Mini Death Machine

So here we have redline's V-twin briggs death machine which I have recently purchased... Basicly I would describe it's current state as everything being laid out about where it should be with a lot of small things to be finished and cleaned up. Not a whole lot of things to really figure out, I'd say the hardest parts are done. I have a couple of ideas, but for the most part I plan on sticking with the basic idea already here. By that I mean I probably won't be changing any major things like the hood, or hacking off the front axle. One thing I was thinking about is adding an air dam or scoop on the bottom of the grill. First priority is to get the engine running and idling good, then I'll probably take the engine off and reconfigure the steering, which has some leverage issues. There was some confusion as to what the thing is currently geared for, 45mph or 60-65mph @ 3600 rpm. I'll have to look back through redline's build thread. At any rate, it's not geared for ripping up your front yard, which is ok since it's pretty much scraping the ground. The plan is to get it going, then GPS some speed runs somewhere...


One of the neat things about it will be the sparks blowing out from behind you after every imperfection in the road. That huge nut/steering shaft sticking down is the lowest point, other than that the only things below the frame are the clutch shaft brackets. We'll see what happens with the steering, maybe that shaft will get moved a little, maybe not. If not, I'd probably weld a guard in front of it to prevent it from getting damaged on anything. With how narrow and short the wheels are, it'll probably end up clearing most things. Maybe a full lenght aluminum skid plate...

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH you bought it. Good. Probably better in your hands anyways lol.

Yeah well, red doesn't have time to finish all this stuff with his motorcycle resto shop, you know.

Anyway, I imagine it'll look something like this going down the road. If it doesn't, I'll weld a piece of steel on the back real low so it does.

Doug Fackler wrote:

Probably better in your hands anyways lol.

Says you!


Yea I guess you can cut that 7/8" pivot with the big bolt down half a inch, it's just bushings. Or rip it out and re do it. Not much room to work with under the chassis or engine in that region.

This is so cool! I can`t wait to see what happens to it! When Red said he sold it I couldn`t believe it but atleast he sold it to the right person

I guess it's not all that bad anyway. I didn't look really close at how it's in there, just kind of eyeballed everything. If I make up a skid plate just for the sake of having the bottom mostly flat, I guess I could just cut out around that stuff, or make the skid plate just under it. I think it's probably better to try to keep things up as much as you can. I've got to find some plastic to make the front spoiler out of, that way it can be right on the ground and it can just flex a little if it hits.

mr.modified wrote:

Yeah well, red doesn't have time to finish all this stuff with his motorcycle resto shop, you know.

Anyway, I imagine it'll look something like this going down the road. If it doesn't, I'll weld a piece of steel on the back real low so it does.

I offered to help with his predicament but he sed no.

Doug Fackler wrote:

I offered to help with his predicament but he sed no.

What??? No one ever told me about this.... What was your idea?

I had a couple of ideas. Mostly what I want to do is change the bent aluminum rod to something straight, or maybe steel with gussets welded in. Would the aluminum hold up? Probably once the steering angles are figured out and it turns easier it would, it just bothers me that it's bent. At the steering shaft end, needs to be shorter for more leverage, this would bring the rod closer to the crankshaft.

What I was thinking was link both wheels with one rod, drag link connected about 1/4 of the way in. Maybe not correct accerman angle and junk though, but I'm thinking of it as more of a straight line speed run machine rather than something that's going it handle good in tight turns. I don't know if this is exactly what I'll end up doing, but I think you would have decent clearance with all of your rods anyway. Looks like everything could be made fairly straight too. I think my drawing is backwards steering, but basic idea is there.


I didn't hack anything yet, but I took the engine loose so's as I can get to the steering. Other issue with current setup is that, not only to the tie rod ends have some wear (acceptable) but it's slightly toed out right now. I think if you lenghtened the ends out enough to take the slack out of things and get it toed in a bit, you'd wouldn't have many threads left in the tie rods. Ideally, tie rods should be about 1/8-1/4" longer each. Not a big deal though, It's close.

I was thinking about it the other night. What if you kept the same setup, but take the pivot point with the two holes in it, and rotate it 180 from how it operates now and re connect it. Then the pitman arm from the colum to the pivot point would the straight and wouldn't have to cross sides like it does now?

That would mean you could have way more room to lengthen/shorten the pitman arm or arm on the pivot point.

Formula 1 mower racing... I think I found my true calling in life

Flipping that pivot around might be ok. Maybe I there's enough room with the engine, I could hook it to the front axle and it wouldn't even be under the bottom of the frame. With the arm on the steering shaft shorter, a straight rod should just make it between the crank and those blocks. I'll unbolt it and see what it looks like.

I bet you guys didn't think I had a wrench to fit that nut....WRONG!!!! Anyway I uh...took it apart, but I didn't get a chance to set the engine on and see what fits where.

Well, good that you got a wrench.... I got a strict no return policy....

I kinda feel the urge to build something like this except with a horizontal shaft diesel 3 speed gearbox like on mule 3 and some sort of small axle thatd let it be quick but not be to hard to roast a set of tires off... >.> stop giving me bad ideas!

redlinemotorsportts wrote:

Well, good that you got a wrench.... I got a strict no return policy....  

I figured.

I think I'm going to rig the brakes up to a hand lever on the right side, then attach a shift lever on the left. Maybe a rod bent out like an S shape or something. Might be a good idea to rig the throttle on the steering wheel in case things get out of hand and I panic, trying to brace myself with my foot holding the gas wide open.

mr.modified wrote:

redlinemotorsportts wrote:

Well, good that you got a wrench.... I got a strict no return policy....  

I figured.

I think I'm going to rig the brakes up to a hand lever on the right side, then attach a shift lever on the left. Maybe a rod bent out like an S shape or something. Might be a good idea to rig the throttle on the steering wheel in case things get out of hand and I panic, trying to brace myself with my foot holding the gas wide open.

probibly a good idea i dont think the local fire department wants to shoop a mangled mr.modified up off of the road.

just sayin

On the note about a air scoop, i read a thing where a shop put a cold air intake on a cummins and it made more power but when they put a air scoop going into the filter box it made less power than stock because it was being force fed air instead of drawing air in by itself.

Some things I've read about air scoops and things like that mention if the scoop is placed wrong it can sometimes hurt more than help. Sometimes you can get a sort of buffeting effect that actually restricts air flow. I guess at 60mph you wouldn't have any huge gains anyway on this thing. Didn't forget about this project, just working on other things right now. Thinking about different options with the rear axle, because I need new rear tires anyway. Not sure if I want to make major changes back there though.