Build Vulcan 8 x 8

So I prepping the top half for paint.



Theres this hole in the dash where the amp meter was.



I’m not having any gauges, so I would like to fill this hole. I had a small piece of this plastic and cut a disc to fill the hole. I was going to attemp to weld it in with a soldering iron. I thought I would try it first at a less “in your face” location. There was another unwanted hole in the rear.



Welded it up a sanded it off. I guess it’s alright.



So I give the dash a try.



I sanded it quite a bit and I can honestly say, If you close your eyes, you can’t even see it.

So this thing had a heat issue at the left rear where the exhaust goes out. It gets so hot, it kind of melts the body and tub. My tub fender was sagging and actually split the edge of the tub. The muffler was hanging off baling wire. The new ones have the exhaust goes out straight out the back. But they also have a fan on top pulling heat out. I didn’t want that , so I am working with what I got. I jacked up the fender and bolted an aluminum angle to both sides of the split.



I made a whole new muffler hanger with a heat shield. (Hard to see) You can see where I “plastic welded” the crack in the tub.



Then I wrapped the exhaust header with some fiberglass tape.



I did take it out and test the transmission in the yard. It all worked except the brakes. I think they just need adjusting. I didn’t have it up to full speed, but it appears it will be about as fast as my zero turn.

WaterH said:

So this thing had a heat issue at the left rear where the exhaust goes out. It gets so hot, it kind of melts the body and tub. My tub fender was sagging and actually split the edge of the tub. The muffler was hanging off baling wire. The new ones have the exhaust goes out straight out the back. But they also have a fan on top pulling heat out. I didn’t want that , so I am working with what I got. I jacked up the fender and bolted an aluminum angle to both sides of the split.

I made a whole new muffler hanger with a heat shield. (Hard to see) You can see where I “plastic welded” the crack in the tub.

Then I wrapped the exhaust header with some fiberglass tape.

I did take it out and test the transmission in the yard. It all worked except the brakes. I think they just need adjusting. I didn’t have it up to full speed, but it appears it will be about as fast as my zero turn.

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Exhaust goes straight up, intake too so it might still run when swamped.

I did one of those things up with a rack over the hood. Just had pins that fit in holes in the "boat rack" so you could lift it up to access the motor.

The battery box could be in the ghetto fab thread. The hold down studs were rusted off, so nothing holding the battery. The box was over size even for a standard car battery. I wanted to make a whole new box, but I didn’t have the materials handy. So I just cut the two corners and rewelded to fit an Optima. I also welded on some stainless studs for hold down.



I fit real nice and I did the big cables for ground and start.



I test fit the top body and I can’t say I like the access to the battery.



Not sure how I plan to deal with this. Slusher, did you just cut the whole center out and put some kind of grating? Do you have pics?

Anyways, I did some more prepping for paint.



Four cans of Ford blue later.

I built a boat rack for the whole thing. 1x1 square tubing on either side of the hood (motor was in the front) so I added cross bars and found a nice piece of wire shelving for the basket.

No pics.

WaterH said:

The battery box . . . was over size even for a standard car battery.

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Probably sized to hold one of those plastic battery containment boxes.

I've made battery trays sized like that before.

Today has its ups and downs.

First I made an aluminum control panel. It’s just starter key that also shuts it off, choke and light switch.



The nice thing about it is it comes off with three screws and everything still operates. That way I can remove the top body and still run the thing if I’m trouble shooting.



I was quite happy with it. But the day is young.

Next, I adjusted the brakes. They didn’t work before. I took a lot of play out of the pedal, but I didn’t get to test them. Then I went on to the wheels. I wanted to remove the wheels for paint and to check out the axle to tub seals. I removed 5 of the wheels with out issue. One wheel had two studs that spun on me. The back of the stud was tough to get at because of the deep dish wheels. I could get a vise grip on it, but the head was round, so not much force could be applied.

Eventually, I got the hot wrench out and heated the nuts cherry red. When the first one came out, I just dropped it and repositioned the vise grip to the other stud. Would you believe while I was laying down there, that I was able to find that hot nut with my ear? Anyways, the second one came off too.

Question, is there any reason I shouldn’t weld these studs back in?



I went about cleaning and painting the wheels and axle/hubs. While I had it on Jack stands like above, I was able to turn the hubs by hand so I could paint the top sides. Ran into some resistance and looked inside the tub to find the choke cable in one of the chain sprockets. I quickly backed it up to get the cable out. Would you believe the MF cable snapped in two.

Apon cleaning the wheels I found some were very rusty. In fact, I was wondering why the guy gave me some inner tubes when these were tubeless tires. I see now.



Some of the wheels were new looking. I’m guessing they were. I think I’m going to need two more wheels. Not sure if these are anything special.

WaterH said:

Question, is there any reason I shouldn’t weld these studs back in?

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A couple hot tacks on the back side. Don't go ham on it or future you will curse now you.

WaterH said:

I think I’m going to need two more wheels. Not sure if these are anything special.

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Looks like a super common size for turf equipment (parks and golf course maintenance). What are the dimensions?

We finished yet?!

ExWrench said:

A couple hot tacks on the back side. Don't go ham on it or future you will curse now you.


Looks like a super common size for turf equipment (parks and golf course maintenance). What are the dimensions?

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The studs are tacked. The wheels are 8” by 8” by 5 lug. Small wheel for 5 lug. I need to measure the lug pattern.

CDA 455 II said:

We finished yet?!

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I got the brilliant idea to put water in the tub to check for leaks. It only leaks at 4 of the six axles. There is a grease nipple at the seal location. I greased one axle and it stopped leaking. I greased at two more locations and the grease blew out the seal to the tub instead of the bearing. My grease gun stopped working at the forth location. I got pissed off and jumped in the pool.

I still have to ulpulstery the seat back. I took half a day to make this.



Those are stainless washers welded on stainless nuts. (On the back side.) once finished, it should be easy to mount. I did ulpostery the seat bottom. My ulpostery work sucks.

WaterH said:

I got pissed off and jumped in the pool.

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I love it! "Screw this, I'm going for a swim!"

WaterH said:

I did ulpostery the seat bottom. My ulpostery work sucks.

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So does your spelling but who are we to judge...

SLOWPOKE693 said:

So does your spelling but who are we to judge...

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True, but I don’t care about spelling. I would like the ulpolstery to look good. I mean, it’s not a12 century love seat, it’s just a F’ing bench. I’m watching some Utube before I do the back.

Edit, new wheels for the Vulcan.



Actually for the wife’s truck.

Ermagerd!

Oh, good.

It would be hilarious to make a fiberglass body for the Max to look like the Bronco-thing. A little blue foam, a little glass fabric....

So here’s my best job on the seat back. I painted it black. You can see on the left side I rolled the vinyl under to staple. The left side sticks up on the cart.





Dont look fantastic, but it will do.





I finally got a pull starter on the bay. It is only for emergency if the electric one don’t work. I determined this engine does not have a stater, so no way to charge the battery. Not a real big deal because I only use it for starting and lights. The lights will all be LED and I don’t figure on driving this at night much. But the battery is pretty much inaccessible once the top is on. So I wired in a trickle charger. I’ve used these before with great success.



Speaking of lights I got some LED taillights. The mount holes line up with holes already in the back.



That was the last of my good luck on them. They are designed to mount on grounded sheet metal. Of course, I’m on plastic, so I need a screw that goes through with a nut. I had a good stainless screw, but the head is too big to fit the light.



The screw on the right was modified with a drill and a grinder.




The other earatating thing was the wire came out at a weird place and I had to drill another hole in the body.


They are on. Wiring for them and the headlights to come later.