Hello everyone! we made huge amounts of progress on the build this past weekend. Basically spend the majority of a 3 day weekend working on it. I'll try to keep the post short, I know I have a tendency to get wordy. Let me know if anyone has any questions or feedback!
COMPLETED:
Adjustable "shift on the fly" belt tensioner
Belt and clutch system, with belt keepers
Shift linkage
Brakes
New ignition switch and wiring
Majority of reassembly, about 80% reassembled.
We had to drop and open up the transaxle to solve an issue that resulted in 6 reverse speeds and one forward speeds Sunday night, at the point that we thought we would be ready to test drive it. It ended up that the bevel gears were installed backwards, but this was the only way they could be installed using the MST 203 splined shaft. it's not meant to support 6 gears. We swapped out the MST 203 splined shaft for the MST 206 one and were able to set the bevel gears in the correct orientation.
Got it out for a short test drive. It was a beast. Everything we hoped it would be...more even. The locked differential works perfect. Remember, this was a locker kit that was installed, so NO WELDING needed. Brakes worked perfect as well. Finally able to lock the rear tires. I haven't had brakes on a tractor in YEARS!
With the stock engine pulley and the 2.90 inch rear pully, it's pretty fast... over 20mph for sure, def not over 25 though. Eventually we will use the deck pulley on the engine side using MurrayMayhem's technique to flip it. It's about 4.5 inches so we should be able to hit 30mph, which was more than our goal!
No videos this time though as it was too dark at test drive time.
We do need a longer drive belt. The one we had on there was too stretched an would slip. The only other we had is too short and it always spins the input shaft. We are also getting a misfire that needs to be diagnosed. I believe its just bad plugs, they have been through a lot.
Overall very happy with how it's coming together.
Some more to come this weekend I hope. We are supposed to get some snow and I definitely want to see how it performs in the snow.
Hey guys! Got it out on a test romp this weekend! Very happy with out it's performing! We verified 20 - 22mph on our GPS.
We had some issues with our belt being too tight and our shift linkage broke. We already bought the parts to make new and improved shift linkage and will be picking up a new belt once we get it sized right.
It's really much harder to turn around with the locker than I was expecting, but I guess we will have to deal with it. Does anyone think running taller or wider tires up front might help? Im running 22.5 x 10 x 8 in the rear and 13.5 x 4.50 x 6 up front. Thinking either 15 inch tall or taller tires might be better up front? We did have issues playing in the snow due to the fact that the front end kept getting caught up.
More to come this weekend as we try to get shifting again, tie down our relocated battery, and install the hood.
LAWN MOWER MUDDER Established Member
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I'd get the same tread pattern. I'd get 18x6.50-8 or 16x6.50-8 Snow-hogs like that on heavy duty GT 8" front rims. Then it will sit more level in the front too.
98svtcobra Member
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I'd get the same tread pattern. I'd get 18x6.50-8 or 16x6.50-8 Snow-hogs like that on heavy duty GT 8" front rims. Then it will sit more level in the front too.
Would those 8 inch rims fit on stock front spindles? would love to not have to extend them or modify them....besides for adding 4 bolt hubs or something like that. I know to use the rear rims up front it requires a lot of modifications and we'd like to try to avoid doing that.
LAWN MOWER MUDDER Established Member
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I'd get the same tread pattern. I'd get 18x6.50-8 or 16x6.50-8 Snow-hogs like that on heavy duty GT 8" front rims. Then it will sit more level in the front too.
Would those 8 inch rims fit on stock front spindles? would love to not have to extend them or modify them....besides for adding 4 bolt hubs or something like that. I know to use the rear rims up front it requires a lot of modifications and we'd like to try to avoid doing that.
Try searching ebay for 8" rims with 5/8 bearings or bushings. That is what you are looking for. If you are running fast speeds don't put the rear tires on the front. I have had them lock fast to the spindles when I was driving one time. Get bushings or bearings.
98svtcobra Member
2015 Build-Off Finalist
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Age : 39 Join date : 2014-04-30 Points : 3979 Posts : 110 Location : Mahopac, NY
I'd get the same tread pattern. I'd get 18x6.50-8 or 16x6.50-8 Snow-hogs like that on heavy duty GT 8" front rims. Then it will sit more level in the front too.
