Max II

So most people won’t know what the hell it is, but it’s an amphibious 6 wheel drive ATV. They use a side shaft engine with a centrifugal clutch and a drive belt, to a T-20 skidsteer transmission. That drives a series of chains which drive each side independently.

I picked it up for a couple hundred bucks because it had sat for around 10 years. It was obvious that it needed 2 tires at the the minimum. This one has a single cylinder 16hp briggs and stratton. All it really needed was a new carb, a battery, the points cleaned and the magneto re-gapped to fire up.

So far I have replaced the battery, chain tensioners, hand throttle, throttle cable, choke cable, fuel lines, shift links, the carburetor and drive belt. It’s a fun little turd but damn it’s rough ridding on dirt.

I plan to turn it into a mini snow cat by installing a set of custom made rubber tracks. I’ll be making the tracks out of used snowmobile tracks that I bought on Ebay. I will have to custom build tire guides since no one makes a kit. I haven’t decided if I want to go with aluminum or steel yet, but will probably go with aluminum since I want to build a cab and flat bed which I plan to build out of aluminum, to save weight.

There are a couple companies that build track kits. The Adair rubber track kits are pretty expensive ($2600 and up). The super track kits are cheaper ($1240) but are molded plastic and aren’t as good in crusted over snow or ice. The tracks I plan to build will be 2” wider than the super track kits, with the bolts used to secure the tire guides doubling as ice cleats. They should end up being 1/3-1/2 the cost of the Adair rubber track kits.