DanB

Rich Miles' R1 Striker was just over 380kg IIRC, with fluids. No carbon or spectacularly light parts, just careful part selection and attention to detail. That was with a Sierra diff, not a Freelander unit, so a change of diff could save a few more kilograms.

If you're looking to have the whole thing professionally done then for a blade you'd be looking at about £3-4k, £5k tops. More expensive engines and the need for a dry sump (you don't need one on a blade) would push the price up. HTH Dan

Ali? Nige, are you feeling unwell. The obvious answer is carbon. Make a foam buck of the shape of the ducting you want, cover it in packing tape, and then lay up layers of carbon and epoxy on top. When it's set, pour petrol on the foam, making it dissolve, and take off the packing tape. That way you can have properly enclosed ducting rather than just a sheet of material. And it's not more than a couple of hours work. I've used this technique to make various ducts and funnels and it works well.

You don't need dust seals for road use. I ran Wilwood Dynalites (no dust seals) on my Pug 205 for 4 years. Used all year round, 10k miles a year, never cleaned them once and they were fine.

I agree with Ed, use the smallest you can find - my 'bird clutch uses an old-fashioned .5" integral reservoir Girling MC. Another option is to use a bike rear brake MC - requires bracketry to keep it in position and some mods to the actuator shaft but it's a handy way of getting an MC with a small diameter. HTH Dan

Try http://www.rawengineering.co.uk/ for a bellhousing

Rob, It's a car which used to be called a Triton Challenger, now being marketed by GTS tuning. http://www.gtscougar.freeserve.co.uk/challenger.htm Don't think there were any problems fitting the 955i engine, it was the factory demonstrator so the Triumph engine mounts are off the shelf AFAIK. Don't think it's dry sumped. The owner's name is Simon Neill - if you want more info, try the Yahoo Groups 'bike-engined-cars' list - the source of all BEC knowledge! Dan

The Triumph 955i triple is rather nice. A friend of mine's got one on a Lotus 11 replica. Decent power and sounds great. Very easy to map as well even on the standard ECU. The trouble is, there's very few out there so you'd be on your own.

Of course if you're a penny pinching weasel (like me) with a rather odd body shape (like me) and, for instance, like a driving position which is normally only achieved with the assistance of a dentist's chair (like me) then you can always make your own - http://djb321.my-bulldog.com/pages/djb321_my-bulldog_com/seat.htm It's only a wet layup because the mould's polyester resin and so won't survive the prepreg oven and at the moment my homebrew prepreg oven isn't large enough. The seat in the picture is going in the racer - I'll be making 2 more for the Furybird as that one's got some pinholes in the top layer of resin (I didn't vac bag it after laying it up which in hindsight was a mistake). That seat, trimmed to shape, weighs around 3kg and is plenty stiff. It's made of 2 layers of 6k 2x2 twill and 2 layers of 12k 2x2 twill. It's incredibly comfy for me, but then it would be... The only downsides are that it takes ferkin ages to do, it's incredibly messy making the mould and if you're daft enough to think the pre-preg is the be all and end all then, well, tough. Dan

I agree with what James has said, and yes, I do like the 'bird engine, but I don't entirely follow the surge/dry sump bit. A dry sumped engine of whatever nature, if the dry sump system is any good and doesn't break, will not suffer surge. If, and it's a big if, a proper DS system is in place I don't think there's really very much between the bike engines out there in terms of reliability. It's when you don't dry sump them and take a winger on whether or not it'll hold together that things can get nasty - and I know, I've blown up 2 bird engines now. Given the empirical testing of RGB racing it seems that the 'busa, 'bird, ZX12R, and GSXR1000 engines need dry sumping. Fireblade, ZX9R and R1s don't. Dan