Would those 8 inch rims fit on stock front spindles? would love to not have to extend them or modify them....besides for adding 4 bolt hubs or something like that. I know to use the rear rims up front it requires a lot of modifications and we'd like to try to avoid doing that.
Try searching ebay for 8" rims with 5/8 bearings or bushings. That is what you are looking for. If you are running fast speeds don't put the rear tires on the front. I have had them lock fast to the spindles when I was driving one time. Get bushings or bearings.
Thanks for the advice man. I think I may try to find some 8 inch 4 on 4 rims and 5/8th spindles with bearings. I wanted to use my 6 inch rims because they were the good ones with the bushings and grease zerks. Had the snow hogs from an old blower though I would give em a try. way to low though lol. I think with the 22.5 inch rear tires I need at least 18 inch up front.
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I'd get the same tread pattern. I'd get 18x6.50-8 or 16x6.50-8 Snow-hogs like that on heavy duty GT 8" front rims. Then it will sit more level in the front too.
Would those 8 inch rims fit on stock front spindles? would love to not have to extend them or modify them....besides for adding 4 bolt hubs or something like that. I know to use the rear rims up front it requires a lot of modifications and we'd like to try to avoid doing that.
Try searching ebay for 8" rims with 5/8 bearings or bushings. That is what you are looking for. If you are running fast speeds don't put the rear tires on the front. I have had them lock fast to the spindles when I was driving one time. Get bushings or bearings.
Thanks for the advice man. I think I may try to find some 8 inch 4 on 4 rims and 5/8th spindles with bearings. I wanted to use my 6 inch rims because they were the good ones with the bushings and grease zerks. Had the snow hogs from an old blower though I would give em a try. way to low though lol. I think with the 22.5 inch rear tires I need at least 18 inch up front.
I am sure that murrays have 3/4" spindles. you need 3/4" holes.
98svtcobra Member
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Hey guys.. Quick update. Had a bit of a snow day today. Me and my brother in law decided to do a little more work on the Murray. We added "oh sh*t handles" as well as a battery tie down for our relocated battery. We still had broken shift linkage and a belt that was a bit on the "too tight" side, but we decided to just throw it in 6th and have at her for a while in the snow.
We had a blast and took a few breaks to tweak things. The turning still isn't great but a big issue was our front tire pressure being way too low. After filling the front tires to the right pressure it handled and turned much better. We wired up the headlights and replaced one that blew right away.
A few guys in cars and ATV's gave us some thumbs ups when they saw us ripping down the road. What's not in the videos are the streets that we turned around in, and drifting them around was awesome. Off road mowers aren't the norm out here. Everything was working great but we ended up overdoing it, overheated and cooked the engine. We literally just powered it off to switch drivers and she just locked up and never started again.
Fortunately we have another identical oppy to swap on and after some needed tweaks we should be good to go again. The plan is to focus on the shift linkage and a few other improvements. Then swap the motor over and be ready to romp again. Our wives have been asking to spend a little less time on the tractor and some more time with them, as we have been hitting the wrenching a little hard recently. So won't be updating as often the next few weeks.....but definitely stay tuned.
My brother-in-law and I will also eventually have a 2nd build thread for a 2nd off road tractor build...an LT1000 we will be building as a 2nd toy to actually hit the trails and romp with. It's going to donate it's oppy power plant to the Murray and we will have to find something else to power it.
Here is a youtube compilation from todays fun I put together. I will put together and imgur album later tonight or tomorrow with some pics. I think you guys will appreciate our kill switch.
All in all for two guys who never have done this before and started off with a stock Murray tractor, to be able to enjoy it today like we did today. It was awesome and totally worth it. We have come a long way, learned a lot and look forward to much more.
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Likin the build and sounds like yall had plenty of fun, but I wanna know how yall managed to overheat and sieze the engine in the snowy cold, maybe it ran out of oil?
98svtcobra Member
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Likin the build and sounds like yall had plenty of fun, but I wanna know how yall managed to overheat and sieze the engine in the snowy cold, maybe it ran out of oil?
I have no idea! Our oil levels were good. We always check before running the engine. We figured we over heated it running WOT for so long. To be honest we didnt put all the cooling tins back on. It had the "red top" main shroud but that was it. The motor was missing the other tins when I got it and we were planning on making our own for each head.
