I've had the desire floating around in the back of my head for a bit (a desire partially dredged back up to the surface by texastars recent drag bike build) to build a simple drag race bike for a few years now. I live within a short driving distance of several 1/8 mile asphalt drag strips and also every summer there is the KOI dirt drag races which travel around to different fairs and drag race a dirt track anywhere from 150 ft to 300 ft, mostly 200ft though.
The idea in my head is a rigid frame simple bike with two wheel sets and probably a set of dr350/650 cush wheels setup which will make for easy rear gearing changes and a disc rear brake. One set will have a drag slick/ street tire front an the other will have knobbies for the dirt drags.
The frame will likely be completely one off built by me, rigid rear end, simple telescoping forks out front.
The question I have for the racing gurus is what powerplant would you recommend going after with the following criteria:
1. Cheap. (I know this word is relative when talking about racing)
2. Plentiful. (easy to find parts and donors)
3. Simple. (two stroke pops into my head, but the KOI races are setup that you may run 5 or 6 runs back to back, so whatever it is needs to be able to stay cool and not meltdown with that many back to back hard runs.)
I'm also not concerned (yet) about being the fastest guy out there, I just wanna have fun.
one of the engines that has popped into my head has been the ex500 ninja lump, which hits the 3 bullet points, but I know they aren't REAL powerhouses.
Ive also thought liquid cooled two stroke snowmobile engine with a cvt setup, but im afraid that even that without a cool down cart will want to melt down with the back to back dirt drags.
So what say you? What engine would you recommend to build a drag bike around?
The idea in my head is a rigid frame simple bike with two wheel sets and probably a set of dr350/650 cush wheels setup which will make for easy rear gearing changes and a disc rear brake. One set will have a drag slick/ street tire front an the other will have knobbies for the dirt drags.
The frame will likely be completely one off built by me, rigid rear end, simple telescoping forks out front.
The question I have for the racing gurus is what powerplant would you recommend going after with the following criteria:
1. Cheap. (I know this word is relative when talking about racing)
2. Plentiful. (easy to find parts and donors)
3. Simple. (two stroke pops into my head, but the KOI races are setup that you may run 5 or 6 runs back to back, so whatever it is needs to be able to stay cool and not meltdown with that many back to back hard runs.)
I'm also not concerned (yet) about being the fastest guy out there, I just wanna have fun.
one of the engines that has popped into my head has been the ex500 ninja lump, which hits the 3 bullet points, but I know they aren't REAL powerhouses.
Ive also thought liquid cooled two stroke snowmobile engine with a cvt setup, but im afraid that even that without a cool down cart will want to melt down with the back to back dirt drags.
So what say you? What engine would you recommend to build a drag bike around?