How good/fast are the bike engined kit cars?? Any ideas?
Discussion
All bike engined kit cars are generally pretty quick, and it actually feels quick too. The best thing about using a bike engine is that you get the sequential gearbox from the bike which can easily be turned into paddle shift (also helps alot of cars get the 0-60 time under the 4 second barrier) 
Definately try get a ride in one and possibly drive one and you'll soon be pursuaded ! They get quite abit of slating about being 'difficult' to drive and impractical but never bothers me. IMO a car with no roof, doors, windows and semi-tyres is not going to be used around town
Definately try get a ride in one and possibly drive one and you'll soon be pursuaded ! They get quite abit of slating about being 'difficult' to drive and impractical but never bothers me. IMO a car with no roof, doors, windows and semi-tyres is not going to be used around town
Its worth it just for the gearbox and noise.
Never thought the ratios were a problem for the road, but I guess it depends on the kit, mine does around 60mph in 1st and 135mph on the limiter in 6th, but if you get one with a chain drive you can easily change the gearing by bolting on a new sprocket.
Never thought the ratios were a problem for the road, but I guess it depends on the kit, mine does around 60mph in 1st and 135mph on the limiter in 6th, but if you get one with a chain drive you can easily change the gearing by bolting on a new sprocket.
Edited by Colin 1985 on Thursday 2nd December 06:18
I've done 7,500 miles in mine, mix of trackdays, tours and odd blats.
It's like nothing else out there. If it's been sat in the garage for a month, and I jump in it, within 5 minutes I'm grinning like a Cheshire cat and wondering why I left it so long.
I've got a mate with a 400 horse Cossie powered 4x4 Dax and I'm comfortably as quick point to point as him. I can match acceleration out of a corner, and brake later, as I'm lighter, but he does have more top end surge.
I had a fantastic blast back from Fort William towards Glasgow with a mate in a V8 Vantage once.
But there are some downsides, I've never found a garage who can service one, bike shops aren't interested and car garages don't want to know, so you'll be doing the spanner work yourself. It'll also need a bit more maintenance than a car engined kit, with more frequent oil / filter / plug changes.
And there are some issues regarding reliability of things like clutches, gearboxes and occasionally oil starvation issues. I use cheap, disposable engines, so if I blow it up, it's not the end of the world. I know some people who spend upwards of £2k on an engine and never give it more than 90% for fear of what would happen if it went bang.
HTH
It's like nothing else out there. If it's been sat in the garage for a month, and I jump in it, within 5 minutes I'm grinning like a Cheshire cat and wondering why I left it so long.
I've got a mate with a 400 horse Cossie powered 4x4 Dax and I'm comfortably as quick point to point as him. I can match acceleration out of a corner, and brake later, as I'm lighter, but he does have more top end surge.
I had a fantastic blast back from Fort William towards Glasgow with a mate in a V8 Vantage once.
But there are some downsides, I've never found a garage who can service one, bike shops aren't interested and car garages don't want to know, so you'll be doing the spanner work yourself. It'll also need a bit more maintenance than a car engined kit, with more frequent oil / filter / plug changes.
And there are some issues regarding reliability of things like clutches, gearboxes and occasionally oil starvation issues. I use cheap, disposable engines, so if I blow it up, it's not the end of the world. I know some people who spend upwards of £2k on an engine and never give it more than 90% for fear of what would happen if it went bang.
HTH
Colin 1985 said:
Its worth it just for the gearbox and noise.
Never thought the ratios were a problem for the road...mine does around 60mph in 1st and 135mph on the limiter in 6th
Your limiter is what, 10,800K rpm? So top gear gives you 12.5mph/1000rpm. For comparison, a typical modern car gearbox will have a top gear giving maybe 27mph/1000rpm, so you're high speed cruising on a BEC will be at more than twice the revs. Some people it doesn't bother. Some find it really gets on your tits. Never thought the ratios were a problem for the road...mine does around 60mph in 1st and 135mph on the limiter in 6th
Like I said: marmite.
Colin 1985 said:
...if you get one with a chain drive you can easily change the gearing by bolting on a new sprocket.
You can change the final drive ratio... if you have a mid-engined car with a chain drive. The majority of BECs are 'Seven' type cars with a shaft drive to a conventional car diff., and you can't really get final drive ratios tall enough.Also, if you change the final drive, you change the gearing of all gears, so, for example, if you wanted to double that 12.5mph/1000rpm top gear to give yourself a sensible cruising ratio in top, you'd find that you had 120mph first gear... which would make hill starts and traffic next to impossible.
Sam_68 said:
Colin 1985 said:
Its worth it just for the gearbox and noise.
