But first, it’s worth understanding what a motor sleigh is and what they are needed for. Motor sleighs are a means of transportation and cargo transportation in snowy conditions. They are basically a very small snowmobile with a wheel. The motor is used either from a scooter or a snowmobile.
For control, there is a handle on which the brake system and fuel supply lever are installed. The seat is small, designed for one person. It is driven by a small wheel with very spiky rubber or a small track. For comfortable movement on snow, skis are installed.
In general, making a snowmobile yourself is not as complicated a process as it might seem at first. Homemade products only seem complicated at first. It is enough to have basic knowledge of how motors work and learn (or ask someone) welding.
Speed and capacity
So, capacity. If you go fishing to catch bream or roach, then you will have more stationary fishing. Complementary feeding, 5-6 holes, and meditation on the nod most of the time. Your snowmobile carries tents, boxes, drills and 3-4 more fishermen. Of course, more than two comrades will not sit on the “snowball”. However, it seems to me that it was the bream fishing enthusiasts who came up with such a thing as a snowmobile sled.
We hitch the sled to the snowmobile, and now the machine, designed to carry 2 riders and small luggage, drags 4-6 adult men and a mountain of fishing belongings across the ice.
But there is one nuance here. You can forget about the mobility of a snowmobile in this version. It serves only to deliver a group of fishermen with gear from the parking lot to 1 or 2 fishing points. That’s it, then the “snowball” stands until the end of fishing, waiting for the entire “fishing gang” to be taken back to the cars.
Or 1-2 anglers ride on it for the purpose of reconnaissance, while the rest thoughtfully meditate over their bream fishing rods.
Frame and body
Before work, it is recommended to draw up a drawing of the frame. The structure is welded from a square pipe 25 x 25 mm with a wall thickness of 2 mm. For a payload of over 150 kg, the section size is increased to 30 x 25 mm. The loading area and body elements are covered with plywood. The seats are selected with a hydrophobic coating.
In the center of the fracture frame there is a hinge that allows rotation around a vertical axis. The maximum rotation angle is limited by welding metal plates. The front half is used for steering, and the engine is placed on the rear half frame.
The solid frame is welded in the form of a rectangle, inside of which axles and tracks are located. The engine is placed in front on a special platform, rigidly welded to the rest of the frame. In both cases, the motor is installed in the transverse direction (the shaft faces the end).
What you need to know about the design
- A motor sleigh consists of a running gear - a motor, a gas tank, wheels, skis, a fuel supply and ignition system. Control - steering wheel, much like a bicycle. There is also a frame and a seat. Let's take a closer look at each element of the chassis.
- Engine – for making a snowmobile with your own hands, a small engine from a scooter or moped is ideal. It is important that it withstands cold weather well and has the ability to be wound by lever or cable. It was also possible to use the oil-fuel mixture as fuel.
- Gas tank - any container that can withstand the presence of fuel inside will do. Therefore, plastic bottles are canceled - they can melt through. An excellent option would be to use a ready-made gas tank. But if you are itching to make a sled with your own hands inside and out, then you can make the tank yourself. This will be discussed later.
- Almost any wheel will do, but it is best to use a car wheel, as it is easier to find studded tires for it. An excellent option would be a wheel from an enduro motorcycle; even a porcupine might envy its needles.
- Skis – it’s better not to skimp here and use alpine skis. They are stronger and more flexible, so they can bear weight more easily. If they don't fit in length, we make them shorter.
- Fuel supply and ignition - everything will be together with the assembled engine, so there is no need to invent anything here.
Well, as for the rest of the elements, it’s already clear; we come up with everything ourselves and make it for ourselves.
It is also worth paying attention to motor sleighs with caterpillar tracks. Yes, this look is more difficult to do yourself. But at the same time, the motor sleigh will feel much better on ice and crust.
Motor sleigh - what and with what
But first, it’s worth understanding what a motor sleigh is and what they are needed for. Motor sleighs are a means of transportation and cargo transportation in snowy conditions. They are basically a very small snowmobile with a wheel. The motor is used either from a scooter or a snowmobile.
For control, there is a handle on which the brake system and fuel supply lever are installed. The seat is small, designed for one person. It is driven by a small wheel with very spiky rubber or a small track. For comfortable movement on snow, skis are installed.
