My Formula 27 Bike Engined Kit Car - how to blow up engines

[Quhet]

Brilliant read, really enjoyed that. Thanks

[ol]

BenWRXSEi said:

Blimey, that's been some journey! I enjoyed that a lot

See you at Croft in August, maybe...?

http://www.javelintrackdays.co.uk/trackday/index.p...

Thanks for the info, I fully intend to come as long as the car is still in one piece after the Nurburgring / Euro hoon last week of July. The Javelin sprints seem to be a good way to dip your toe into competitive driving on a budget.

stevenorris29 said:

Great write up! Fitted a ZZR1400 to a robin reliant when I worked at ZCars! You wont be disappointed!

Sounds interesting, have you got any photos / video of it? I bet it was nuts!

Baryonyx said:

fking hell, it sounds like that has been a struggle to own!

I don't think it's so much that the Blackbird engine is weak, it's a fantastic piece of engineering and will do many, many thousands of fast miles...in a motorbike. It was just never meant to lug a heavy old car around.

Treat 'em mean keep 'em keen. Every time it breaks or blows an engine it makes me more determined to get it running properly. One day.

Quhet said:

Brilliant read, really enjoyed that. Thanks

Thanks!


Anyway, I went to visit the 'patient' today and it's all looking good. Engine is wired up and mounted, just need the new exhaust manifold to arrive (next week) then the only things left are the headlights (smaller dominator style lights) the paddle shift, the aero screen and the gear indicator / shift light. Should all be ready by the end of next week!

We also decided to put new brakes on, since the power is being increased, so it now has a shiny new set of willwood 4pot callipers and mintex pads. Should make a big difference from what I've been told.



hello cheeky!



Engine in





And luckily the hole in the bonnet is in exactly the right place for the new air filter to poke out from. I'm so relieved as I thought I would have to patch the hole up and cut another one.

[ol]

Got myself a new diffuser on order from SA Fabrication and Motorsport. Should tidy up the rear end a bit

[OliilO]

I've got a blade engined Mac1 and in many ways have had similar experiences, although only one engine so far! It's certainly a 'journey', but the the fun I've had has been well worth it.

I think I remember reading somewhere that blackbird engines have quite a weak engine casing meaning that under hard cornering, if the chassis flexes and depending on how the engine is mounted, it can cause issues with alignments of the internals. I can't find the source though, so might be a load of bks!

[OliilO]

Found the topic that I was thinking of on LCB, http://www.locostbuilders.co.uk/viewthread.php?tid...

Although it looks like it was you who started it!

[marky911]

Good write up and well done on your persistence.
I'm a firm believer, after running one for a couple of years, that bike engines don't work in cars. You spend more time fixing them than you do driving them.

The seller was a nicer guy than me. If someone came to buy something I had for sale for £6500 and offered me £3500, they'd be leaving with their tail between their legs. Well done on bagging a bargain though.

Good luck with it.

[ol]

OliilO said:

Found the topic that I was thinking of on LCB, http://www.locostbuilders.co.uk/viewthread.php?tid...

Although it looks like it was you who started it!

Yep, was my thread!

marky911 said:

Good write up and well done on your persistence.
I'm a firm believer, after running one for a couple of years, that bike engines don't work in cars. You spend more time fixing them than you do driving them.

The seller was a nicer guy than me. If someone came to buy something I had for sale for £6500 and offered me £3500, they'd be leaving with their tail between their legs. Well done on bagging a bargain though.

Good luck with it.

Thanks, I think bike engines car work if everything is done properly. I have friends who have run them hard for years with no issues. I was just unlucky.


Little update on the car. I keep adding more bits, so the rebuild is taking a lot longer than expected, but the car will be back in the next few days.

Added a Longacre 17" mirror. Much better visibility and looks great.





New smaller lights are on, the old ones were huge and acted as little air brakes



New diffuser fitted, much better than the old one. They had run out of black trim so finished the edge in white. I'll probably change this to some black trim soon





Aeroscreen fitted. Took a while to find a tall one so the wind isn't directed straight into my face!



We had some issues with the speedo not working, and the rev counter not reading properly. I would have had to send the old dials away to be re-calibrated, so I took the plunge and we've installed a Koso digital dash. I'll be re-doing the whole dash over winter so we just mounted it on a plate to cover the holes left by the speedo / rev counter



Fitted a new steering wheel and got the paddles working. They are connected straight to the gearbox so we've done away with a gear stick. I much prefer having paddles, so this should be a great addition to the drivability of it



Electric adjustable water pump fitted to help with cooling, and pipercross air filter with trumpets underneath







Here is a video of it running. It sounds great , very different to the Blackbird.. (click image to open video)



Garage coming along well so at least it has a place to live




So there it is. I'll pick it up on Friday and then will be taking it to Cadwell on the 30th for a sprint event. I was booked onto my first one yesterday at Croft, and was meant to be using the F27, but since it wasn't ready I took the daily - Panamera Turbo. Looked a bit out of place alongside all the stripped out race cars, but I won my class and got 3rd fastest time of the day, only getting beaten by a Radical and a modified Exige driven by one of the Croft race instructors. Pretty pleased with that







...and a little onboard video of my fastest lap

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CUxhwyyiWs&HD...