I've heard of the lower cyl getting too hot since its further away, esp with out it's cooling tins. That's what we thought we did. The motor initially died pretty peacefully too. It was running fine and I shut it down to switch drivers.....and it was just locked up after that.
I will upload the video later, but the next day we actually UNSEIZED the motor....got it running again, but it was short lived. It ran ok for a few min then started to knock. We also noticed BAD blowby on the TOP cyl and it ended up blowing completely 5 min later. We took the heads off and what we found is actually the TOP cylinder seized to the block! It looked like it got really hot as the top most bolt was hard to get out and it looked burnt. In the final end for the engine, the top piston seized to the block and the connecting rod broke. It actually ran on 1 cyl but there was a hole in the block so we shut it down. We also noticed that it looked like the 2 valves on that same top cylinder did not close all the way at any point in its stroke...came close but not all the way. Not sure if it was a result of the engine blowing or perhaps a symptom. To keep us scratching our head we always had on and off again issues with the top cylinder misfiring anyway. Not sure if it was all related or not.
Luckily I actually have a nearly identical 19.5 oppy that we will be replacing the now blown one with. It's newer and ran better anyway, it just needed a carb and coil. Which fortunately I rebuilt the carb on the engine that just blew and replaced the coil.
Gunna take some time off for the next week or so to spend time with the wives as they have been letting us know we've been spending too much time in the garage recently tractor tinkering. We are also going take our time and do a good job fixing our shift linkage. We are also planning on swapping the stock engine pulley with the deck pulley for some more speed. Of course we also have to swap the newer engine on as well.....but I don't expect to have the Murray out and running again till about March. We are also planning on starting a Craftsman LT1000 build too so my bother-in-law and I can ride together too. Should be a quick and straight forward build though. Just pulley swapped and need to find a motor for it.
I'll keep everyone posted. Thanks for following along. The other video of us reviving and then re-killing the 21hp oppy should be posted tomorrow.
Last edited by 98svtcobra on January 28th 2015, 5:01 pm; edited 2 times in total
LAWN MOWER MUDDER Established Member
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Likin the build and sounds like yall had plenty of fun, but I wanna know how yall managed to overheat and sieze the engine in the snowy cold, maybe it ran out of oil?
I have no idea! Our oil levels were good. We always check before running the engine. We figured we over heated it running WOT for so long. To be honest we didnt put all the cooling tins back on. It had the "red top" main shroud but that was it. The motor was missing the other tins when I got it and we were planning on making our own for each head.
I've heard of the lower cyl getting too hot since its further away, esp with out it's cooling tins. That's what we thought we did. The motor initially died pretty peacefully too. It was running fine and I shut it down to switch drivers.....and it was just locked up after that.
I will upload the video later, but the next day we actually UNSEIZED the motor....got it running again, but it was short lived. It ran ok for a few min then started to knock. We also noticed BAD blowby on the TOP cyl and it ended up blowing completely 5 min later. We took the heads off and what we found is actually the TOP cylinder seized to the block! It looked like it got really hot as the top most bolt was hard to get out and it looked burnt. In the final end for the engine, the top piston seized to the block and the connecting rod broke. It actually ran on 1 cyl but there was a hole in the block so we shut it down. We also noticed that it looked like the 2 valves on that same top cylinder did not close all the way at any point in its stroke...came close but not all the way. Not sure if it was a result of the engine blowing or perhaps a symptom. To keep us scratching our head we always had on and off again issues with the top cylinder misfiring anyway. Not sure if it was all related or not.
Luckily I actually have a nearly identical 19.5 oppy that we will be replacing the now blown one with. It's newer and ran better anyway, it just needed a carb, which fortunately I rebuilt on the engine that just blew.
Oil slinger. There is a gear thing in the bottom of the motor that slings oil up inside the engine when the engine is running. Those bearings are commonly known to seize up, thus not letting oil get into the upper part of the motor. From being around a mower shop for a few years, we always check those bearings when we have an oppy apart. Its really important because they don't make the lower pan and bearing that they sit in anymore. That is one reason I put the V-Twin on my tractor.
