Hello, Different from a sprint car or midget, traditional quarter midgets are driven by kids from 5 to 15, and have been since the 30's. Based on midgets and sprint cars, but differing mostly in that they are single cylinder rear engine air cooled. In a moment of craziness, I thought it would be neat to build a FULL size quarter midget, using an air cooled Volkswagen motor. Two problems/hurdles that I need to address: - I want to run the car on Methanol and the question I have for this group: REGISTERING the thing. My thought is to buy a currently registered volkswagen, keep the registration current through the build while parting it out, attach the VIN to my new ch***is and use the motor for my build. IF I do it this way I ***ume I avoid most DMV entanglements? Its my understanding that if I am under 1400 pounds that I can run my fenderless vehicle? MY SECOND choice, is that I have a VW that I owned previously. I parted it out, but saved the VIN Number. I told DMV I had abated the vehicle when they sent me the renewal about 8 years ago. Is it difficult to put this VIN back into the system at DMV? Can I just go in and say I have the car, need plates and pay my registration plus penalties for not NonOping it? Thanks in advance for the advice. John
It's a quarter midget because it has a 250cc motor, I thought. Quarter of a liter.Real midgets have VW and other engines. If you are building a full size quarter midget, wouldn't that be a Midget. Or if it was really full size wouldn't it be a sprint car with a midget engine?
A full size quarter midget is a quarter midget I don't think you will be able to cram a VW engine in one. Of course if you increase the size of the quarter midget by couple of hundred per cent. But that won't be a quarter midget will it?
http://www.semasan.com/main/main.aspx?id=62843#tag-***le-toolbox-2011 Some great info here.....I cant imagine tampering with a vin plate/stamped numbers is ok anywhere, but I think if you keep the VW pan and center tunnel you may be golden
yeah the vin is stamped on the tunnel of a bug.. by the back seat at Y.. you gonna want to keep the tunnel, and you can go from there adding your custom pan. chris.
...and just so you know, a mild mannered 1914cc VW, with a stock stroke crank, and a small turbo, can muster close to 200 horsepower when you boost it at about 17-18 pounds... plenty enough for a lightweight car. And yeah, **DO NOT** try to weld that VIN ch***is number into anything !!!!! Like other posters have said, keep the tunnel, wishbone, and the ID # right by the access hole for the shift coupler, and you'll be fine.
Hi John... The" junked" vw vin will have to be inspected for brake,light and vin verified.... not going to be easy to convince someone it's a vw.....LOL ..So p*** on the junked one... 1500 lbs is the fender law in ca... I think we need to take a look at widening a full midget ch***is to accomodate 2 people, and dress it up to look like a traditional 1/4 midget.. And now for the traditional hot rod police to step in here... Call me (or txt ) Dave
Thanks for all the good info, I truly appreciate. I get the jokes on the full size vs it just being a midget... but my idea is for it to be rear engined like a quarter midget, as opposed to a traditional midget, VW or otherwise which would be front engined. Also, since it will be "street legal" I want the transaxle, midgets are direct drive. (Of course, so is a quarter midget, but I digress) I guess the PROPER term for my build would be a scaled up quarter midget? I am hoping to use it to attract attention for the sport, and what better way to get kids to ask their parents for one than to have a race car driving down the street. OH.. and half midgets are limited in size to 250 cc's... Quarter Midgets with a traditional motor would be a flathead continental,(approximately 130cc if memory serves) or in newer quarter midgets it would be 120 to 160 cc Briggs or Honda.
We raced Quarter midgets for about 5 years, I was a dealer for fast track Q/Midgets,,in the mid 80's,, at that time the engines were 2nd ww 3hp DECO (later called contenial motors )that were used during the 2nd WW to power field generators,,, and due to the short supply of Deco's their cost was way out of reason,( and QMA politics) We fought tooth and nail to get the 3h/p honda legalized as a begineer motor, ( cheap and plentiful)finally did and then quit the sport all together,, as for the term Quarter Midget,, they were susposably 1/4 the size of a full size midget, and resembled a Midget pretty close, so I think yours would be more likely to be a Midget,, except rear engined, Off topic I know,, ****TTTTTTTTTTTTT!!!! I have a restored Pacemaker Q/Midget roadster era early 60's for sale by the way
When the Dune buggy craze was popular in California, the DMV required you to junk the VW first then re-register it as a special construction vehicle. I can't imagine they have made it any easier but I do remember that they were very upset if you tried to byp*** the junk certificate.
I called the DMV main office about Specially Constructed Vehicles. She didn't tell me much 'cept, "people do it all the time" and "talk to your local DMV manager". At this point I'm under the impression that one of those "500 exemptions" (SB 100) is not needed for my case because I'm gonna smog the engine, which is a '72. http://grahamshotrodshop.com/about.html http://dmv.ca.gov/vr/checklists/special_con.htm
Now I got it. I'm thinking of TQs. Three Quarter Midgets. 750cc. They put on a very good show at Fremont. Mixing up fractions and metrics has me confused.
I did throw out the first smart ***ed comment yesterday, but I do think your idea is a fairly sound one. I take it from one of your posts that you know that midgets in the seventies and eighties used quite a few VW powerplants mounted in a traditional front engined format. That would seem to make most sense for what you want to do, but I get the the rear engined idea now as well. the biggest problem I see right off the bat is keeping the tail proportionate and covering the engine. That seems like a tall order. Something that might help would be Type111 engine tin that dropped the profile of the VW motor at the expense of growing in length. Might help though.
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