Motorhead question

The latest version of Ford's OHC 2.3 liter 4 :

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Reply to
Jim Wilkins
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Another good engine, if he can find one, is the twin-cam Toyota "A" series engine from the old EA86 SR5 - or a Mazda Miata 1800. On a light car like a Lotus 7 clone you don't need to turbo it - but the turbo lag is not very noticeable with a light racing flywheel on a fly-weight vehicle. A friend used to race a "lightweight" Miata with a turbo on it and he was VERY competetive.It was down well under 1400 lbs in racing form and gave a lot of high-buck sports racers a good run for their money. Didn't need the turbo at the bottom end and really didn't NEED it at the top end either - but it made life interesting - - - That was after the 3 cyl turbo "zook" (1988 Suzuki Forsa) - (same as a Chevy Turbo Sprint or Pontiac Turbo Firefly) which was also a real handful.

Reply to
Clare Snyder

ANd contrary to what you would expect, the reliability has IMPROVED with the sophistication, not decreased. Generally the more complicated you make something the more goes wrong. Today it is well within the realm of "normal" for an engine to go 1/4 million miles without ANY repairs - simply change the spark plugs every 100,000 and the oil every 10,000 - the fuel and air filters a few times and mabee a belt or hose or two -- - Used to be 1HP per cu inch was the holy grail - now 2 is getting pretty common - like 197 hp out of a 1.3 liter turbo hyabusa - that's just under 80 cubic inches and 2.46 hp per cubic inch!!!!!

Reply to
Clare Snyder

Yeah, I thought about a Bug engine. And I know all about those ring gear swaps. The transaxle from a bus had the ring gear swapped to the other side because the buses had a gear reduction on each wheel. So to put a bus transaxle in a Bug the gear needed swapping. Back to bug engines. I drove bugs for years and really know them inside out. But I also trashed a few engines being plain too hard on them. And they're air cooled. I want heat in the winter. Eric

Reply to
etpm

Try to find one cheap. There's a guy down the road into town who rebuilds rice burners and an entire, multicolored, multiyeared MR-2 car lot sits out front of it in various states of dismantle. He probably has the grabs on everything MR-2 in this half of the state.

Reply to
Larry Jaques

Sounds like fun, Eric. Suggestion: Make friends with a local bodyman and offer to help him out a few hours/day, a day or 2 a week, in return for him teaching you how to wheel. They're likely to know where to find flat sheet for bodywork, too.

Your best bet is to find a blingable drive train you like and then build what you want around it. Have you read all the sheet metal and fab books yet? A few:

Paint & Body Handbook by Don Taylor and Larry Hofer

Ultimate Sheet Metal Fabrication: Build from scratch with aluminum and steel. by Timothy Remus (English wheel info)

Sheet Metal Handbook: How to form and shape sheet metal for competition, custom, and restoration use. by Ron & Sue Fournier

Let us know what you settle on. I'd love to follow your build, having had the same hankering long ago.

Reply to
Larry Jaques

I did too, until I helped build a batch of prototype electric cars and saw how many little things had to be just right. I still don't understand the subtleties of caster and camber and kingpin inclination. Fortunately [a racing chassis expert] was on the team.

Reply to
Jim Wilkins

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