IRQVET
Member
Can’t speak to the past, as I don’t live there. No disrespect, I’m new(er) to this sport . . .
Harbor Freight 212 Ghost
- Thread starter Mark @ EC
- Start date
There is a famous quote.
Something about not knowing our history, be forced to relive it.
As a fellow vet you know what shaw is referring to and I am sure you embrace the theroy so......
We got into karting in the mid 2000's so info from before that was learned second hand. Karting started with 2 stroke power plants and at points in time there were quite a number of those smokey monsters competing for dominance. When small 4 strokes became the direction small engine equipment was going racers slowly gravitated to them and for a bit you could find several different offerings at tracks.
Briggs and Stratton caught wind of the use of their engines and saw a marketing angle and formed Briggs motorsports and karting had factory support for the sport. Deals were made and karting had an era of fairly stable racing. The 2 smokers still shared the track but with the exception of the big HP/open guys if you ran 4 stroke you ran flatty. It was not all roses but about the biggest contravercy in the Briggs era was a few head design changes that made some engines illegal out of spec but it was actually an easy fix all things considered
Enter the EPA and clean air. The flatty got pushed out in favor of ohv engines that were "better for the environment". Briggs phased out the flatty but to show support for karting they introduced the animal.
Unfortunately karters knew for a fact that flatheads would always reign supreme and balked at Briggs trying to force them to abandon their beloved flattys. Now Briggs motorsports had already pulled back a bit on their support because of lack of budget so the racers anger was not totally unfounded.
This was about the same time I entered kart racing. Ohv was going to be the future and Briggs had animal and world formula. There was also a new division called f200 that pitted 4 different makes against each other which was promising. About this time alot of flatty racers that were tired of paying up to $2500 for a flatty with $600 to 1000 refreshes saw that ohv was the future but wanted to cut the Briggs umbilical cord.
Enter the china will save karting era. China was producing Honda based knock offs (usually 1-3 versions earlier than the current Honda) at a fraction of the cost of a new Honda engine. The karting world latched onto these. Some years 3 or 4 different makes of these would show up at the track within a season but their quality control was average to poor and it was sort of a flavor of the month kind of thing.
It seems to have stabilized to an extent but I thank my stars we got out of racing when we did.
Now I am sure that there will be plenty of hate on the ghost but here's something to consider. HF lost alot of money in the early days of China will save karting because racers would go and buy their 6hp engine, pull the governor, race it, blow a hole in the side, throw the governor parts through the hole in the case and take it back to HF and get another one for free under warranty (with coupon you were paying a whole $70 for the dam engine lol)
HF stiffened their return policy and people cried lol. The fact that HF wants to market a kart specific package after karters ripped them off should gain some respect. Further, if HF is willing to throw even 1/4 of the support to the sport Briggs did in their hay day using the ghost as their conduit then we could be entering a new stable version of the sport that has not been seen since about 2005.
The racers, promoters, and sanctioning bodies can continue status quo and things will continue as is. The other option is to see HF as they in the past looked to Briggs and just maybe they will show love to this great sport that has been in need of a hug for over a decade.
We got into karting in the mid 2000's so info from before that was learned second hand. Karting started with 2 stroke power plants and at points in time there were quite a number of those smokey monsters competing for dominance. When small 4 strokes became the direction small engine equipment was going racers slowly gravitated to them and for a bit you could find several different offerings at tracks.
Briggs and Stratton caught wind of the use of their engines and saw a marketing angle and formed Briggs motorsports and karting had factory support for the sport. Deals were made and karting had an era of fairly stable racing. The 2 smokers still shared the track but with the exception of the big HP/open guys if you ran 4 stroke you ran flatty. It was not all roses but about the biggest contravercy in the Briggs era was a few head design changes that made some engines illegal out of spec but it was actually an easy fix all things considered
Enter the EPA and clean air. The flatty got pushed out in favor of ohv engines that were "better for the environment". Briggs phased out the flatty but to show support for karting they introduced the animal.
Unfortunately karters knew for a fact that flatheads would always reign supreme and balked at Briggs trying to force them to abandon their beloved flattys. Now Briggs motorsports had already pulled back a bit on their support because of lack of budget so the racers anger was not totally unfounded.
This was about the same time I entered kart racing. Ohv was going to be the future and Briggs had animal and world formula. There was also a new division called f200 that pitted 4 different makes against each other which was promising. About this time alot of flatty racers that were tired of paying up to $2500 for a flatty with $600 to 1000 refreshes saw that ohv was the future but wanted to cut the Briggs umbilical cord.
Enter the china will save karting era. China was producing Honda based knock offs (usually 1-3 versions earlier than the current Honda) at a fraction of the cost of a new Honda engine. The karting world latched onto these. Some years 3 or 4 different makes of these would show up at the track within a season but their quality control was average to poor and it was sort of a flavor of the month kind of thing.
It seems to have stabilized to an extent but I thank my stars we got out of racing when we did.
Now I am sure that there will be plenty of hate on the ghost but here's something to consider. HF lost alot of money in the early days of China will save karting because racers would go and buy their 6hp engine, pull the governor, race it, blow a hole in the side, throw the governor parts through the hole in the case and take it back to HF and get another one for free under warranty (with coupon you were paying a whole $70 for the dam engine lol)
HF stiffened their return policy and people cried lol. The fact that HF wants to market a kart specific package after karters ripped them off should gain some respect. Further, if HF is willing to throw even 1/4 of the support to the sport Briggs did in their hay day using the ghost as their conduit then we could be entering a new stable version of the sport that has not been seen since about 2005.