98svtcobra Member
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Age : 39 Join date : 2014-04-30 Points : 3979 Posts : 110 Location : Mahopac, NY
Hey Guys...here is the video of us reviving the 21hp oppy and then killing it again a short time later! Check out how the engine still wanted to run on 1 cyl with almost no oil and a hole in the block. Gotta love Briggs!
Again, the plan is to focus on fixing the shift linkage and a few other tweaks...then replacing the engine and being ready to romp again come spring. Will also be doing a quick LT1000 build once we find a motor for it. Will just be pulley swapped with decent tires.
crafsmankiller Member
Age : 27 Join date : 2012-10-18 Points : 4894 Posts : 412 Location : livingston texas
Likin the build and sounds like yall had plenty of fun, but I wanna know how yall managed to overheat and sieze the engine in the snowy cold, maybe it ran out of oil?
I have no idea! Our oil levels were good. We always check before running the engine. We figured we over heated it running WOT for so long. To be honest we didnt put all the cooling tins back on. It had the "red top" main shroud but that was it. The motor was missing the other tins when I got it and we were planning on making our own for each head.
I've heard of the lower cyl getting too hot since its further away, esp with out it's cooling tins. That's what we thought we did. The motor initially died pretty peacefully too. It was running fine and I shut it down to switch drivers.....and it was just locked up after that.
I will upload the video later, but the next day we actually UNSEIZED the motor....got it running again, but it was short lived. It ran ok for a few min then started to knock. We also noticed BAD blowby on the TOP cyl and it ended up blowing completely 5 min later. We took the heads off and what we found is actually the TOP cylinder seized to the block! It looked like it got really hot as the top most bolt was hard to get out and it looked burnt. In the final end for the engine, the top piston seized to the block and the connecting rod broke. It actually ran on 1 cyl but there was a hole in the block so we shut it down. We also noticed that it looked like the 2 valves on that same top cylinder did not close all the way at any point in its stroke...came close but not all the way. Not sure if it was a result of the engine blowing or perhaps a symptom. To keep us scratching our head we always had on and off again issues with the top cylinder misfiring anyway. Not sure if it was all related or not.
Luckily I actually have a nearly identical 19.5 oppy that we will be replacing the now blown one with. It's newer and ran better anyway, it just needed a carb and coil. Which fortunately I rebuilt the carb on the engine that just blew and replaced the coil.
Gunna take some time off for the next week or so to spend time with the wives as they have been letting us know we've been spending too much time in the garage recently tractor tinkering. We are also going take our time and do a good job fixing our shift linkage. We are also planning on swapping the stock engine pulley with the deck pulley for some more speed. Of course we also have to swap the newer engine on as well.....but I don't expect to have the Murray out and running again till about March. We are also planning on starting a Craftsman LT1000 build too so my bother-in-law and I can ride together too. Should be a quick and straight forward build though. Just pulley swapped and need to find a motor for it.
I'll keep everyone posted. Thanks for following along. The other video of us reviving and then re-killing the 21hp oppy should be posted tomorrow.
i think yall just had bad luck with it, ive ran mine in the summer heat without any way for it to get cooling air and it still runs, lol, its a single tho, but y'all just had bad luck. but your oppy sounded good on 1 cyl, gotta give it that
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Sorry for the delay. I've been meaning to post this update all week but I've been so busy with work.
My brother-in-law and I got back to working on this this past weekend. We tore the entire thing down again to re-design and rebuild our shift linkage and replace the engine amongst a few other changes and tweaks.
Believe it or not after tearing down the engine a little, just out of curiosity, it appears the oil slinger was working. It spins as the motor spins. You can see from our pictures though, that we definitely toasted that top cylinder.
The organized tear down took most of our time on Saturday and we picked up some supplies as well. On Sunday we got to work on the linkage. Our idea was to simply try to make a stronger piece of linkage as 1 piece and use the heim joint at our point of rotation where there needs to be a little flexibility. We also wanted to make the linkage adjustable so we were going to weld on some bolts to allow for adjustments.
Unfortunately it didn't work out too well for us. First, one of the original pieces that we welded on from the old linkage broke. It happens, we just tried to recycle a little too much. Remedied that issue, but then one of our welds broke....TWICE. Welding the 3/8ths round stock was proving to be a little more difficult than we thought. We were just not getting the DEEP penetration we needed. Finally, on our last attempt, the welds held....but due to the tightness and degree of the bends we made and the 1 piece design the linkage now didn't fit where we needed it to. CRAP!
