Dirt Oval Kart Setup for Beginners

[@jacobcatoe997]

Appreciate you guys doing a technical talk. I want to get into the hobby, but have zero knowledge about it, so this video is very educational for me.

[@TurnLeftMotorsports]

If you have no experience it can be very intimidating trying to get into kart racing. I'm trying to help make it easier to get into it with these videos. I also encourage going to your local tracks you're looking at running and watching the races, and go into the pits afterwards and try talking to some folks. There are a lot of helpful people out there.

[@jacobcatoe997]

​@@TurnLeftMotorsportsThanks for the tip! Keep up the great content!

[@dynamicdopamine]

Or you can always just go to a good engine builder and ask them to help you set up your go-kart while using their engines because they're not going to want their engine looking horrible out on the track so they're going to try to get you set up so that you can drive the kart... not only that, you need to do your research and study the tire game!

[@zachthorp5267]

Any tips to convert a road course Emmick to Dirt? Or am I looking for a bumpy frame rail kart and selling this one 😅

[@TurnLeftMotorsports]

Move in your wheels as far as you can, try to get your overall width as narrow as the frame allows. Get an oval wheel set. Dial in some RF camber if possible. Those should help, but ultimately a road course kart is never going to be as good as an offset kart on dirt oval.

[@BenjaminDover0496]

Is the push cart level when u try to get angles? American is pretty important. U want your left to turn faster than your right. Hope this hel

[@TurnLeftMotorsports]

In an ideal world the cart would be level, you'd have a set spot in the garage where the kart sits and everything is perfectly level on the concrete. But in order to video tape we had to be outside and up in the air. We zeroed the angle finder out on the back rail which should get it pretty close. Ackerman, I'll be honest I don't know too much about adjusting it(I'm not the guy doing most of the talking and my setup knowledge is not as good as his), but we have found on the track we run straight up tends to work good, but obviously stuff changes when you go to other tracks.

[@kzspeed1288]

I dont mean to knock your video. But, toe and camber are significantly effected by chassis flex. Therefore, toe and camber need to be checked with the driver in the kart. I think you will find the toe especially is way off.

[@TurnLeftMotorsports]

Not a knock at all, thank you for your input. That totally makes sense. These chassis do flex a ton, especially with heavier drivers(me) lol

[@kzspeed1288]

@@TurnLeftMotorsports What I’ve done is set my toe with my little man in the kart using my accustoe. Then I have these toe plates that bolt on the hub. So I’ve set toe on the ground, then I put the kart on the stand and took measurements. I always set it back to those measurements. On my kid’s MineCon it’s 1/4” out. Which gives me 1/8” when he’s in it. I run a little more toe because they make a lot of contact in Wing Karts. I never want to be toed in. Good Luck. I’m still learning this stuff every day. That’s why I watch every video I see.

[@TurnLeftMotorsports]

@@kzspeed1288 that's great advice, we are typically setting our karts up by ourselves so it's hard to measure stuff while sitting in the kart. But if you get that baseline like you have it's doable. You can never stop learning. Thank you for the comments!

[@jamietwigg5152]

No such thing as rear steer on a sold axle, moving the rear axle forward or back changes the Yaw of the kart.

[@TurnLeftMotorsports]

Sure I can agree with this statement, but you clearly understand what we meant. We work mostly with 3 link racecars, and with the suspension the term rear steer becomes valid vs yaw, so that's just our common terminology. I personally will continue to use the term rear steer on the karts over the term yaw because it just makes more sense to me

[@jamietwigg5152]

@@TurnLeftMotorsports it isn't rear steer, I also deal with a 4 link on a super latemodel. All it does is change the offset of the rear tires tracking to the fronts. It's wrong terminology to say rear steer on a kart, I also worked for a major chassis manufacturer for 14 years

[@TurnLeftMotorsports]

​@@jamietwigg5152Rear Steer per Google "when the rear end of a car changes position relative to the steer axis, and can be caused by suspension movement or acceleration." So your trailing arm angles, as your rear suspension changes, change the position of the rear end relative to the steering axis, hence rear steer. I won't argue against the correctness of the terminology on the karts since there is no suspension, although one could argue the karts have chassis flex that acts as suspension, but in a 3 link (4 link probably too, but I haven't done much with them) they have rear steer per definition. The panhard bar angle is what actively changes the "offset"

[@stevenburdick424]

Push the seat forward.

[@TurnLeftMotorsports]

Driver is 6' tall, won't be able to get into the kart if it went forward in this case.

[@stevenburdick424]

@@TurnLeftMotorsports ok

[@stevenburdick424]

Where is the body of kart?

[@TurnLeftMotorsports]

@@stevenburdick424 in the rafters of my garage, I don't like running them. There are definitely perks to running a body but between running a stock clone and my track being so small it's not as much of a factor so I choose not to run one.

[@stevenburdick424]

@@TurnLeftMotorsports Got to get out and compete.

[@dynamicdopamine]

So you're telling me if the go-kart is loose I need to put more cross in it and if it's tight I need to take cross out of it😂

[@AustinHull-l8f]

There is a sweet spot with karts. Tight/loose works on a bell curve, you might be loose below 60% cross but youll also find loose above say 70% as well. Hope this clears some stuff up!

[@BenjaminDover0496]

Toe to what tho? If your right ain't square with the rear then you are literally just guessing.

[@TurnLeftMotorsports]

Steering is pinned, sorry that's not mentioned in the video. Sure it's probably smart to check your square as part of your setup everytime but this is a video intended for beginners and I didn't want it to be 30 minutes long. Just a brief overview. It being intended for beginners is why some of our setup stuff in the video is basic. We normally use toe plates, digital scales, etc etc. But we want this to be realistic for someone just starting out.

[@Toddscamry-lk5wr]

You cant set camper on stand has to be on level pad or ground

[@TurnLeftMotorsports]

A level surface is always best to do setup, but in this case we didn't have a designated level spot, so we made due with what we had. Also we did it on a stand because it's easier to video it that way. We acknowledged the stands themselves were not level, and that's why we zeroed the angle finder on the center frame rail. All angles found with that should be accurate, only exception I can think of is if your frame is tweaked, which at that point you'd have larger issues.