We finished our first hunting season with the golf caft, so I thought I would give some updates. It has held up well over our rough roads. The engine is a little cold natured but always started right up, worked flawlessly and used very little gas. We have not had any running gear break down.
Initially it seemed that if you could even see a rock, the differential would hit it. We took it home and I fashionned a guard out of 1/8" steel plate. I cut a 1 by 2 foot piece, used a sledge hammer to beat a spot for the differential, and used U bolts to attach it to the frame. After airing a flat tire back up we noted that we gained a lot of groung clearance just by having the correct inflation. We tried to get some bigger tires for groung clearance, but they would not fit. We called and found out that the frames on Yamahas won't allow big tires. In any case, with these tires inflated correctly we did not hit nearly as frequently, and with the belly plate it does not matter.
We also discovered that the mounting for the top is not very sturdy. The windshield is 2-3 inches above the frame and only connected by two bolts. The bouncing around sheared those bolts halfway through the season, right about when it got cold and rainy. I have an EZGO golf cart at home and the mounting of the top is much sturdier, and the frame allows room to install much bigger tires.
If it was to do over, we probably still would go with the golf cart. However, we would get the EZGO for the clearance and top. The tires that came are very cheap so we also would get the lift kit and intall it ourselves.