Never thought the ratios were a problem for the road...mine does around 60mph in 1st and 135mph on the limiter in 6th
Your limiter is what, 10,800K rpm? So top gear gives you 12.5mph/1000rpm. For comparison, a typical modern car gearbox will have a top gear giving maybe 27mph/1000rpm, so you're high speed cruising on a BEC will be at more than twice the revs. Some people it doesn't bother. Some find it really gets on your tits. Never thought the ratios were a problem for the road...mine does around 60mph in 1st and 135mph on the limiter in 6th
Like I said: marmite.
Because of the lack of wheather protection I will not be taking it to Europe or anything like that so in the case where you wanted to do some long distance driving I would agree with Sam that a car engine may be more suitable.
Sam_68 said:
Colin 1985 said:
...if you get one with a chain drive you can easily change the gearing by bolting on a new sprocket.
You can change the final drive ratio... if you have a mid-engined car with a chain drive. The majority of BECs are 'Seven' type cars with a shaft drive to a conventional car diff., and you can't really get final drive ratios tall enough.Also, if you change the final drive, you change the gearing of all gears, so, for example, if you wanted to double that 12.5mph/1000rpm top gear to give yourself a sensible cruising ratio in top, you'd find that you had 120mph first gear... which would make hill starts and traffic next to impossible.
Guess the OP needs to decide what type of driving he will be doing, if it will be a fair bit of cruising then maybe something a bit more tame will be more suitable.
Are you planing to use it for trackdays or just hooning and how good are the local roads - do you need to travel far?
redtwin said:
Why would that be though?. If you kept the same size (teeth) countershaft sprocket and axle sprocket as on the original bike you would usually have approx 60+MPH 1st and 160+MPH 6th. Or is something else changed within the gearbox to alter the ratios?.
Bolt a new sprocket to the diff to change the final drive, as Sam has said it will increase/decrees all the ratios but if you raise top gear from 135 to 165mph thats going to raise the rest by the same % so 1st will go from 60 to 73mph etc. Obviously different engines will have different ratios so you would need to find out what they are in that specific case.Eg.
This is a picture before the car was finished (not built by me).
As you can see the rear sprocket just bolts to the Diff. Not the case with front engined cars, but I think Westfield XTR2's and some radicals use the same system.
I've had a fair bit of experience with these things, GuinessMK's post above sums it up really.
You're doing a lot to the engine that it wasn't designed for so there will always be reliability issues.
There are bolt on bits you can buy to make it stronger, clutches and so on, but a cheap disposable engine is the way to go, and a spare one in the garage!
You're doing a lot to the engine that it wasn't designed for so there will always be reliability issues.
There are bolt on bits you can buy to make it stronger, clutches and so on, but a cheap disposable engine is the way to go, and a spare one in the garage!
Quite fast.
I like this vid - Go to 1:00 - he seems to like the taste of fresh lotus! (although, it is a Turbo!)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ArjcJJ2VaY&fea...
I like this vid - Go to 1:00 - he seems to like the taste of fresh lotus! (although, it is a Turbo!)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ArjcJJ2VaY&fea...
Edited by FreeLitres on Thursday 2nd December 10:27
BEC? No worries. Did 18k in mine as a daily driver over 2 years. Loads of fun, gave it beans from cold most days, thrashed it mercilessly and often with reason. It took oil and filters every 3k , carbs balanced every 2nd service and after a DynaJet kit and sausage filter, it ran like a dream. My final drive on the axle 'blade engined striker was 3.54 which gave approx 10mph per 1k rpm. I drove it to LeMans without trouble, just pop in the best in-ear noise defenders and a full face helmet and it is more of a problem for those on the outside. Although in my case a static noise reading of 105dB at 6k made it a little anti-social. The plus side was that after a day in the office if I was giving it beans the current Mrs BB would be able to hear me in the house from so far off that she could get out, move her car and open the garage before I turned up!!!
Nothing on the engine broke in the time I had it. Things that did go were rear engine mount cracked, bushes on the old rear shocks, fuel pump.
My Sylva Striker weighed in wet at 420kgs.
Drivability improved by reducing the clutch arm on the old pedal box, to make less throw. Meant that I could feather the throttle rather than have it as a switch. Also doubled up on the return springs on the throttle, as there was much less resistance on the bike engine carbs compared to what I was used to.
Happy days.
Would I get another for a daily drive? Not on your Nelly. I need my creature comforts.
Would I get another instead of a trad car engined toy? Probably, although the allure of a nicely fettled Caterham would probably be too strong. A BEC Caterham on the other hand...
Would I get another as a track car? Definitely. No doubt in my mind. Especially if the BEC in question was a Radical!
BB
Nothing on the engine broke in the time I had it. Things that did go were rear engine mount cracked, bushes on the old rear shocks, fuel pump.
My Sylva Striker weighed in wet at 420kgs.