So this weekend the plan is to try to make our 1 piece design into a 2 piece design.....if that doesn't work, we have a plan "b" that is going a completely different route. For our plan b, instead of trying to use the stock location of the linkage on left side of the tractor, we are going to try to relocate it to the right side where we have plenty of room for linkage. The problem with the left side is that there is a lot of crap in the way.
Anyway, more to come this weekend! We will keep you posted.
Also, for anyone interested, my brother-in-law and I have started a YouTube channel. It's is going to be DIY and off/road tractor oriented. Check it out! Subscribe! Much more to come!
Hey everyone. Been meaning to post this update all week (again). Last weekend Joe and I made some significant progress in the build.
We finally got the linkage sorted out. It seems to be very strong and it operates exactly how we need. It took some trial and error, but in the end we made our original plan work. The stock shift locations still work as well, which wasn't the case with the last linkage we made, so that's a plus.
We also stripped and removed the 21hp oppy to make room for the new engine and all of our body work.
Over the next few weekends we will be working on some body work as we need to make some repairs and tweaks. The dash was only secured to the body with self tapping screws, so we need to repair all of that. Once the body work is squared away, then we need to swap in the new 19.5 turbo cool oppy, do our engine side pulley swap and we should be up and running soon after that. Just a lot of misc. stuff that needs to be done to get there. Hopefully in the next month we will be riding this thing!
Hey everyone. Joe and I got some work done last weekend on the Murray. Still making progress, with more to come this weekend.
We did the repairs to the dash that we needed to do as well as removed one of the idler pulleys for replacement. This upcoming weekend we will be continuing with some body work. This time tackling the rear body section to finish our "oh shi*t" handle installations.
At this point we are addressing all the small repairs and tweaks that need to be addressed as we perform this round of reassembly. Last time we did this, we were trying to beat out the snow and we just threw things together a bit quickly. Wishing to not repeat this we are trying to cross our t's and dot our i's. Once we get these body sections straightened out how we need and finish up with what needs to be done with the body off, then we are going to swap in the new 20.5 hp opposed twin engine. From there it shouldn't be long before we are romping this beast! and yes, I said 20.5 hp oppy! I previously thought it was a 19.5 we had as our back up engine but it really was a 20.5. Great news!
Hello everyone. Another weekend with no family plans means.....more progress! We got a TON done this weekend.
We started off with a bare frame but nearly completed chassis. We replaced some pulleys, got all of the body work and tweaks completed and mounted up the body. We also took care of some tweaking on the steering system. We made some changes to our brake linkage and slowly but surely the Murray was being reassembled.
Finally the it got to the point where we decided, we need to get the engine that it needs ready to swap in. So we stand the Murray up on it's rear tires and make room for the Craftsman. The Craftman "EZ3" that you see here is actually our 2015 ATLTF build off entry. It will be powered by a 18hp V-Twin Kohler Command. For now, it's donating its 20.5 opposed twin to the Murray. We needed to change the coil and swap the intake/carb from the 21hp oppy that died to get it up and running.
We ended the weekend with lots of success. We got the 20.5 hp oppy purring like a kitten and ready to be swapped into the Murray. We didn't get a video but we will post it running in the Murray, don't worry! The Murray is ready to accept the 20.5 oppy and besides for getting a new correctly sized belt, re-wired, it only needs its 4.5 inch engine pulley swap and it's ready for romping!
Here is the IMGUR gallery for this installment of our Murray Select build! Enjoy!:https://imgur.com/a/LxM5f
We will be posting more updates this week and already have plans to start swapping the engine over this upcoming weekend.
Oh one last thing, we made a video to describe our brake clutch linkage setup. We didn't get a great picture of it, but we are quite happy with it. We utilized a set of springs and washers to allow for a really nice clutch and braking action.