Edited by ol on Monday 17th August 16:25

[Baron Greenback]

Love the work and sound of the car, I do miss my F27! Interested to hear you initial drive of the car and if you can tell the difference between the 2 engines.

[BenWRXSEi]

Couple of shots of the Panamera for you:





That's all there was I'm afraid, right at the end of the zoom lens. Still can't get over just how quick it was!

[ol]

Thanks Ben. Yeah it's a bit of a beast - complete contrast to the F27 - I took it to Vmax earlier this year and got 186mph indicated. Here is is against my friends GT3RS

http://youtu.be/pvulDJONMoE

Then took it to the Nurburgring a couple of weeks ago. Was going to take the kit car but obviously it wasn't ready in time. Here's the first lap I did in the Panamera - quicker than anything else I've been out there in

http://youtu.be/ydHkuCaItxY

[civicduty]

I like the shots of the Ex-RAF Tri-Stars and VC10 towards the end of the VMax video!!

[cheesewotsit]

Super thread - great read!

[ol]

civicduty said:

I like the shots of the Ex-RAF Tri-Stars and VC10 towards the end of the VMax video!!

Haha, I prefer the GT3 doing 180mph but each to their own!!

cheesewotsit said:

Super thread - great read!

Thanks

I'm picking it up today, it feels like Christmas. Had a short test drive the other day and it's definitely nippy! I noise tested it with a DB meter I have and it came out at 107.8! I'm going to take it to Croft later this afternoon to get them to test it with their equipment otherwise I'll have to sort a new exhaust or get some exhaust baffles to be able to use it on any tracks.

[AyBee]

ol said:

nippy!

Nippy?! I imagine it's positively rapid!

[BenWRXSEi]

Blimey that's noisy! Hopefully some baffles will sort it.

Looking forward to seeing it in action at Blyton

[ol]

AyBee said:

ol said:

nippy!

Nippy?! I imagine it's positively rapid!

Yes, it's definitely quicker than it was with the blackbird engine. Trouble is, 1400 kawasaki engines have a feature that dulls the power in the first few gears to stop bikers flipping them. I've bought a TRE device that will get rid of this and should make it even quicker through the first few gears.

BenWRXSEi said:

Blimey that's noisy! Hopefully some baffles will sort it.

Looking forward to seeing it in action at Blyton

I'm going to buy some this weekend and test it. I definitely need to get the volume down!

The diff needs changing too as top speed is 106 at almost 13,000 rpm... Acceleration is nice though!

Brought it home yesterday was a pleasure to drive. Aside from a little problem with the water pump and it overheating all is well.

Edited by ol on Monday 24th August 21:27

[Mr Tidy]

Brilliant write-up OP!

Have to admire your persistence - hopefully the ZZR engine will behave better.

[sheepdip]

I too once owned a F27 in yellow! I built it from new in 1999 with a blade engine. I raced it for a few seasons then changed to a ZX12R engine. Gave up racing as I seemed to spend all my spare time trying to make a reverse that actually worked! I then went sprinting. It ended up with 204bhp and 465kg. I then put it back on the road and scared myself senseless! so sold it. I blow several blade boxes, lost one zx12 to a failed dry sump system(Pace unit to blame)then another to a gearbox failure. Also had great trouble keeping it under trackday noise limits.
What diff are using as your gearing seems very low - also are sure the 1400 engine will do 15000rpm?

[ol]

Mr Tidy said:

Brilliant write-up OP!

Have to admire your persistence - hopefully the ZZR engine will behave better.

Thanks, reliability is the name of the game from here on in!

sheepdip said:

I too once owned a F27 in yellow! I built it from new in 1999 with a blade engine. I raced it for a few seasons then changed to a ZX12R engine. Gave up racing as I seemed to spend all my spare time trying to make a reverse that actually worked! I then went sprinting. It ended up with 204bhp and 465kg. I then put it back on the road and scared myself senseless! so sold it. I blow several blade boxes, lost one zx12 to a failed dry sump system(Pace unit to blame)then another to a gearbox failure. Also had great trouble keeping it under trackday noise limits.
What diff are using as your gearing seems very low - also are sure the 1400 engine will do 15000rpm?

Sorry I meant 13,000rpm. Edited original post. I thought I had a 3.89 diff but I think now it might be a 4.1. The lowest I can get for an English axle is 3.54 which should give me 125ish.
Your car sounds like it was good fun! 204 and 465kg are pretty good numbers - what did you do to the ZX12 to get 204?! I haven't dry sumped it but got a billet sump made up. I'm planning to do a fair bit of hill climbing / sprinting next year.

[sheepdip]

I used a 3.54 in an English axle with a plated lsd. If you have trouble finding one I have one in stock. My engine was stock apart from extra advance and better breathing. Having only a half cage helped to keep the weight down!