American lump

[SXS]

Dont worry - no ones gonna do it... the costs outweigh a basic rebuild... the only ones I can think of who will do it is those unfortunate enough to have a block fall apart on them... and I cant see that happening for a while yet - touch wood ( mine )

[DuncanM]

[quote=SXS ]Dont worry - no ones gonna do it... the costs outweigh a basic rebuild... the only ones I can think of who will do it is those unfortunate enough to have a block fall apart on them... and I cant see that happening for a while yet - touch wood ( mine )[/quote]

Scary thing though Ash is someone has done it!

Your car is going to imprint the Cerb on many minds before your done !

I bet if you compete in 10of the best etc (and win ) it will get a lot of the big power Jap fans interested in trying out a Cerb .

The AJP8 is such a great engine and 80% of the reason I bought the car .

Duncan

[SXS]

Win? More like obliterate!
If the traction ideas come off, there wont be another road legal car that will match us! PTW ratio and 850lb/ft with a 1000rwhp... us Cerbera owners will leave a scar on every budding tuners concious!
British is best! and dont you forget it!
Guess what the rear window sticker will say????

[J_S_G]

SXS said:

Guess what the rear window sticker will say????

"Driven Well? Telephone 0800 xxx xxxx"

[SXS]

J_S_G said:

SXS said: Guess what the rear window sticker will say???? "Driven Well? Telephone 0800 xxx xxxx"

Or "Driven Well? Telephone 999"

[simonsparrow]

gazzab said:

£1800 for a rebuild for an AJP ? No way - really?! they used to cost that just to take the engine out at the dealers! Other engine option = BMW M3.

I would guess that cost doesn't include engine in/out, but it was from TVR power.

[SXS]

It took my engineers under an hour to take the cerbera engine out... although they're normally used to taking monster truck 9 litre big blocks out, this one was apparently a piece of pish - but they did say the way it was mounted was flippin stupid...

[vprman]

[quote=SXS ]Dont worry - no ones gonna do it... the costs outweigh a basic rebuild... [/quote]

I'm afraid to say your wrong, once you have built a couple of cars from scratch, body, chassis, suspension,interior.... replacing an engine will be a POC. And cost won't really be an issue coz I do everything myself. It would be well under way if I didn't have so many other projects and of course my day job. This is just a hobby.
I prefer the large amounts of low end torque of the american V8, for just cruising around

[SXS]

vprman said:

SXS said: Dont worry - no ones gonna do it... the costs outweigh a basic rebuild... I'm afraid to say your wrong, once you have built a couple of cars from scratch, body, chassis, suspension,interior.... replacing an engine will be a POC. And cost won't really be an issue coz I do everything myself. It would be well under way if I didn't have so many other projects and of course my day job. This is just a hobby. I prefer the large amounts of low end torque of the american V8, for just cruising around

Never said it was impossible...
I'll be wrong when someones done it with a cerbera! Till then, I'm right...

[madbob]

Thanks for all your replies; “SXS” said you would have more money than sense to swap the AJP8 for an LS1 engine. Owning a TVR isn’t probably the most sensible choice for a car and as for money you can just keep spending it; they can be like a bottomless pit. But you don’t buy a TVR because it makes sense you buy one because you just want one, your head says No but your heart says Yes. No one on this forum wants a screaming 2 litre turbo charged, intercooled ugly foreign chav mobile. What I don’t want is to have to rebuild an engine every 12000 miles or so again and again. What I do want is a great and cool looking car (Cerbera), an engine that I can start hot or cold, drive with confidence, doesn’t sound like a bag of spanners on tick over (cold), it must bursts your eardrums on any opening throttle and rumbles enough to vibrate old folks teeth and scare small children.
I have full machine shop, fabrication & design facilities and have transplanted engines in the past (rover V8’s).I found the end products to be more reliable than you can imagine, no weekend tinkering just put the fuel in and drive. So to stop me contacting “boosted” can anyone guarantee an AJP8 engine to run for 20000 miles without a rebuild? Let me know and I will forget all about this, some might say, expensive idea.

