Best sub 1 litre engine?

[A Scotsman]

Anyone any thoughts on which sub 1 litre engine would a good option for building into a small lightweight sports car prototype?

[Sam_68]

Bike or car engine?

[944fan]

Bike engine surely? Real cars dont have engines that size

[snowmuncher]

a hayabusa perhaps ?

Seen some cool turbo equipped hayabusa's

[A Scotsman]

Car engine preferably..... less mods needed.

[MrFlibbles]

Define "best"?

[doodles19]

snowmuncher said:

a hayabusa perhaps ?

Seen some cool turbo equipped hayabusa's

1300cc...

[doodles19]

the 660cc forced induction lumps from the hotter kei cars might be a good shout.

[rhinochopig]

In race terms - Honda 6 without doubt. Revolutionary for it's time - to the point where attempts to copy it for replicas have proved incredibly difficult to due to the manufacturing process used. Worth googling to read about the engine.

In production terms - CBR250RR or any of the late 80s 250 4 stroke engines. A 19,0000 rpm redline in a production engine with a years warranty - incredible. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honda_CBR250

ETA Read the post properly numb-nuts

OP have a look in the kit-car section. Best lumps to use are early blade, or R1 engines as they don't require a dry-sump, give 150bhp and you get a free sequential box thrown in.

Edited by rhinochopig on Tuesday 9th November 16:20

[A Scotsman]

doodles19 said:

the 660cc forced induction lumps from the hotter kei cars might be a good shout.

I already have a Suzuki Cappuccino with their 657cc 3cyl 12v twin cam with turbo. It was that which sparked the idea of a more modern version.

[Sam_68]

A Scotsman said:

Car engine preferably..... less mods needed.

Despite it's age, I'd suggest that Hillman Imp engine might be worth a look, then.

Very light, with equally light 4 speed transaxle (optional 5 speed with a Jack Knight gears) that can be inverted to give a mid-engined configuration.

Probably lighter and certainly simpler installation than a lot of bike engines (by the time you've cobbled together a reverse gear and differential assembly) or Kei-class turbo units.

Depends how much power you need, really (the Imp would give about 100bhp in a manageable state of tune for road use, at 998cc).

[DRCAGE]

Daihatsu Charade gtti 1.0 tubbo?

Must be loads of perky 1.0 16valvers about these days?

The obvious answer is a 2-stroke snowmobile engine! not sure how easy it would be to get rid of the CVT and replace with a car box?

[A Scotsman]

DRCAGE said:

The obvious answer is a 2-stroke snowmobile engine!

Some of those are a more up to date version of the Suzuki engine used in the Cappo. The K6A or something similar. Bloke in Norway dropped one into a Cappo and it does produce over 100bhp. So you could be right.

[anonymous-user]

Assuming you are not chassing big power outputs, i think the toyota Igo engine is a really well designed modern small capacity engine, it's VERY light too:



"Toyota engineers developed a brand new 1.0-litre VVT-i petrol engine, adopting a 3-cylinder configuration. This lightweight unit weighs only 67 kg, which makes it the lightest internal combustion engine on the car market today. In addition, it is not only the most powerful 1.0-litre around (68 DIN hp/50 kW), but is also class-leading in specific torque (93 Nm at 3600 rpm)."

some of the design details on it, like the combined airfilter housing / cam cover are VERY well done, basically they have combined as many functions into every part that's on the engine to make it light and simple / cheap.

[jsg612]

Not sure how modern you are looking into, however many small 'kit cars' or prototypes run a variant of the lower capacity Fiat 8v FIRE engine.

John

[A Scotsman]

Max_Torque said:

"Toyota engineers developed a brand new 1.0-litre VVT-i petrol engine, adopting a 3-cylinder configuration. This lightweight unit weighs only 67 kg, which makes it the lightest internal combustion engine on the car market today. In addition, it is not only the most powerful 1.0-litre around (68 DIN hp/50 kW), but is also class-leading in specific torque (93 Nm at 3600 rpm)."

I like light..

[DRCAGE]

Max_Torque said:

Assuming you are not chassing big power outputs, i think the toyota Igo engine is a really well designed modern small capacity engine, it's VERY light too:



"Toyota engineers developed a brand new 1.0-litre VVT-i petrol engine, adopting a 3-cylinder configuration. This lightweight unit weighs only 67 kg, which makes it the lightest internal combustion engine on the car market today. In addition, it is not only the most powerful 1.0-litre around (68 DIN hp/50 kW), but is also class-leading in specific torque (93 Nm at 3600 rpm)."

some of the design details on it, like the combined airfilter housing / cam cover are VERY well done, basically they have combined as many functions into every part that's on the engine to make it light and simple / cheap.

No wonder its so light, much of the engine seems to be cutaway...



regarding combined parts, I remeber seeing a telly programme about people trying to get a job at williams F1, cue loads of complicated people waffling loads of complicated rubbish in an attempt to blag a job, enter a normal bloke, whos idea was to combine the brake caliper and susp upright (or similar), He got the job!

[itiejim]

Old hat by comparison to other stuff mentioned, but the Reliant 850 can easily be made into a lovely, revvy and relatively powerful engine whilst in a very light old skool package.

[taz turbo]

Another shout for the Charade GT-ti engine, spec shamelessly stolen from the web, would of thought these engines/cars would be just about disposable these days. I would worry about the Aygo engine, after driving a loan car on more than one sad occasion, it's about the slowest car Iv'e ever driven....

some web site said:

1987 Daihatsu Charade GT-ti engine
Bore × stroke 76.00 mm × 73.00 mm
2.99 in × 2.87 in
Cylinders Inline 3
Displacement 1 litre
993 cc
(60.597 cu in)
Type DOHC
Key: SOHCSingle overhead camshaft DOHCDouble overhead camshaft OHVOverhead valves TSTwo stroke SVSide valves SlSleeve valves oiseOverhead inlet side exhaust See more...
4 valves per cylinder
12 valves in total
Construction
Lubrication
Compression ratio 7.80:1
Fuel system EFi
Maximum power
DIN 100.4 PS (99 bhp) (73.8 kW)
@ 6500 rpm
Specific output
DIN 99.7 bhp/litre
1.63 bhp/cu in
Maximum torque
DIN 126.0 Nm (93 ft·lb) (12.8 kgm)
@ 3500 rpm
bmep 1594.5 kPa (231.3 psi)
Specific torque
DIN 126.89 Nm/litre
Maximum rpm
Manufacturer Daihatsu
Code
Main crankshaft bearings 4
Coolant Water
Bore/stroke ratio 1.04
Unitary capacity 331 cc per cylinder
Aspiration Turbo
Compressor type 1 IHI RHB51 turbo
Intercooler Air/Air
Catalytic converter N
1987 Daihatsu Charade GT-ti performance


0-50 mph (80 km/h)
0-60 mph 7.70 s
0-100 km/h
0-100 mph
80-120 km/h (50-70 mph) in top
Standing ¼mile 16.40 s
Standing km
Top speed 185 km/h (115 mph)
Fuel consumption
CO2 Emissions
Carfolio Calculated CO2 ?
Power-to-weight 122.52 bhp/ton
1987 Daihatsu Charade GT-ti chassis
Engine location Front
Engine alignment Transverse
Drive Front wheel drive

[HereBeMonsters]

If you want a cheap one, the 954cc from a Peugeot/Citroen is great. Or if you want to stretch the 1.0 capacity to 1124cc then they do a great 16v variant.