Hoonigan's GT40 Build
Discussion
V6 Pushfit said:
Is that it in one of the garages at Le Mans?
I'm sure Paul wishes it was 
No photos or video will ever do this car justice, seeing and hearing it in the flesh yesterday was incredible and Paul has done an amazing job on this build.We've done our best on the video front though, so watch this space. I've wanted to bring Readers' Cars to life in video format for years and we're finally doing it. As one of my favourite builds on PH, we had to start with this one. Here's another photo for now...
Ben Lowden said:
V6 Pushfit said:
Is that it in one of the garages at Le Mans?
I'm sure Paul wishes it was No photos or video will ever do this car justice, seeing and hearing it in the flesh yesterday was incredible and Paul has done an amazing job on this build.We've done our best on the video front though, so watch this space. I've wanted to bring Readers' Cars to life in video format for years and we're finally doing it. As one of my favourite builds on PH, we had to start with this one. Here's another photo for now...
Ben Lowden said:
V6 Pushfit said:
Is that it in one of the garages at Le Mans?
I'm sure Paul wishes it was No photos or video will ever do this car justice, seeing and hearing it in the flesh yesterday was incredible and Paul has done an amazing job on this build.We've done our best on the video front though, so watch this space. I've wanted to bring Readers' Cars to life in video format for years and we're finally doing it. As one of my favourite builds on PH, we had to start with this one. Here's another photo for now...
Really can’t wait (if not dreading listening to myself) to see the end result.
Prob time for a bit of a long overdue update…
The car has been on the road and I’ve have done nearly 2000 miles in it which considering lockdown etc is not too bad.
Generally it’s been pretty good with only minor issues to tweak, Howe unfortunately I recently heard a knocking and though a process of elimination came to the worst possible conclusion that the gearbox was at fault! As it turns out the output shafts on the gearbox were a little bit wobbly, f
k, fk, fk….
Typically the gearbox is the only bit of the car I didn’t sort myself
and it turns out the chap who rebuilt the box for me did a less than perfect job, he had by the looks of things not set the preload of the differential correctly hence all the movement. It always leaked a bit of oil too so only one thing for it, getting balls deep in gearbox rebuilding 
Stripping it down was fault straight forward, it came apart easily which was definitely assisted by the fact it was put together with bathroom sealant which didn’t bond to the casting at all.
In for a penny in for a pound I say… we’ll actually quite a few pounds (of course less than if £50 Mrs Hoonigan asks). While the box is out it makes sense to shove an LSD in it, mad not too right? I had of course always wanted one but during the build every time I added a bigger ticket item it just delayed the finish date so this along with an 8 Stack EFI were the things that didn’t make the final cut, so at least one of them is getting remedied now.
I am now the owner of a shiny new Quaife LSD (ATB to be precise)
So with a few bits swapped over (that was a bd of a job) the diff was ready to install but this time I set the preload correctly (I hope) using a fishing scale, the the correct tool and the Lotus rebuild manual borrowed from a very kind chap who works at Lotus.
It’s now all back together and ready to reinstall.
And Tadaaaa it’s all back together, fresh oil and all seems good.
Now it’s all back together and I’ve had chance to use it I’m very pleasantly surprised how much of a difference the ATB has made to the drive, without doubt worth every penny spent. It makes the car feel so much better to drive and has really boosted my confidence in it.
I’ve also been upgrading a few other bits on the car. Firstly I replaced the the rear bulkhead glass that was previously sausage shaped with a more original shape one that perfectly fills the rear clam shape, so it not only looks the nuts it also improves the rear visibility loads.
I was very fortunate that a friend who is Bulding the same car made this for me as he was making one for himself, it’s one of my favourite bits on the car now.
Finally as this is going on far too long the latest thing that I have done is to upgrade the expansion tank to one that is a more suitable size, the old one was just not big enough and meant I had to run the water level very low to avoid issues, it also looked st so changing it was win win.
I’ve now got a (albeit slightly scaled down) original shape one that looks great and works soo much better.
And what it replaced (the only photo I can find)
That’s it for now but more things planned so I’ll keep updating if and when I do them…
The car has been on the road and I’ve have done nearly 2000 miles in it which considering lockdown etc is not too bad.
Generally it’s been pretty good with only minor issues to tweak, Howe unfortunately I recently heard a knocking and though a process of elimination came to the worst possible conclusion that the gearbox was at fault! As it turns out the output shafts on the gearbox were a little bit wobbly, f
k, fk, fk…. Typically the gearbox is the only bit of the car I didn’t sort myself
and it turns out the chap who rebuilt the box for me did a less than perfect job, he had by the looks of things not set the preload of the differential correctly hence all the movement. It always leaked a bit of oil too so only one thing for it, getting balls deep in gearbox rebuilding Stripping it down was fault straight forward, it came apart easily which was definitely assisted by the fact it was put together with bathroom sealant which didn’t bond to the casting at all.
In for a penny in for a pound I say… we’ll actually quite a few pounds (of course less than if £50 Mrs Hoonigan asks). While the box is out it makes sense to shove an LSD in it, mad not too right? I had of course always wanted one but during the build every time I added a bigger ticket item it just delayed the finish date so this along with an 8 Stack EFI were the things that didn’t make the final cut, so at least one of them is getting remedied now.
I am now the owner of a shiny new Quaife LSD (ATB to be precise)
So with a few bits swapped over (that was a b
d of a job) the diff was ready to install but this time I set the preload correctly (I hope) using a fishing scale, the the correct tool and the Lotus rebuild manual borrowed from a very kind chap who works at Lotus.It’s now all back together and ready to reinstall.
And Tadaaaa it’s all back together, fresh oil and all seems good.
Now it’s all back together and I’ve had chance to use it I’m very pleasantly surprised how much of a difference the ATB has made to the drive, without doubt worth every penny spent. It makes the car feel so much better to drive and has really boosted my confidence in it.
I’ve also been upgrading a few other bits on the car. Firstly I replaced the the rear bulkhead glass that was previously sausage shaped with a more original shape one that perfectly fills the rear clam shape, so it not only looks the nuts it also improves the rear visibility loads.
I was very fortunate that a friend who is Bulding the same car made this for me as he was making one for himself, it’s one of my favourite bits on the car now.
Finally as this is going on far too long the latest thing that I have done is to upgrade the expansion tank to one that is a more suitable size, the old one was just not big enough and meant I had to run the water level very low to avoid issues, it also looked s
t so changing it was win win.I’ve now got a (albeit slightly scaled down) original shape one that looks great and works soo much better.
And what it replaced (the only photo I can find)
That’s it for now but more things planned so I’ll keep updating if and when I do them…
Edited by Hoonigan on Tuesday 14th September 22:24
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