[J_S_G]

madbob said:

Thanks for all your replies; “SXS” said you would have more money than sense to swap the AJP8 for an LS1 engine. Owning a TVR isn’t probably the most sensible choice for a car and as for money you can just keep spending it; they can be like a bottomless pit. But you don’t buy a TVR because it makes sense you buy one because you just want one, your head says No but your heart says Yes. No one on this forum wants a screaming 2 litre turbo charged, intercooled ugly foreign chav mobile. What I don’t want is to have to rebuild an engine every 12000 miles or so again and again. What I do want is a great and cool looking car (Cerbera), an engine that I can start hot or cold, drive with confidence, doesn’t sound like a bag of spanners on tick over (cold), it must bursts your eardrums on any opening throttle and rumbles enough to vibrate old folks teeth and scare small children. I have full machine shop, fabrication & design facilities and have transplanted engines in the past (rover V8’s).I found the end products to be more reliable than you can imagine, no weekend tinkering just put the fuel in and drive. So to stop me contacting “boosted” can anyone guarantee an AJP8 engine to run for 20000 miles without a rebuild? Let me know and I will forget all about this, some might say, expensive idea.

Don't think anyone can "guarantee" an engine. You can get one "warrantied", though.

If I bought another AJP engined car, I'd think I'd be:
VERY unlucky if it needed major engine work within 20k miles of new.
Quite unlucky at 40k.
I'd accept it at 60k, without grumbling too much.
I'd be fairly happy if it hit 80k before needing work.

Admittedly, not on the same scale as an LS1 lump, etc. but it'd potentially save paying thousands on a new block. If I was serious about changing the engine, I'd buy a cheap one with an engine that was likely to go pop (an early, un-rebuilt S6) paying a cheap price for the car, and switch it in that one. But NOT UNTIL THE ENGINE IMPLODED. There's no point shelling out the money on a "maybe" unless it's your only means of transport, and you can't be without it for any period of time.

Wouldn't buy a "cheap" 4.2/4.5, as you're talking an early car where there're as likely to be other problems as there are engine ones...

[SXS]

The american engines these days are pretty good and solid - but the AJP is a flatplane - and flatplanes are a different ballgame...

I'd want to keep the flatplane setup, the quick revving and that *real* race car sound...

Name one american engine that is a flatplane setup and is reliable???????!!!

[BCA]

I agree with Simonsparrow, the AJP8 is a big part of the Cerbera fun. To be honest, even though they arent producing claimed power (in4.5 guise), it seems relatively inexpensive mods can get you a reliable 400bhp, which for the weight - isnt exactly bad.

Quite a big fan of the AJP8 to be honest, ours has done around 50k miles without any problems, its just the rest of the car that is a worry

I still want to put an AJP8 in an Elise at some point, now that would be immense!!!

[SXS]

BCA said:

I still want to put an AJP8 in an Elise at some point, now that would be immense!!!

What??????????

[BCA]

[quote=SXS ]

BCA said:

I still want to put an AJP8 in an Elise at some point, now that would be immense!!!

What?????????? [/quote]

under 800 kilos, V8, nice shape, amazing steering... err cant think of a downside? (im sure it can be done for less cash than you are throwing at your Cerb, even if it means pretty substantial work to the Elise)

[J_S_G]

SXS said:

BCA said: I still want to put an AJP8 in an Elise at some point, now that would be immense!!! What??????????

Spent a lot of time getting it measured up & prices quoted, etc. for dropping an S6 into an (S1) Elise. If you're willing to lose the "boot", it can be done. Will bugger up the weight distribution, though, making it more rear-engined than mid-engined...

[BCA]

J_S_G said:

Spent a lot of time getting it measured up & prices quoted, etc. for dropping an S6 into an (S1) Elise. If you're willing to lose the "boot", it can be done. Will bugger up the weight distribution, though, making it more rear-engined than mid-engined...

I know it can be done, just involves a bit of an extention... shouldnt mess up the weight too much if its done properly.

[J_S_G]

BCA said:

I know it can be done, just involves a bit of an extention... shouldnt mess up the weight too much if its done properly.

In absolute terms, no. But given how little weight there is there to begin with, and the fact that the Elise is so "special" because of its poise, I chickened out of doing it largely for that reason. I loaded a load of stone slabs into the boot, putting them behind the rear axle to simulate it a bit, and it wasn't good. (Well, OK, it still handled better than nearly everything else, but it kind of ruined the Elise feel). If those stone blocks had added 200BHP+ to the car, I might have been thinking differently, tho...

[SXS]

I laughed because thats the craziest idea I've heard yet... that chassis was not designed for heavy torque... it wont be just a drop in job... it will need substantial work.... IMO anyway...

[SXS]

Now this is what I call fun...

www.gmmginc.net/images/video/burnout1.mpg