

at this point ill take any descent horizontal shaft engine lol.

Yeah, usually when people have horizontal shafts engines for sale them want a lot of money for them. Unfortunately.

today i mounted the gas tank, got a drive pulley, and instaled the pulleyfor the alternator. i also had to make a small idler to make the belt work for the alternator.

Looks good man! I just noticed the exhaust threads in to the block, that might make it kinda difficult to remove haha.

AllisKidD21 wrote:

Looks good man! I just noticed the exhaust threads in to the block, that might make it kinda difficult to remove haha.

the muffler screws in the block but the pipes are just slipped inside of the muffler.

Oh! Ok that makes sense