The Road Rat comes from the importer mostly assembled.
We needed to install the "suede" covered steering wheel on the steering
shaft, mount the nerf bars and rear bumper, and mount the rear tires.
The fuel tank shown here is of decent quality and a nice feature,
but it is decorative on the Road Rat. The engine uses the stock
fuel tank and a fuel pump and lines would be required to use the
plastic tank.
The brake rotor has some interesting "lightening"
holes in it, is of decent quality, and mounts to an aluminum hub.
The caliper has a nice gold finish on it, and appears capable of
stopping the kart well enough on dirt. Unfortunately, due to the
somewhat unusual mounting arrangement, only about half of the brake
pad area contacts just the outer 3/4" of the rotor. (See disk in
picture above) A simple updated caliper mount would solve this and
give improved braking on dirt and pavement. Also visible is the
braided brake line with banjo fittings, a very nice feature on such
an inexpensive kart.
The brake master cylinder appears to be taken from another application,
but is of decent quality with a nice sealed reservoir and quality
hardware. The lack of a front dust boot is a concern, but there
are many simple and inexpensive fixes to that (a piece of inner
tube ty-wrapped around the M/C for example.)
The wheels on the Road Rat are one-piece machined aluminum, with
the fronts being a direct spindle mount style with the bearing pressed
into the rim. While the machining is a little rough, the wheels
appear round and true and hold air. A sealed front wheel bearing
would add to longevity, as the shield on the stock bearings may
allow dirt to contaminate the bearing. The front spindles are long
enough to allow a fair amount of tuning with the included 1/2" spacers.
Tires are a 5" hard-compound concession tire from China. These tires
have been seen in other areas of karting and should work well as
a first set as they will give long life and good wear while giving
decent grip. One benefit of this type of tire is that they will
be very safe on pavement, and not create too much grip for the kart.
The rear wheels have a slightly odd set of aluminum lug nuts. These
look as if they are hand machined, or made on an older automated
machine. The durability of the threads might be a concern, but replacement
nuts should work fine.
The Road Rat comes with one of the nameless Chinese clones of a
Honda GX200. These engines look just like a Honda from more than
5-feet away. On closer inspection, one realizes that every part
on the engine is slightly different from the Honda in some way.
Some backyard karters have had good luck with the clones, while
others have had vibration issues and an outright failure of a new
motor. This may be why the importer suggests using a thread locker
on all of the fasteners and checking for loose bolts regularly.
The motor mount is machined from aluminum and sits the engine flat
on the frame. Adjusting screws from the front and rear help keep
the engine from sliding, though they may be a little overkill.
Front spindles are sand-cast and have no apparent finish on them.
The wheel spacers are visible in the picture above, as well as the
slightly primitive threaded rod tie rods. While this was fine for
racing karts for years, current karts tend to use a male rod end
with aluminum tubular tie rods. It remains to be seen how well these
will hold up to heavy kart to kart contact.
The bodywork on the Road Rat is knock off of some of the more popular
European body styles, though it is made from a much harder and thicker
type of glass-reinforced plastic. There will not be much energy
absorption from the bodywork, and it's strength in prolonged competition
remains to be seen. That said, the bodywork could be easily updated
to the European style at little expense and without modifications.
The fiberglass seat fits a driver up to about 180 lbs and is of
fair quality. Some of the attention to details, such as machined
aluminum mounting washers, seems almost contradictory to the inexpensive
nature of the kart
The Road Rat comes with a 40mm diameter steel axle. The axle, common
on current asphalt sprint karts, may be a little stiff for backyard
competition, but shouldn't bend on rough tracks. The three rear
axle bearings are again common on sprint karts, but may be overkill
for dirt karting. Axle bearings are of unknown quality and will
hopefully give long life as changing bearings is a bit of a pain
on any kart. The chain is of decent quality, appearing to be a metric
219 pitch with master link. The sprocket is one piece, making it
difficult to remove it and change ratios, but the bolt pattern is
common to all sprockets. Thus, it would be a simple conversion to
go to a more common #35 chain and split rear sprockets.
The seat mounts to welded mounts as well as bolt on seat struts.
Adjustment requires drilling the seat for new mounting holes and
may require some simple fabrication to accommodate a young or small
driver.
In conclusion, the Road Rat is an enigma in the
karting world. It is a Chinese knock off of what the American
and European sprint kart builders are making, for 1/4 the price.
Is the quality there? Will it hold up on the dirt? Possibly more
intriguing, could it be competitive in asphalt sprint racing?
We hope to answer some of these questions as soon as the snow
melts in the northeast United States.
Owner's Note: Use
extreme caution when mounting tires as there have been some rim
failures resulting in injuries. Always use proper mounting procedures,
and do not exceed manufacturer's recommended mounting pressure
when setting a bead.
If you have experience with the Road Rat, or would like to suggest
a kart to be evaluated, email info@grasspass.org
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