The racers, promoters, and sanctioning bodies can continue status quo and things will continue as is. The other option is to see HF as they in the past looked to Briggs and just maybe they will show love to this great sport that has been in need of a hug for over a decade.
All_Knight
Member
get a hold of gary costanza he already dynoed the ghost out of the box and the number are pretty good
All_Knight
Member
"J'-remy
Member
what are clone and regular box stock predator numbers on this dyno?
All_Knight
Member
Contact Gary he will tell you
"J'-remy
Member
Dawgwood just posted this.
foreverfaster
Site Supporter
so one of our back yard guys bought one of these motors and the "hop up kit" we helped him install
Issues and fixes. 1st comment.. don't buy the hop up kit unless your spending this money just for the angled intake tube. which i'm sure you can get elsewhere for less. the angled intake tube does give you more tire clearance.
the supplied header will not work with the standard ARC or comparable clutch / chain guard. might fit for a mini bike... so we got a standard header on this motor.
Fuel pump is nice, its metal.. pulls fuel, with better then average fuel pressure.. Kit and motor does not come with the throttle cable!! Exact same size and configuration as the Briggs animal /206.
No mounting hardware for the throttle cable. We used two bent tabs drilled and tapped like a standard top plate has. Set up like Briggs.
motor could be utilized like any other starter class... just is another option to the masses. for what it is, has great acceleration for the short track we were on. Box stock type power out of the box.
AS TIME permits, we are going to pull the ignition system and see if it will work on older stock, clones and or predators... if you've already done this,,, would love to hear your information. if the ignition system works on standard predator and clones it would be a nice tool to put on classes that want a rpm limit.
For the money, you could get ahold of your local builder and spend the same amount on an existing motor and get a better package. only real treat to this is the PZ22 carb, which people have already been putting on motors for years.
Just my .02
Issues and fixes. 1st comment.. don't buy the hop up kit unless your spending this money just for the angled intake tube. which i'm sure you can get elsewhere for less. the angled intake tube does give you more tire clearance.
the supplied header will not work with the standard ARC or comparable clutch / chain guard. might fit for a mini bike... so we got a standard header on this motor.
Fuel pump is nice, its metal.. pulls fuel, with better then average fuel pressure.. Kit and motor does not come with the throttle cable!! Exact same size and configuration as the Briggs animal /206.
No mounting hardware for the throttle cable. We used two bent tabs drilled and tapped like a standard top plate has. Set up like Briggs.
motor could be utilized like any other starter class... just is another option to the masses. for what it is, has great acceleration for the short track we were on. Box stock type power out of the box.
AS TIME permits, we are going to pull the ignition system and see if it will work on older stock, clones and or predators... if you've already done this,,, would love to hear your information. if the ignition system works on standard predator and clones it would be a nice tool to put on classes that want a rpm limit.
For the money, you could get ahold of your local builder and spend the same amount on an existing motor and get a better package. only real treat to this is the PZ22 carb, which people have already been putting on motors for years.
Just my .02
IRQVET
Member
Sounds like alot of trial and error to get one going. Thinking out loud, I can get a used Lo206 with a Faster Motors kit for alot less and proven performance (if thats the direction I wanted to go). Just saw a turn key one go for $600 locally.
So don't want to consider myself an old timer but done this since 93', always ran stock Briggs class, motors just got better, faster, then you started them a drill instead of a pull rope, then showed up at my local track one day 08' or 09' and there was a "cyclone" class... blue harbor freight motors out of the box plastic gas tanks still on them,( I got a motor from my kart shop that had a metal tank on it "blue max") that turned into tanks on the floor and top plates, no governors, guys started building them, flathead class died, now the stock class is clones and now the same thing is happening with the predators, started don't touch em' now they have open header rule, guys having motor builders "massage" them... seems like history repeating itself
SchieberRacing6
Member
My opinion... that is a Briggs and stratton motor built in China. The factory is also selling to HF. Go to your local home improvement store and look at any of the horizontal shaft Briggs implements.
rebsfan4
Member
The coil on the ghost is digital. It's not going to work on a standard flywheel. The magnet on the ghost flywheel is a way different position than any of the stock stuff.
rebsfan4
Member
Wondering what other engines will do on dynos that people are dynoing the Ghost on doesn't and wouldnt give an clear comparison to the Ghost engine. The other engines don't have 26 pounds spring in them from the factory. They don't have the same type of coil and flywheel set up. They don't have the same head design, which the excpetion on tbe ducar 212. And it isnt eaxctky the same. The other engines don't have the same valve seat design. They don't have 255 lift cams. The ONLy thing that the Ghost is comparable to is the the Lo206. That was and is the intent of the guys at Harbor Freight who decided to have the engine brought into existance. They are sprint racers, with major backgrounds in the world of extremely expsensive forms of racing. Like really expensive. $500,000 just for the cheap cars to even get started kind of expenseive. They sent their specsand parameters to the manufacturers in China, so as to create an engine that, while not exactly the same, would be as close to it as possible, with budget orientation in mind. I get it. I understand the need for people to want to compare this engine to what we have in the dirt racing world. The reality is, is not the same, at all. Just bought my third one. Will be buying number 4 and 5 Wednesday.