MKC gears up for Superkarts
Author: Roger Polak
“You’ve got to come Superkarting. You’ve got to come Superkarting. When are you coming Superkarting?” These words from Victorian Superkart club member Lee Filliponi have been bouncing around the walls of Melbourne Kart Centre for a couple of years now and so last Friday I finally took Lee up on his offer of a loaner Rotax 125 engine to bolt on to a Monaco chassis to try out the big (by sprint kart standards!) track at Winton.
Lee’s brother-in-law Dave provided us with the Rotax, which other than a 16 tooth front sprocket, is basically the same as the Rotax’s used in AKA sprint kart racing. The 125 Max class is designed so that any sprint kart racer with a Rotax can quickly get it ready for the Superkart Max class. We’ll get to a few setup topics later, but essentially, any Rotax kart in good (safe!) condition can be made ready to race in Superkarts.
The first step on my way to Winton was to build the kart. So I took a Monaco GP5 B-Max, exactly as we’ve used it for Clubman and Leopard classes, and fitted up the Rotax. The main difference between the Rotax sprint kart and the Superkart is the 16 tooth front sprocket. Lee recommended the gearing for Winton be 16-75, which is what I fitted. And that was basically it! To build the kart to pass Superkart scrutineering requires a few extra changes, like a solid dowel in the top of the steering shaft; a Hella wet weather light on the back, seat strengthening washers and other small changes. But for our practice day at Winton these changes aren’t compulsory. If you start racing 125 Max Superkarts then the changes are required.
It’s a 3 odd hour trip to Winton from MKC, and despite many hours of Superkart talk with Lee, I wasn’t sure what was in store. We drove through the gate at Winton then parked our gear in one of the carport pit shelters in the paddock. It’s best to arrive around 9am to get set up. Then you head to the track office and pay up $100, which will let you practice for the whole day. Then get ready for your first session.
Getting your kart ready for action is very similar to sprint karts, chain lube, tyre pressure and check everything is tight! You don’t want wheels or other bits flying off at over 150kph! Then you drive your kart to the out grid (no trolley’s required) and wait for the cars to leave the circuit. The format for practice varies, but generally the race cars practice on their own, sedans get a separate session and then karts and bikes go out together.
You have to be very easy on the Rotax clutch to get it off the line with 16T on the front sprocket, but after you leave the grid the clutch will be engaged the whole time. We sell Lee all his Superkart bits and he doesn’t seem to be bugging us for clutch bits that often. Actually he gets a year out of his Rotax clutch.
Lee gave me several words of advice before we hit the track, but his main point was “Watch out for the bikes!” I thought he meant watch out as they pass you, but as I braked frantically to avoid cleaning up some sort of race bike the first time I came across one, I worked out that the Max Superkart is actually faster than many of the bikes!
You’ve got really good grip thanks to tyres like the MG Reds, Bridgestone YGKs and Dunlop SL6’s and so for most of the lap you’re flat out and hard into the throttle. Then when you hit the brakes (using only the single disk on the B-Max) you pull up really hard. I guess we don’t get to feel how good these brakes really are on sprint tracks, but they really do pull the karts up!
So aside from avoiding bikes, you concentrate on nailing each corner cleanly and make sure you get a good exit speed. Oh yeah, you don’t back off much either! At Winton you touch the brakes 4 times a lap, some guys reckon that turn one can be taken flat out too, but I didn’t feel enough grip to try that on this Friday.
The lap record for 125 Max at Winton is 1:31. But according to Lee the track wasn’t too fast on this occasion and the tyres we had on weren’t at their peak either. However the point of the day wasn’t to get slick times… yes, actually it was and in hindsight I would have put on some near new MG Reds to shave a second or two of the 1:34 I put down.
When you first drive one of these things they genuinely feel fast. Truth is, I’ll admit that I wondered whether the highly geared up Rotax would feel exciting or like a hire kart. But once they wind up the 125 Max karts are really a buzz to drive. And at a practice day at Winton you can clock up around 1 ½ hours of track time in a day. Indeed I was guilty of doing the entire 20 minute session more than once!
Bottom line is that this is great fun. And sure you’ll hear the arguments go back and forth between sprint karters and Superkart folk over who has the best racing, best value and all that. But in the end this is another string in the bow of karting and is well worth a try. At MKC we’re going to expand further into Superkarting and will actually be competing in a couple of classes this year. So have a chat to us about maybe having a stab at this type of karting (we will be stocking all the stuff you need) and contact the various Superkart clubs around Aust via their website at. It’s top fun and Lee tells us that the guys who run Superkarts are a friendly bunch who will welcome their sprinting cousins. Thanks again to Lee and Dave for their time and gear on this Winton expedition. It won’t be my last!
