Dax 50cc Kit Lives!

Snax

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8:04 AM
Joined
May 1, 2008
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I AM TOTALLY STOKED!

I just finished assembling my recycled/junked parts MTB and Dax 50cc 2-stroke kit yesterday and took it for a test ride. I loved it!

While I expected to feel a little more punch at the low end, the speed of the kit is both impressive and deceiving. Without having to work for it, one loses some perspective on how fast they are actually going!

Regardless, I'm now revelling in the fact of how little I spent on this entire bike. Using parts and a frame from multiple bikes that people have discarded or donated, I have well under $30 into it excluding the motor cost. It is truly a cheapskate special.

Of course, the shakedown cruise literally turned into a 'shake down' as I soon realized the motor mounts weren't tight enough, but only a half mile from home, I realized the major benefit of MB'ing: It didn't matter because I had pedals!


Now to cancel the car insurance for the summer . . .
 
Loud is relative. It's certainly not quiet at anything over a few mph and the clutch makes allot of noise, but I can put it this way: If you ride it up and down your street 10-20 times at 9pm at night, your neighbors may be inclined to tell you it is in fact annoyingly loud. It's not horrible, but it is a 2-stroke, so noisier than a 4. I would certainly like it to be quieter and will be exploring my options there.

I rode it to work today, a round trip of 8 miles and didn't have any hiccups or parts that I failed to tighten fall off. I'm glad I took it for several short shakedowns near the house this weekend though, as the clutch cable broke yesterday at the lever. Fortunately a slightly heavier guage of brake cable that I had on hand made for an easy replacement that has performed flawlessly.

It also seems to run better the more broken in it gets. I'm looking forward to being able to open it up a bit more.
 
I'm sorry, I misunderstood which engine you had.
I read the "Dax" part and totally thought it was the Titan engine. That is the engine I've been contemplating.
Sorry about the mixup, but I do appreciate your time.

Randy
 
Ok, I've ridden it back and forth to work for a week now (except for thursday when I foolishly ran out of gas 1/4 mile from home on the way to work), so I'll offer a few observations:

#1 The vibration is pretty intense through the seat and the bars. It's likely par for the course with a HT motor, so that's not a dig so much as a heads-up to potential buyers. I'm thinking that I will ultimately be upgrading to a better padded cruiser style seat soon because of it. A good pair of riding gloves however makes a significant improvement on the vibration through the bars, plus I think changing the ergos of the MTB setup to a higher stem and cruiser type of handlebars will further relieve some of the stress of it primarly by taking much of my body weight off of my hands.

#2 It's noisy. Not so much for the exhaust, but rather all of the whirring noise from the clutch and driveline. It has a howl that's loud enough directly above it to have me contemplating hearing protection. I don't believe bystanders by contrast really notice it however. Perhaps I just need to start wearing my full face motorcycle helmet instead of the bicycle helmet.

#3 The tensioner really is a weak point here. It never seems to be properly aligned after riding it any distance. The mounting stud just doesn't seem to seat solidly in one position, and the single bearing is essentially free floating within the tensioner wheel. An upgrade to this part alone would go a long way toward improving satisfaction, but it is an easily fixable thing for anybody with a spare inline skate wheel around. I plan to make one up very soon.

#4 Minor oily residue leakage from the driveline side of the crankcase. This truly is a minor point in my mind. It's not dumping fluid out on the roadway or anything, but it seems likely to be a constant source of residue and dirt collection. A quick wipe with a rag every few days is probably a reasonable remedy.

#5 This thing just seems to keep getting faster! I know, I know, break-in and all that, but I have opened it up a few times to see what it will do and I'm impressed.

#6 Invest in nylon lock nuts for every part on the kit. The lock washers and regular nuts just aren't going to hang around for long with all of the vibration, and if I weren't so impatient and had the spare bucks to do it during the original kit install, I would have done this myself. As it is, I have had the clutch mount nut fall off, one of the throttle mount nuts fall off, both nuts for the front engine mount fall off . . er. . I'm not going to wait for anything else to fall off and buying a bunch of locknuts today!

#7 The clutch cable really wasn't up to snuff. I may have mentioned it before, but it snapped at the lever the second day. It's just too small a cable guage for that much force, and the casting of the cable lever anchor on mine was simply shoddy. A good brake line for a replacement is a far more durable upgrade.

Anyway, despite the negatives listed here, I'm not the least bit dissatisfied with the kit. I just need to get some of the kinks worked out, but I'm starting to break even on the riding vs. wrenching time. Just the installation of the locknuts should change that for the better by a longshot.
 
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Ah yes, I had seen your mod before but forgotten about it. Thanks for the reminder. I'm finding the clutch lever effort to be excessive - and I'm not a little guy nor a stranger to working with my hands. All I need is some angle iron and I'll be ready to build it.
 
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