In general, making a snowmobile yourself is not as complicated a process as it might seem at first. Homemade products only seem complicated at first. It is enough to have basic knowledge of how motors work and learn (or ask someone) welding.
Load capacity
The same goes for carrying capacity. Of course, pike is a rather big fish. Specimens weighing 10-15 kg also feed in winter. And with a good bite from a decent pike, you can pick up 10-20 carcasses of 3-5 kg each during a fishing trip. And this, as arithmetic says, is from 30 to 100 kg of fish.
Another question is that a normal fisherman does not need such a quantity of fish. And the right pike people stop fishing when they have caught enough fish to feed themselves and their family.
In normal times, a pike snowmobile carries two riders and a load of gear. No tents, no food, no attributes of a permanent ice camp. However, if fishing is done with spoons and balancers, then the winter iron weighs no less than the summer one. This means that you can safely put 10 kg on each fishing box.
How to choose an engine
In order to create a snowmobile, it is necessary to take into account the most important and central part of the entire mechanism - the motor. The motor must have decent traction in order to move the entire mechanism in difficult snowy weather conditions. For everything to work out as it should, a powerful motor from the Neva walk-behind tractor will do.
If such an engine is available, one or two people will be able to move on a homemade snowmobile from a walk-behind tractor with their own hands. The engine power is 6-7 horsepower, which is quite enough to move on snow cover.
If you add a snowmobile stand to the walk-behind tractor, the lifting force will increase and you can easily load your walk-behind tractor for snow trips.
What is good about this engine, many ask. In fact, there are many more advantages than you might think:
- First of all, it is an affordable price.
- Also good quality is proven by Japanese production.
- The motor has an additional air cooling system.
Also note that gasoline can be used as fuel.
What can you take ready-made?
To make something like a motorbike, you don’t need to do everything from scratch. You can take some element, design, sold in the store.
In order not to buy a new scooter, you can take it from your own hands, it will be even cheaper. An even cheaper option is to look at the disassembly markets, where there is a lot of this extra stuff.
You can use a snow scooter for the base of a motorized sled, but you need to choose a completely metal one and additionally change the design with your own hands, otherwise this subtype of sled simply will not withstand the loads.
The wheel is also worth looking at in the store. In addition to the above-mentioned wheel from an enduro motorcycle, you can use standard wheels from a car, and for better grip on snow, simply add chains.
There is also an option using dutik – tubeless rubber wheels. But first you should strengthen them with a chain or strips of iron.
For wealthy citizens, an excellent option would be to introduce into the design the so-called VGD - off-road tracked propulsion units.
The seat can most often be taken from the same scooter, and if you want to make it yourself, you can use publicly available diagrams. Skis are bought in a store or kept in a garage.
It is best to use ultra-light alpine skis; with them, the motor sleigh will not fall into the snow. Some homemade products use now popular modules for motorized towing vehicles as a basis.
But if your task is a motor sleigh with minimal investment, then this option is not for you.
Read also: Helicopter made from a chainsaw video
Selected features
If you fish for pike in winter on small bodies of water separated by land, then you will need a snowmobile with a wide track and runners. Narrow skis and goosenecks are good for high-speed sports snowmobiling on the smooth snow of a large reservoir or a decent river.
And in the snowdrifts of copses and on the chubby snow of a small pond, they will play a cruel joke on you. You will be more engaged in winter “off-road” - pulling the snowmobile out of the snowdrifts and pushing it, than doing proper pike fishing.
Construction of a homemade motoblock snowmobile
This is a sought-after invention that you can make yourself if you have quality parts. The walk-behind tractor is taken partially (separate parts) or used completely. If you decide to use it not fully assembled, you need to weld a supporting frame with a rear axle, steering fork and wheels onto it. The most difficult stage in this case is the transformation of the working shaft of the walk-behind tractor into a drive gear.
The most practical and universal solution in the manufacture of a self-propelled vehicle would be to use parts from a walk-behind tractor. You only need to remove the steering fork and engine from the finished walk-behind tractor.
The motor can be located at the rear of the structure.
