Hey!
I've recently discovered this site after being linked here to read about the 2.9L 24V Taunus Transit (awesome build by the way!), so I thought I'd start a readers ride thread just to show my motors off
There's two, but I'll start a new thread for the other one. This is my weekend toy, a 1978 Mini Clubman, into which I've fitted a C16SE Vauxhall engine (originally put in the Mk3 Astra GLS!).
The story behind it is too long to tell here in full, but basically I bought it in 2003 for £230, no tax or mot. Spent a little time doing the usual rust repairs and a bit of work on the oily bits and ran it for a while. It was a completely standard 1098cc, drum braked car, and was pretty much completely reliable, it looked a bit like this (excuse the stupid grin!):
Anyway, after a short amount of time more power was needed, but firstly better stopping was needed! So I fitted Cooper 'S' disc assemblies with alloy 4-pots, meaning arch extensions were needed, and I fitted some 10x5" anthracite Minilights:
Then in went the usual 1275cc engine, into which I bunged a cam and a bit of home brew headwork, tuned it, and off I went for a couple of months, but it still wasn't fast enough!
So in the autumn of 2004 I took it off the road for what eventually turned into a full bare-shell rebuild! I ordered a fast-road spec 1293cc engine from A-Series builder Simon Morson of Morspeed. Fast forward to August 2005 and a lot of hard work later and I had a different coloured car, producing just over 100bhp and making an awesome noise from the straight-cut gearbox and drop gears:
Then, the day after the rolling road, off we went to the Nurburgring:
You probably wonder why on earth I went for purple?? Truth be told I didn't have the facilities or skill to confidently spray the original bronze metallic, so in order to be completely different I went to B&Q and got a dulux colour chart, picked the colour from there and had it mixed - probably the only Mini in 'Dulux Arctic Purple'!!
Anyway, as it turned out the paint was curse word - it was a bit of a rush job, so with my 2005 Christmas bonus I had it sprayed professionally - the difference was unreal:
From this
To this
By now I'd covered about 5000 miles with the A-Series and was spending more and more money on it. The gearbox required a rebuild due to a bad 1st gear baulk ring, I fitted an oil cooler and twin carbs, not to mention loads of smaller parts, it looked like this:
I was getting fed up of it being off the road more than it was on! A friend had just started a C16SE conversion so I went down to see Rob Hall at Allspeed (4 miles from where I live), who had a C16SE engined demonstrator car. At first I fancied the idea of a B16A1 1.6 Honda Vtec engine, but for budget reasons I went with the C16SE idea.
I decided that rather than spend countless hours in the garage with the car off the road building my own subframe, I'd buy the Allspeed kit, which came complete with engine mountings, driveshafts, bottom arms and tie rods and the subframe itself, for a reasonable figure which saved a huge amount of time! So, in July 2006 the car again looked like this:
Here's the subframe:
And engine:
Modifications were required to the bulkhead and inner wings to fit it all in:
And I also fabricated a new bracket to move the handbrake back to allow optimum positioning of the gear selector:
Another trip to the Ring was planned for the end of August 2006, so it was a race against time to get it finished! Eventually it went in around August 10th 06:
Now began the time consuming task of fitting all of the ancillaries, making special brackets for the alternator, doing the wiring etc etc, all in a couple of weeks (whilst working full time!) not to mention getting it through an MOT!
Piles of parts:
Electronic Smiths Telemetrix gauges:
Finally it was all in and running about August 19th 06:
Went through the MOT and off to the 'Ring again! ;D
It hibernated through the winter of 2006 and into 2007, but then in May 2007 it suffered the indignity of a trip on the back of an AA truck after blowing its gearbox
The engine I'd rebuilt in 2006 was suffering, it had well over 125k on the clock when I fitted it, and was smoking badly and a bit down on power. I stripped it down upon removal and found a nasty score in bore number 3.
After much thought and contemplating 16V conversions I decided to see if the C16SE engine was available from Vauxhall still. A phonecall later had ordered me a brand new unit, pretty much ready to fit, for £750!! Straight from the dealers, all I needed was to exchange my old engine - sorted
I managed to get a new gearbox from eBay for 99p after the seller spelt Vauxhall wrong, so it was fitted in time for a trip to the 'Ring in August 2007!:
Before putting it to bed over the winter 2007-8 it had one more little trip to make, acting as the wedding car for my Mum's wedding - all ribboned up!
And thats about it! There's plenty more plans for 2008, but as always its a case of loads of ideas but not enough time in the day!
I'll try to update this as time goes by, and if you want to read the full build thread then have a look here:
www.theminiforum.co.uk/forums/index.php?showtopic=4682
Thanks for reading!
