My 36 yrs of experience has shown me this one important thing. You don't need that CAD stuff, it's all fancy, but if you can't draw it (and I don't
mean on a PC), you can't build it.
soliver - 8-4-2017 at 08:29 AM
I've been a cabinet maker for the last 10 yrs roughly and I learned drafting with a T-square and achitect'scale, a boatload of triangles and a
pencil... and it's still what I use. Even when reworking my own buggy, I also used the T-square and pencil ... I'm not necessarily old, but I do it
old school.Bladerunner - 8-4-2017 at 10:06 AM
I won't ever make my own buggy but if I did these are a few things I would try and achieve.
I would try to design my front fork so it will accommodate a variety of tire types. From barrow through big foot to racing discs.
I would design the back rest bar and side rails to move my seat forward and back for balance.
I would make it break down fast and easy for transport / storage.
I would build in height adjustability on the back axle. + a tow hook.
I would want to feel confident enough in my build to go over 50mph without worries.
I'll never be able to build anything to live up to that last request of myself. Too bad because quality home builds I have seen can be pretty awesome.
Taking buggy design places it has never been before!
Best wishes to all of you on your builds. I can only suggest you don't cut corners to save on cost. The buggies that I have seen that work are built
with no expenses spared. Zipzit - 8-4-2017 at 11:10 AM
WELDNGOD, Windstruck, soliver
I appreciate and respect your input. And yes on the Computer Assisted Drafting (CAD) thing, its all about the old dog --> new tricks thing.
The problem is, that I spent 30 years in the automotive industry as a OEM design engineer (+) and I've been actively using CAD since 1984 (IBM with
Autocad) I've done ACAD, Prime-Lundy, Catia, Solidworks, etc... for so long, I can't think of anything else. Nevermind car parts (don't quit your
dayjob), I was designing windsurfing sails in the early 1990's with ACAD (but I will say the transfer from 1930's NACA airfoils 3D shapes to flat
patterns on the sailcloth drove me crazy... ) I've been designing custom bicycle frames in the past ten years. Apologies, but I'm an old dog hard
glued to CAD.
While that is definitely not true for everyone, I suspect I have enough skills to make this work.
The one thing that CAD does for me, is it does give me the opportunity to do three or four different design iterations before touching a single piece
of steel tube. Do I always get that right? Heck no, but I really want to understand the concepts..
Two things I'd love to know.. what is minimum ground clearance (3"?) for a dry lake and what's optimal trail? I would guess three or four inches for
trail, but I'm not really sure... I suspect trail is related to overall buggy weight / rolling inertia but I really don't know. It makes sense to
me to build a buggy with adjustments as a test bed, but I'm sure many of you have already been there...
And one more thing. I have no problem sharing my work on this. OpenSource for the we-all-win.
Many thanks, Zip. Windstruck - 8-4-2017 at 03:30 PM
So I think Zip is going to fit right in here in the Monkey House. Always room for a few more good chimps!
[img][/img]Jack.Oh - 14-9-2021 at 05:41 AM
I just saw this post yesterday. I read the hole post. Things on the forum have been kinda slow, so looking at older posts.
Now I was left wondering did you ever build the buggy?
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