1970 Ginetta G15

It was a toss up between Last Caress and Hybrid Moments at the choice came down on Hybrid after listening to an acoustic version by Brody Dalle, Which was after a full on Tim Armstrong week from Rancid to Timebomb with Op Ivy Transplants Distillers and a bit of Interrupters.

Headphones on now - off on a trip down the Dub highway and not a Beetle in sight...

Another day in the garage.

Cage work on the G15 - gave myself the task of getting the O/S bar in.

First off I needed to adjust the angle of one of the bends as the early cars body sits differently from the series 4 and 5 cars and the cage was designed around the later cars. That and the cars are not the most symmetrical so its inevitable that the bends will need to be tweaked.

First task was to see if the MAPP torch would generate enough heat to warm up freezing 1-1/2" 12-SWG CDS



Good enough




And after a few checks I was happy enough with the angles




















Now what I should have done at this stage is to fit the dash mount rail and the dash to make sure that there was plenty of clearance - Nope didn't do that - I liked the way the cage looked and the tube angles so just pressed on.














And the inevitable





Yep need to create a couple of dents in the dash.

The gearbox guru has been at it again rebuilding Imp Transaxles using up all the old stock parts he assembled when he did the last few. When he stripped this one down he was pretty impressed with how good a condition it was in and after he had hand selected some better diff parts to go along with the new bearings and seals deemed it about as good as they get so it was offered up to next in line of local Ginetta crew and molebert didn't need to think about it for very long.













Another one to collect when I drop down for a quick visit once this LD-2.0 is completed. There will be an exchange of parts 2 Transaxles and big bore combined manifold coming back with me and a V6 Type 9 staying with him to rebuild, with a long first and other little Type 9 box tuning tricks, and drop onto the back of his Zetec in his G27. No doubt there are other things for me to collect I have forgotten about.

May need to sort out a price for Mr molebert for the single 40 manifold and Carb I have .....Hmmmmm. letting go priceless artifacts like that .... He's going to be feeling the pinch soon with all this expense 38CDS - Steel strip 25mm Alumin' was dropped off at my place this week that he'd already coughed up for earlier.

Have to see how cold and damp it is this weekend for getting some more of that work done.

Itchy also dropped bay and did a kerbside collection of his rebuilt hubs which are already in place on the G32 - Probably spring time now before he finds out out how smooth the car now rolls.

That's it for this Friday's check in - Time for a Cappuccino and Netflix.

Mr B has completed his works and here we have molebert s transaxle all buttoned up and ready for collection.





Imp block modified for a rear oil seal.





Mr B's big bore long stroke special with liners fitted and the spacer plate in place





Very little to report on the cage front as it has been a busy week work wise running about so no time in the evenings for anything much apart from a bit of de-stress dog walking. See if I can get a bit more active tomorrow. Although at the moment it looks bloody cold out there.

Cheers. I should be further on than I am at present but other things are taking up my time unfortunately.

The engine work is for capacity and torque - Bore is taken out from 68mm to 75mm hence why the existing liners have to be fully machined out and new ones pressed in - cannot remember what they are from - you then take a brand new un-ground crank - and have it ground to a 65mm stroke from the stock 60.37 - Typically you would use standard rods as well but Mr B had special stronger straight split rods made with a small change of rod ratio. You cannot get straight splits down the std 68mm bore - Pistons and rods both forged.

Takes it out to 1150cc - You can go to 75.5 and now I type that this may be a 75.5 engine which is 1164 known as the 1200 - and about as far as you can go - if you look at the pictures above you will see that where the two liners meet there is very little land for the gasket for each bore. This will run a Wills ring but it all gets rather tight.

Its also a problem with compression ratio - because squeezing 1200 cc into a chamber designed for 875 gets a bit tight and even with the thick chamber 180 head you cannot take much out of the chamber before it starts getting a bit flexible - You will see some of the details on the really modified heads in this thread where long grub screws are inserted into the head to support the chamber to stop it moving.

The only way left to control the compression ratio is to sacrifice even more squish and lower the piston height in the bore.

So he gets the best chance of this engine lasting its all being built up around a new old stock Sunbeam B1 block which was the last and strongest iteration of the Imp engine. Its a special engine.

I'll be interested to see how your big bore comes out as I have a similar project on the go. In my case I have kept the bore to 74.1mm so I can use readily available liners but have a 70mm stroke crank. Some slight modification of the pistons is necessary to enable Imp rods to be used. The liners are set proud of the block and a spacer plate used. The resultant capacity will be 1207cc. Not decided on which head to use but the favourite, if used, will be a surprise.

Pete Richards

Full day in the garage today as the rain was in all day - the only thing that varied with it was the intensity - thankfully there was a small break in it around the 18:00 - 18:30 for the dog walking half hour but other than that rain. No work on the Polo air filter and plugs that can wait for another day.


It was not exactly cold in the garage but the air was damp with a capital H2O whilst working on the N/S front cage leg - Not an easy task but it got done and the bar across the top of the screen left to complete next time...










... together with the two extra legs for the rear cage that will tie to the door bar work.





For from an easy day getting that done.

Merry Christmas

I got an early christmas gift a few weeks ago. Thanks for the help with finding new doors for my G15. Do you know if the windowframes are bolted or riveted to the door?

Some paint and adjustments an we are ready to go...

As per the photo I lifted my new stainless steel frames on Aluminium spacers to give a better fit of the frames in the door aperture, then sealed the gap with black RTV silicone. So neoprene foam never really figured as an option... No idea what the factory did, but there was only a gunky sealant between the old frames and the top of the door, no sign of any foam or runbber seal. Was worth the effort to get the fit right as the doors now shut properly onto the seals and there isn't daylight visible in the gap :-) Recall I used M6 bolts to attach the frames, and used the angle grinder to thin the heads down to allow the furry slider seals to sit flush in the bottom of the frames. I re-used my old perspex windows but predictably they needed fettling and carefully filing to make them slide easily. The navigator gets cross if he can't quickly and easily open the windows at controls so it was important to at least get the nearside one spot on!