Tom
I've recently discovered this site after being linked here to read about the 2.9L 24V Taunus Transit (awesome build by the way!), so I thought I'd start a readers ride thread just to show my motors off
There's two, but I'll start a new thread for the other one. This is my weekend toy, a 1978 Mini Clubman, into which I've fitted a C16SE Vauxhall engine (originally put in the Mk3 Astra GLS!).
The story behind it is too long to tell here in full, but basically I bought it in 2003 for £230, no tax or mot. Spent a little time doing the usual rust repairs and a bit of work on the oily bits and ran it for a while. It was a completely standard 1098cc, drum braked car, and was pretty much completely reliable, it looked a bit like this (excuse the stupid grin!):
Anyway, after a short amount of time more power was needed, but firstly better stopping was needed! So I fitted Cooper 'S' disc assemblies with alloy 4-pots, meaning arch extensions were needed, and I fitted some 10x5" anthracite Minilights:
Then in went the usual 1275cc engine, into which I bunged a cam and a bit of home brew headwork, tuned it, and off I went for a couple of months, but it still wasn't fast enough!
So in the autumn of 2004 I took it off the road for what eventually turned into a full bare-shell rebuild! I ordered a fast-road spec 1293cc engine from A-Series builder Simon Morson of Morspeed. Fast forward to August 2005 and a lot of hard work later and I had a different coloured car, producing just over 100bhp and making an awesome noise from the straight-cut gearbox and drop gears:
Then, the day after the rolling road, off we went to the Nurburgring:
You probably wonder why on earth I went for purple?? Truth be told I didn't have the facilities or skill to confidently spray the original bronze metallic, so in order to be completely different I went to B&Q and got a dulux colour chart, picked the colour from there and had it mixed - probably the only Mini in 'Dulux Arctic Purple'!!
Anyway, as it turned out the paint was curse word - it was a bit of a rush job, so with my 2005 Christmas bonus I had it sprayed professionally - the difference was unreal:
From this
To this
By now I'd covered about 5000 miles with the A-Series and was spending more and more money on it. The gearbox required a rebuild due to a bad 1st gear baulk ring, I fitted an oil cooler and twin carbs, not to mention loads of smaller parts, it looked like this:
I was getting fed up of it being off the road more than it was on! A friend had just started a C16SE conversion so I went down to see Rob Hall at Allspeed (4 miles from where I live), who had a C16SE engined demonstrator car. At first I fancied the idea of a B16A1 1.6 Honda Vtec engine, but for budget reasons I went with the C16SE idea.
I decided that rather than spend countless hours in the garage with the car off the road building my own subframe, I'd buy the Allspeed kit, which came complete with engine mountings, driveshafts, bottom arms and tie rods and the subframe itself, for a reasonable figure which saved a huge amount of time! So, in July 2006 the car again looked like this:
Here's the subframe:
And engine:
Modifications were required to the bulkhead and inner wings to fit it all in:
And I also fabricated a new bracket to move the handbrake back to allow optimum positioning of the gear selector:
Another trip to the Ring was planned for the end of August 2006, so it was a race against time to get it finished! Eventually it went in around August 10th 06:
Now began the time consuming task of fitting all of the ancillaries, making special brackets for the alternator, doing the wiring etc etc, all in a couple of weeks (whilst working full time!) not to mention getting it through an MOT!
Piles of parts:
Electronic Smiths Telemetrix gauges:
Finally it was all in and running about August 19th 06:
Went through the MOT and off to the 'Ring again! ;D
It hibernated through the winter of 2006 and into 2007, but then in May 2007 it suffered the indignity of a trip on the back of an AA truck after blowing its gearbox
The engine I'd rebuilt in 2006 was suffering, it had well over 125k on the clock when I fitted it, and was smoking badly and a bit down on power. I stripped it down upon removal and found a nasty score in bore number 3.
After much thought and contemplating 16V conversions I decided to see if the C16SE engine was available from Vauxhall still. A phonecall later had ordered me a brand new unit, pretty much ready to fit, for £750!! Straight from the dealers, all I needed was to exchange my old engine - sorted
I managed to get a new gearbox from eBay for 99p after the seller spelt Vauxhall wrong, so it was fitted in time for a trip to the 'Ring in August 2007!:
Before putting it to bed over the winter 2007-8 it had one more little trip to make, acting as the wedding car for my Mum's wedding - all ribboned up!
And thats about it! There's plenty more plans for 2008, but as always its a case of loads of ideas but not enough time in the day!
I'll try to update this as time goes by, and if you want to read the full build thread then have a look here:
www.theminiforum.co.uk/forums/index.php?showtopic=4682
Thanks for reading!
Tom
