Mr.Modified's Simplicity Adventure Edition [2016 Build-Off Finalist]

1975-76 Simplicity system 5010. Basic idea is to use a 1968-71 sears suburban transaxle and front axle. Suspension up front. Single cylinder briggs mounted on the frame. Focusing on long range and reliability this time. If it turns out to be a good machine, I was thinking about attempting to get it registered as an ATV in New Jersey. I'm going to try getting it done for Haspin in June. Gonna have to work fast. Not my usual, "yeah, gonna build this thing real quick no problem". Like actually get it done this time.

High tech overview.....

-Engine: Briggs and stratton 8hp flathead. Probably stretching things a bit thin in the horsepower department, but what we're looking for is fuel economy, reliability, and something easy to get apart. Small size allows it to fit under the small simplicity hood and leave room for everything else. Probably add a snorkel. Tecumseh side draft carb replacing the stock up draft. Recoil pull start.

-The Rear End: Peerless 633 transaxle locked with 5 lug hubs. Aluminum skid plate. 12" sears rims with Kenda bear claws. Brakes will probably end up being band type on either one or both wheels. Seat will be on a spring. Not sure on fenders. My idea was to go without.

-The Front End: Sears suburban front axle on coil overs with a wishbone. Guess you'd call that a mono link front end. Bearing hubs with 4 bolt wheels. Kenda ag treads. Sears suburban steering box.

-Fuel system: Originally, I had the idea to mount the engine in a cage behind the transaxle down near the ground. This would allow gravity feed of fuel with fuel tanks under the hood. But for deep water crossings, I wanted the engine up a little higher, so I decided on mounting it up on the frame in a more conventional layout. I wasn't so sure it would be the most reliable way of doing things to just snorkel the engine and run it submerged in anything but extremely shallow water. Might need to use a fuel pump. Dual gas tanks will be stuffed in somewhere.

-Electrical: Planning on running an alternator for lights. May look into getting a small winch. Waterproof LED headlights. Probably a single tail light with an option of on solid or flash mode. I was thinking some sort of adjustable work light might be neat. Maybe something on an expandable pole off the side of the hood that you can turn 360 degrees.

-Bumpers and Rub rails: Tube bumpers front and rear. Bumpers will be somewhat less sporty looking than on the baja sears. Going for more of a jeep or safari vehicle kind of look than speed. Designing this thing to be as bullet proof as possible. Needs to be able to blast through brush and over small trees without denting up that nice original grill or knocking out our lights.

Kenda tires front and rear.


Some serious adjusting needs to be done to swap in the sears parts. Actual simplicity parts used will pretty much just be the forward half of the frame, hood, and grill.


Most likely the dash will not be used either.


Main color will be orange most likely. Undecided on tubing and bumpers.

Looks good man, I like the plan so far, and those front tires are mean! what size are they?

18/4-10. He copied my tires from last years Craftsman lol.

Nice! Doug you gonna make it to haspin this year? You and Mister Modified could car pool

Alright, chromoly backhalf frame, mandrel bent stainless exhaust, solid billet blocks milled to engine parts, nitrous, double beadlocks, aluminum body work, all tig welded.

Maybe not. But the 8hp looks like a 10 basically, so should be fine. i wonder if you can swap parts from your spare engine or match them up to "make" it a 10hp if its the same design.

Thanks
Front tires are from BMI karts.com
Possibly car pooling to haspin with doug and redline
8hp is smaller bore than the 10hp, but they are somewhat close

If you do make it out this way, I've got a couple 11hp Briggs that would probably fit. Haspin swap, lol. Dan ran a 8hp that was loooow on compression for a while, just rev the snot out of it!

OOOOhhhh that dash might work for my build. lol hint hint.....

Getting the pull start bug, eh? What year is that engine? Looks to be more modern than mine, judging by the strip along the shroud which shows the model, code etc. Those front tyres look interesting. Would like to see how they look on the tractor, being so narrow. Can't wait for the next update. Good luck!

Creepycrawler wrote:

Nice! Doug you gonna make it to haspin this year? You and Mister Modified could car pool

I took vacation days for that time, so I hope so lol.

