Late marathon/Early Medalist Front Suspension Differences??

[BoostedOne]

Ok, I am really lost here, looking for some help..
When I got my cart back in 08, it appeared to be a 94ish Medalist with some sort of 2" lift. Lift appears to be some long shackles in the rear, and not sure how it was done in the front, but it clears 22" tires fine and appears to be a factory style straight axle and standard spindles.

Way back then, I noticed the front suspension to not be all that precise so I ordered wheelbearings, king pin bolts and king pin tubes for a 94-01 Medalist/TXT, but I never got a round tuit so I could install them..

Fast forward to recent days.. I'm finally getting around to fixing up the cart. Saturday night I went to redo the wheelbearings and kingpin hardware and found what was on the cart was totally different.. Instead of having a king pin bolt and tube, mine had a fancy machined king pin bolt.

At the time, I assumed this was just a difference in "aftermarket parts" and the only reason I didn't just continue and put it all back together was because the new king pin bolts have a different thread, so I hit a stopping point because I need to get a new pair of nuts. Seemed simple enough, so i didnt really bother to get online over the weekend researching this..

But today I was getting together a list of knick knacks to pick up at dealer on the way home from work so I can drive this thing. Thats when I found out that the style of king pin bolt I have is for a late model marathon??

From what I can gather, there are 3 different breaks.. Marathon 88-94, Medalist/TXT from 94 to early 01, and TXT 01 and up... And all of the major components are different.. Spindles.. axle beams.. and the king pin hardware.

So what are the differences, and is this something that may have been factory built this way or something that someone shade-tree engineered? I thought the Marathon suspension mounting points were different?

For instance I don't want to go by replacement king pins for the Marathon style setup, only to find that my axle beam is also so worn that I need to replace the beam, then after I do that find that some inappropriate axle beam was forced to fit on there in the first place...

There is a bunch of slop in the king pin, and I am honestly not sure how much of it is due to wear of the axle beam and how much is wear in the pins. There isn't any really slop between the pin and the spindles, but the king pin slops around pretty bad in the axle.

What I am trying to do is figure out where to go from here.. Which version makes the most sense dollarwise, combined with maybe which set up is better?

Parts I know that need to be replaced due to condition alone are the king pins, and possibly the axle beam.. The spindles are perfectly fine.

Parts that need replaced due to configuration changes and possible bastardization, I have no idea and looking for a hand in sorting this out..

Thank you very much.
Scott

[BoostedOne]

I don't know if these pics help, but here are some pics from 2008 and 2009 when I first got it and started working on it.

[rusty shackel]

looks like you got a 1995 to 96medalist front end on there at least the body , the axle on a glance is txt style early years

rusty s

[BoostedOne]

Well i was at the EZGO dealer when that response was posted, so I will just say what I managed to find out...

Since i already had kingpin tubes and bolts for the TXT style front, and I was concerned that my kingpin holes were wallered out on the axle beam, I just decided to buy a new axle beam.. He had an early TXT spindle on the desk, and we put a late style marathon king pin in it and found it fit nice and snug, so I figured that even if my spindles and whatnot are marathon, they will fit the TXT beam..

Got home and lined them up to eachother. Vertical hole spacing is the same on the late marathon beam and the new TXT beam..

It was when I went to install it is when I found the difference, and confirmed that I must have some sort of marathon beam.. The beam off my cart is taller than it is deep, ie, a very pronounced rectangle. The new TXT is not as tall, but its deeper, ie, it has more of a square profile..
I found this out when I went to transfer the lift over, which I finally figured out how they did it.. The lift on the front of my cart essentially flips the spring over to the top of the axle, using a peice of angle iron across the top of the beam with two spring plates welded to it.. Well, the holes for the front bolts didn't line up because the beam that came out was narrower and taller.. Notched the holes so the bolts would go through, and because the new beam is shorter, the bolts are pretty long.. I need to install some shorter bolts and correct spring plates.

But all the other parts fit on fine.. The marathon spindles are right at home on the TXT beam, and with the new wheel bearings everything feels much better.