Before you start making your own structure, draw a drawing, collect all the necessary materials, prepare the tools, and you can get started. The design is quite simple and anyone can handle it; technical education and any skills are not required.
If you have not graduated from the Faculty of Engineering and find it difficult to draw up a drawing, use ours.
Drawing of a simple frame for a homemade snowmobile
The drawing shows the frame that you will need when making a snowmobile.
The walk-behind tractor in a homemade caterpillar snowmobile is the main part due to which your vehicle will move.
If everything is done correctly according to the drawing, you will get a snowmobile based on a gooseneck.
Drawing of a snowmobile frame on tracks
We assemble the sleigh with our own hands
First, you need to decide on the design; to do this, look for photos or videos of motor sleighs and copy them. If you intend to make motorfins yourself, then you should arm yourself with a pencil.
First, sketch out on paper what you want to see. After this, begin to sweep aside those parts without which the unit will not lose its qualities.
Add stiffeners and fastenings as necessary. Once you finally understand what you want, move on to the drawings.
At this stage, it will become clear which bolts and nuts are best to use, which elements will be homemade, as well as the main welding points.
Look for scooters at scrap yards or markets. Any will do, the main thing is that their engine volume is no more than 50 cubic centimeters (otherwise the sled will fall under the A1 license category).
Also take into account such a nuance as a stable injection and ignition system. Remaking it yourself and bringing it to mind is for those who want to do absolutely everything with their own hands.
A gas tank would be a good idea. But at the same time, you can use a can of gasoline, or make it yourself.
Important: do not solder the tank under any circumstances. Only welding. Otherwise, you can witness the “tin plague” - a process when tin becomes brittle in severe frost and breaks out of the seams.
Start assembling the frame following the drawings. At this stage, the ability to do your own welding will come in handy.
Use pipes for the frame. They are easier to bend than rolled profiles.
They can also be connected at sharp angles without loss of stability. This will make your sled more aesthetically pleasing.
Don't forget to also make a bushing for the snowmobile's steering wheel. Simply weld a piece of pipe larger than the handlebar post at a 90-degree angle to the frame.
Start putting all the parts together, from the engine and cables to the pipes. It is worth considering that skis are best secured on a low-moving basis. After you have installed everything yourself on the future motor sled, do not be lazy and test them. As soon as the shortcomings are corrected, install the seat.
Tip: use non-flammable insulation, such as glass wool, as seat padding. Then it can be mounted on the cylinder block, having previously strengthened it - this way you will get a motor sleigh with a heated seat.
How to make a homemade snowmobile from a walk-behind tractor on tracks
Four wheels are installed inside the track. When movement occurs, they roll along a conveyor belt with fixed lugs. The caterpillar drive is carried out by a chain from the motor, special drive sprockets, through the driven shaft. They were taken from Buran.
The engine is taken from a conventional walk-behind tractor with a power of 6 hp. You won't be able to accelerate quickly on it. The soft ski and track suspension have been removed because the sled is designed to ride on powder. This simplified the design and reduced the weight of the snowmobile.
Making tracks for a snowmobile
Let's look at the process of making a caterpillar. Plastic water pipe 40 mm, cut to length 470 mm. Blanks for lugs will be made from them. After which each of them is sawn lengthwise into equal parts with a circular saw.
The lugs are attached with furniture bolts to the conveyor belt. When making a track, it is extremely important to maintain the same distance between the lugs. Otherwise, there will be a “running” on the teeth of the drive sprocket, as a result of which the caterpillar will slip and slide off the rollers.
To drill holes for the mounting bolts in the conveyor belt, a jig was made. To drill the holes, a wood drill with a special sharpening was used.
This jig allows six holes to be drilled simultaneously into the conveyor belt to attach three track lugs. Drive sprockets (2 pcs), an inflatable rubber wheel (4 pcs), sealed bearings No. 205 (2 pcs) were also purchased.
The turner made a support for the bearings and the drive shaft of the track. The snowmobile frame is made independently. For this, square pipes 25x25 mm were used. The articulated axes of rotation of the steering wheel and skis are in the same plane and on the same line, so a continuous steering rod without ball ends was used.