Well the 8hp I/C in the picture should be a 1993. But that's most likely going to be the spare. I have a 1984 aluminum bore 7hp that I'll use first. Both electronic ignition, same block more or less. If I blow up the older one, I was thinking about getting a billet rod made for the I/C. I plan on having the spare engine with it's own carb and intake bolted on and ready to go for haspin. Swapping engines if needed should only take a few minutes. I figured I could weld a rod between the engine bolts on each side of the engine so you can take the nuts off from the bottom without having to hold a wrench up top.

It would be nice if the 10-11hp blocks have the same mounting pattern as the 8's. I'll have to see if the cranks end up in the same spot or not. The 8hp engines are semi easy to find I think compared to the bigger engines.

I would use electric start, it's just that these engines didn't have it as far as I know, and either way, the ones I had to use were pull start. Less stuff to go bad in this case anyway. At least this time I'll have a recoil instead of just a rope.

I think youll have good luck with the 8hp, I had one on my first offroad tractor I drove very much, It smoked alot, so it would run out of oil and lock itself up. Id drag it home, take out spark plug and fill it up with atf and then put a extension through spark plug hole, beat the piston back down the cylinder, then I would use a big pipe wrench to get it turning over again. Did this to many times to count, and motor still ran 2 years later when it got retired. It had no balls, but it was a tough M-F 'er

Na meng go big or go home!

8 and 11hp should be same on mounts. I seem to find 11hp motors, bet I've got 3 or 4 of them.

Good to know, I can always upgrade later if needed. I have a spare 10hp laying around, but it's not in real good shape.

Striped down to the bare frame. Torched out the simplicity front axle which is welded solid to the frame. Also torched off the bracket for the deck raise/lower lever and the pivot point that held the stock trans. With the new design, the top of the frame should sit pretty well level.


Engine will probably get bolted on the flat area just behind where the vertical shaft engine was bolted. I pounded down some of the stamped out tabs that used to hold the stock dash and welded them back in. Next step is to get a rolling 633 trans and a front axle and mock up where the mounting points will be.

Not sure what is in mind, but i'd be cool to see the stock dash design kinda wrapped around the engine so its like a true "mid" engine lookin deal. Looks like room to mount a battery and or gas tank in front of the engine now.

any reason for running engine mid ship? or has your mr2 just been rubbing off on you? New name for this MR1? hahaaaa

Frame looks good! I agree with redline on the wraparound idea, would be hard to access if the dash was mounted solid but other than that it would be pretty neat.

I'm just keeping the engine towards the back mostly to make the drive belt shorter. Using some of the stock dash and tin would be neat, but it's too small to fit around the engine. The frame is actually pretty small. The alternator needs to go somewhere too. Either in front of or behind the engine. Probably it'll go up front to stay out of the way of the drive belt and clutch. If there's room the fuel tanks can go above the alternator, but I'm not sure if they will fit under the hood too well. I don't really have much of an idea how everything will fit. I'll get the axles hooked on and set the engine in place, then I can go from there. Steering column has to go in behind the engine too, so I need to remember to leave room for that.

Chassis looks good. Will you be making a custom rear section to house the 633 gearbox?

You using vertical or horizontal shaft engine? Never mind, I see the engine now. I don't have any horizontal shaft engines that big.

I'll have to make something up to hook to the transmission. I'm going to just wheel it up to the back of the frame and see how things look.

As for the engine, vertical shaft stuff is pretty easy to get, but for some reason I like horizontal shaft setups better. There was a vertical shaft tecumseh on it when I got it. I thought of using that and finding a peerless 820 to use, but then I wouldn't have any spares and I already had the 633 trans to use. Plus I just bought some briggs and stratton stickers that I need to use up.

Any ideas on paint yet?

And you can always use the harbor freight engines.

Paint colors: Orange for the tin work, white grill. I think the tubing and bumpers are going to be black on this one. Not sure yet on the wheels. And I've never bought any new engines so far. I pick stuff up at some swap meets pretty often.

Sears suburban for parts. Simplicity frame for size comparison.


The stock muffler might be neat to use. I'm taking the steering and front axle out of this one.


Removed the 633. Cast iron input pulley is a slight issue as I can't weld to it. The other 633 I have also has a cast pulley. Gotta work on freeing up the hubs. The other 633 had 3 lug hubs but I can't even use them for spares because I broke them taking them off. Shouldn't need spare hubs anyway. If you break one of these before the trans I think you've probably also broke your leg or something.