98svtcobra Member
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Age : 39 Join date : 2014-04-30 Points : 3979 Posts : 110 Location : Mahopac, NY
My brother-in-law, Joe and I made HUGE amounts of progress on the build this weekend. Here's what went down:
Swapped 20.5 oppy from Craftsman to Murray
Performed "tune up" on 20.5 hp oppy: new plugs, fresh oil, fuel filter, and straightened out cooling shrouds,
Completed install and hook up of 20.5 oppy in the Murray including: installed, tested, and cleaned up wiring including ignition switch, kill switch, battery and new tach/hour meter.
connected all linkages: throttle, choke, gas pedal.
fabricated custom 4.5 inch engine side drive pulley. made from the stock deck pulley and collar from the original 3 inch engine pulley.
installed new 4.5 inch engine pulley. grinded down chassis where required.
sized and obtained new drive belt.
put it all back together, installed the exhaust, checked and double checked everything.....
did some TEST ROMPS!
We are EXTREMELY pleased with how things turned out and how our test runs went. If anyone wants to take some guesstimates on our GPS confirmed top speed, here is what we are working with: 4.5 inch engine pulley, 2.90 inch transaxle pulley on an MST-206 transaxle on 22.5 inch tall tires.....Joe and I were modest with our estimate of ~27mph, which we would have been happy with. Our previous best was 22mph with the old motor and 3 inch engine pulley.
30.8mph according to our GPS!!! We actually think this is closer to 33mph due to the fact that the GPS in our phones (Samsung Galaxy S5) appears to be about 2mph slow consistently. 33mph!! We couldn't believe it!! It definitely feels as fast as we want to go with stock steering and stock brakes.
Overall, we were MORE than satisfied with how everything worked during our test rides. We cannot believe we got 10mph out of the front pulley swap alone pretty much. The gear ratios are perfect for what we wanted. The pulley setup we have makes the gears much more versatile. We cannot start off in 6th gear, you almost have to work your way up the gears like a automotive manual transmission. I was starting in 1st or 2nd, shifting to 3rd or 4th, then going into 6th to hit top speed. 1st and 2nd are still geared low enough that you can start on hills or pull things without issue, though it's border line almost too fast at idle in 1st. Probably goes about 5mph at idle, fully off the clutch in 1st gear.
Everything worked as expected. We could find every gear using our new shift linkage. It feels very solid. We could press the clutch/brake about 50-75% of the way down to shift while moving without applying brakes....and a 100% throw of the clutch/brake will engage the brakes. They stopped the tractor pretty well from less than 20 and could lock the wheels if you are going slow enough. Close to 30mph though and they struggle to stop....but this is to be expected on the stock tiny brake that is only meant to stop the tractor from 5mph.
The steering has a little play at 30+ mph, so things get a bit hairy on uneven pavement. Eventually we will probably do a few tweaks to tighten this up, like swap out the "tie rods" for heim joints, but for now we took as much play out as we could, and it is definitely manageable for now.
The engine runs better than our 21hp oppy ever ran! It just starts, runs and drives better all around. It sounds better and even feels smoother. We initially thought this engine was newer than our 21hp oppy but we found out that it really was manufactured in 1998 and our 21hp oppy we killed was manufactured in 01. Regardless of the age, the engine runs sweet and we hope we get to keep it around for a while. I even ordered the OEM cooling tins we are missing to ensure it stays running cool.
As for what's next with this build? It will likely always be a work in progress to some degree. This has been our first adventure into the all terrain lawn tractor building world and I believe we have done awesome for first timers. We wanted to get the Murray to a point that most of the major fabrication and work was done and we can actually enjoy it while completing the rest at a bit slower pace. We are pretty much there now with only a few more things to do. There are a few small tweaks that we want to do before we consider this phase of the build as complete. To name a few:
We didn't install the hood as we wanted to modify the mounts to allow for better fitment. To do this, we are going to build a small front bumper/bull bar that will integrate with the hood mounts. Should come out nice.
we need to tweak one of our idler pullies that keeps dropping the belt when we depress the clutch.
we need to fine tune our gas pedal as it wasn't adjusted 100% how we wanted.
we will be fabricating a better tow/trailer hitch/back bumper.
we will be installing an ATV style rack on the back.
Once the hood get's installed, we will continue on the last items mentioned above at a bit of a slower pace since we will likely changing our focus to our ATLTF 2015 build off build, our Craftsman EZ Mudder Build. Please stay tuned as there is more to come!
Subject: 
January 14th 2015, 3:06 pm