Ski turning bushings are quite easy to make. A plumbing coupling with a 3/4-inch internal thread is welded onto the front cross member of the frame. The pipes with external threads are screwed in there. I welded the bipod of the ski rack and steering rod to them. Angles are installed on the skis, which serve as an attachment to the snowmobile's rotating stand. A metal undercut is made at the bottom to better control the snowmobile while driving on compacted snow or crust.
Chain tension is adjusted by motor offset
Driving a snowmobile is quite simple. To increase engine speed, use the gas handle, which is located on the steering wheel. This engages the automatic centrifugal clutch, causing the snowmobile to move. Since the engine power is low, the speed of the snowmobile is 10-15 km/h. Therefore, brakes are not provided. To stop you need to reduce the engine speed.
Tracks are manufactured in any width. Choose what is more convenient to make: a narrow but long track, or a wide but short one. It is important to remember that a larger track will put more strain on the engine and make the snowmobile more difficult to control. If the caterpillar is made small, the car may fall through in deep snow.
The weight of the snowmobile with all parts was 76 kg. It included: steering wheel and engine (25 kg), skis (5 kg), wheels with axles (9 kg), drive shaft (7 kg), caterpillar (9 kg), seat with racks (6 kg).
You can reduce the weight of some parts. For this size of a snowmobile with a caterpillar, the weight indicator is quite satisfactory.
Characteristics of the resulting homemade snowmobile
frame length 2000 mm; track width 470 mm; the axial distance of the support rollers is 1070 mm.
Advantages and disadvantages of “motor dogs”
Experienced fishermen, who often go fishing in the winter, have long decided on the appropriate transport for their trips. And novice fishermen are just trying to decide which vehicle to choose.
For transportation, you can choose almost any equipment - from a snowmobile to the actual karkat assembled in the garage. But we would like to recommend a lighter, cheaper and more compact motorized towing vehicle, which is nicknamed the “motor dog”.
You can make money on a “motor dog” even if you make money on the Internet. The professional resource www.t2money.ru will help with this. The encyclopedia of home Internet business will help you promote your website, affiliate business and teach you how to make money on the Internet. “Motodog” is an ideal means of transportation over short distances, because... its speed is less than that of a snowmobile. But you will have to travel with a little discomfort - often standing or sitting on things.
However, a motorized towing vehicle also has its advantages.
The first is their cost. “Motodog” is several times cheaper than a snowmobile and is very economical. Some models of motorized towing vehicles, moving over rough terrain, consume approximately 2.5 liters of fuel per hour. Also, spare parts and consumables for motorized towing vehicles are very inexpensive.
Second, excellent cross-country ability. A motorized dog will easily take you to the most inaccessible places, not yielding to either a snowmobile or a caracat, and sometimes even surpassing them. Although it must be taken into account that different types of suspension for motorized towing vehicles work better under certain conditions.
For example, a slick design is an ideal option for driving through thick and loose snowdrifts. Snow will not get inside the caterpillar, so the cross-country ability and useful power of the “motor dog” are improved. But, moving on clean ice or a tightly packed track is fraught with vibrations and overheating of the sliding guides, which require snow for cooling. Motorized towing vehicles with roller suspension do not have these disadvantages. It has a soft ride and is great for driving on ice. But when moving through snowdrifts, a lot of snow gets inside the tracks. As a result, the load on the engine increases, and cross-country ability leaves much to be desired.
comments powered by HyperComments
The best homemade products - a snowmobile from a walk-behind tractor
When making a homemade snowmobile, they use tracks from other snowmobiles, or homemade ones assembled from scrap materials. After choosing a track, you need to decide what type of suspension to use. You need to choose from two main types: roller suspension and skid suspension.
Each of them has both advantages and disadvantages. After this, it is important to decide what kind of layout the snowmobile will have. Typically, a snowmobile is equipped with two steering skis at the front and a track block at the rear.
The engine can be installed either at the rear or at the front of the snowmobile.
How to fish with an elastic band correctly
I’ll tell you straight that even the mention of such gear as an elastic band, like a donkey with a rubber shock absorber, makes me smile nervously and have some semblance of micro-tremors. An experienced psychologist who can read gestures would clearly say that I don’t really like this tackle. And this is the honest truth.