Drivability improved by reducing the clutch arm on the old pedal box, to make less throw. Meant that I could feather the throttle rather than have it as a switch. Also doubled up on the return springs on the throttle, as there was much less resistance on the bike engine carbs compared to what I was used to.
Happy days.
Would I get another for a daily drive? Not on your Nelly. I need my creature comforts.
Would I get another instead of a trad car engined toy? Probably, although the allure of a nicely fettled Caterham would probably be too strong. A BEC Caterham on the other hand...
Would I get another as a track car? Definitely. No doubt in my mind. Especially if the BEC in question was a Radical!
BB
I recently saw what i assume is a r1 or similar high power motorbike Caterfield 7 style car.
It was being driven up an down the indistrial unit in Gloucester by the Merc dealership. If the owner is on here, your car sounds amazing and goes like the clappers! 1st>3th must have easily been 0-nearly 100. You had nearly every mechanic at Merc stood on the forcourt watching ;-)
It was being driven up an down the indistrial unit in Gloucester by the Merc dealership. If the owner is on here, your car sounds amazing and goes like the clappers! 1st>3th must have easily been 0-nearly 100. You had nearly every mechanic at Merc stood on the forcourt watching ;-)
I have an R1 powered MK Indy and use it for track days and the odd weekend blast. As has been said before you will either love it or hate it:
Pros:
Sequential gearbox
Speed to 60mph
Cost (try getting a Caterham to perform like one and you will be spending 20K)
Easy to repair/maintain
Awesome fun
Cons:
Not the best for driving on dual carriageways etc
NO creature comforts (as they work best as light as possible) and anything not needed makes a difference!
Overall, I would say an R1 powered car is about the same as a Caterham R300, but obviously the build quality is dependent upon the builder!
Lee
Pros:
Sequential gearbox
Speed to 60mph
Cost (try getting a Caterham to perform like one and you will be spending 20K)
Easy to repair/maintain
Awesome fun
Cons:
Not the best for driving on dual carriageways etc
NO creature comforts (as they work best as light as possible) and anything not needed makes a difference!
Overall, I would say an R1 powered car is about the same as a Caterham R300, but obviously the build quality is dependent upon the builder!
Lee
I have an R1 powered MK Indy and use it for track days and the odd weekend blast. As has been said before you will either love it or hate it:
Pros:
Sequential gearbox
Speed to 60mph
Cost (try getting a Caterham to perform like one and you will be spending 20K)
Easy to repair/maintain
Awesome fun
Cons:
Not the best for driving on dual carriageways etc
NO creature comforts (as they work best as light as possible) and anything not needed makes a difference!
Overall, I would say an R1 powered car is about the same as a Caterham R300, but obviously the build quality is dependent upon the builder!
Lee
Pros:
Sequential gearbox
Speed to 60mph
Cost (try getting a Caterham to perform like one and you will be spending 20K)
Easy to repair/maintain
Awesome fun
Cons:
Not the best for driving on dual carriageways etc
NO creature comforts (as they work best as light as possible) and anything not needed makes a difference!
Overall, I would say an R1 powered car is about the same as a Caterham R300, but obviously the build quality is dependent upon the builder!
Lee
Usage is for fun, maybe a few long runs, like going abroad to the sun and twisty roads, I have had the litre sportsbikes, R1 included, have had a TVR chimaera 500, now just after something different, maybe look into hill climbs or sprints, dunno???
Some look amazing, others look like they have been built by a blind man, I presume that build quality is the first and important thing?
Cheers for all posts, never thought about the final drive etc before!
Some look amazing, others look like they have been built by a blind man, I presume that build quality is the first and important thing?
Cheers for all posts, never thought about the final drive etc before!
One thing to add, check the chassis for rust in great detail.
The kit car market in general is a disgrace when it comes to coatings. There are very very few companies who do it well and offer chassis / suspension components that won't start rusting inside of a year. Cost is no indicator of coating quality either.
The kit car market in general is a disgrace when it comes to coatings. There are very very few companies who do it well and offer chassis / suspension components that won't start rusting inside of a year. Cost is no indicator of coating quality either.
I'm currently building a ZX10R powered 7.
Why? Becuase I went in an MK Indy and Mac#1 and the blew me away.
Seriously I thought I had been in some quick cars (a 993 GT2 for example) but these things were in another league, I knew instantly that I had to have one.
Go and try one out.... and you will have to have one. Anyone who doesn't want one hasn't been in one.
Why? Becuase I went in an MK Indy and Mac#1 and the blew me away.
Seriously I thought I had been in some quick cars (a 993 GT2 for example) but these things were in another league, I knew instantly that I had to have one.
Go and try one out.... and you will have to have one. Anyone who doesn't want one hasn't been in one.
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