Kit car engine. Original ECU, or independent aftermarket one

[George111]

First thing to consider is physically mounting the engine and finding a gearbox and adaptor which will fit your kit car. If it won't fit or you can't get a suitable gearbox then you're stuffed. You might find it much easier buying a V8 engine from somebody who specialises in supplying them for kits or transplants as they will also sell the associated gearboxes, possibly engine mounts, electronics, throttle linkages etc.

Once you know the kit manufacturer says yes then I'd look for aftermarket ECU and a loom to match. Don't underestimate the magnitude of wiring a kit car using a non-standard engine, nightmare springs to mind unless you really enjoy knitting.

I don't know - you might be just the sort of bloke who loves welding up engine mounts, has a mate who can cast a gearbox adaptor and can solder and make a loom like an expert . . . in which case ignore the above and find the engine you really fancy !

I'd suggest as somebody else did, an older engine, Lexus 1UZFE with stock ECU or BMW 4.4 from E39 with aftermarket. The Lexus engine is remarkably good and there are many stock engines running 400+ bhp quite reliably with modest turbos. http://www.lextreme.com/1uzfe_info.html

I know it sounds boring but the Rover V8 with carbs is a really nice engine, sounds lovely and in a light kit car (no idea which kit you're thinking about) it's reasonably potent and there are a lot of Rover/TVR tuning parts and engineering shops. Cheap, nice sound, reasonable power and torque and very amateur friendly.

[PhillipM]

Pectel do a pretty much plug and play setup for the BMW V10 including vanos control, etc - which they kindly came out with after we spent 2 months making a DTA run one...

[Krikkit]

Wow, didn't realise the S85 was quad VANOS, no mean feat!

The specialised components ECUs look very reasonable for the control. I suppose it all boils down to who can map it?

[Evoluzione]

Krikkit said:

Wow, didn't realise the S85 was quad VANOS, no mean feat!

The specialised components ECUs look very reasonable for the control. I suppose it all boils down to who can map it?

Paul at RS Tuning in Leeds knows them very well.

[blitzracing]

George111 said:

I know it sounds boring but the Rover V8 with carbs is a really nice engine, sounds lovely and in a light kit car (no idea which kit you're thinking about) it's reasonably potent and there are a lot of Rover/TVR tuning parts and engineering shops. Cheap, nice sound, reasonable power and torque and very amateur friendly.

If you can get one with the 14CUX Fuel injection system although its now pretty old we now have all the facilities to rechip / program the ECU and most of its free like RoverGauge and Tunerpro, and lots of maps available to download. Its a nice simple ECU to start with for novices.