Hyabusa engines are fairly reliable once you fix the weak spots (chain tensioner recalled twice by Suzuki, oil pump tends to be a bit chocolate as does the starter motor gears) and like most big bike engines it needs dry sumping. If anything I'd say that a Blackbird engine is less trouble (IF IT'S DRY SUMPED). The key to bike engines is keeping good oil pressure - if you can make sure that the OP's good, then they're pretty bullet-proof. However, getting more power out of one is not easy. Getting more power out of most car engines is easy because they're in such a mild state of tune already. Bike engines like the 'busas and 'birds are already very highly tuned. To get up to 200bhp is going to require a big bore conversion, cams and a ported head - around £2k-£3k fitted. Given that the engine only costs £2.5k-£3k, that's a disproportionately high figure for only a few ponies. Why aren't they seen around more? Well, they are. There are plenty of Westies, Furies, Rushes etc. out there with 'busa engines. There are very few in Caterhams because by and large (Noger and Adam being honourable exceptions) Caterham owners tend to stick with whatever engines Caterham use rather than sticking in whatever they fancy. The 'busa is an extremely popular engine in other vehicles, which goes some way to explaining the relatively high prices. A £5k conversion would be just about possible in parts alone, but obviously if you get someone else to do the conversion you're going to have to add labour to that. A top end budget of £10k wouldn't be unreasonable IMHO. Why aren't V-twins used? Well, they are sometimes - Stuart Taylor have done at least a couple of Honda V-twin cars including one racer. They also use the PanEuro ST1100 V4 in some cars (my brother's put on in a Stuart Taylor Locost). But the bottom line is that they don't produce the power. The V-twins produce about 120bhp max - a decent inline 4 like an R1 or a GSXR1000 is producing at least 150bhp. The power delivery of the twins is different - a chap called Ian Fletcher drives a homemade special in the 750MC RGB series with a V-twin in it and by all accounts he gets pretty good drive out of the corners. However, he's down on power on the straights. If you want bang per buck, a V-Twin doesn't make sense. And if you want torque, buy a tractor. Or a watermill. Dan

Try using hydraulic hose clamps from Stauff - www.stauff.com

No, there isn't unless you shell out for the Brembo handbrake-only calipers which are heavy (2kg each) and expensive (230 quid+ for a pair). I'm using new MINI calipers on the Furybird II - ali, nice handbrake mechanism - but retrofitting a pair to a Cat would be a PITA.

I suppose it's because some people like to think things through themselves, and apply their own intellect and critical analysis. Rather than going 'Oooooh, look, it's done by [brand name] so it must be good'. It doesn't look too bad to me TBH although I agree that the ARB mount could be more elegantly constructed. I've been doing a few preliminary designs for a pushrod/bellcrank system, and from the FEA analysis I've done so far (quick'n'dirty but useful) the rocker arm on the CSR should be OK, as long as it's made from a suitable grade of ali.

Ed - shhhhh... You're right, of course...

The chances of a car getting nicked (unless they're stoopdily high, like Escort Cossies used to be) makes very little difference to insurance. The major cost of insurance isn't paying for people who've had their cars stolen - it's paying out to people who have suffered long-term disability as a result of an accident caused by someone else. The cost of replacing a car is 10s of thousands - the cost of compensating someone for a lifetime's lost income is 10s of millions.

BOSS, Well in that case the GF's mother was lurking, so I couldn't have a leisurely ciggy with my cup'o'char, so no, it was just a swift one. Dan p.s. on the saloon it's not necessary to cut away the bumper on the Towsure towbar - I assume it's the same for the estate. Given that my car's got a dent on every near side panel, I'm not too worried about the bumper - adds character! Then again, my father wasn't too impressed when I managed to get the whole of the A-frame of a trailer through the rear window of his Volvo estate... 😳

I've got a really nasty 1998 R-reg TDi 110 saloon. The towbar from Towsure fitted on the back seat no problem and the rear cross-member fits in the boot (it was in the boot when I bought the car, as it already had a no-name towbar fitted). Fitting the towbar is very easy. You take off the rear bumper (self-tappers and spring clips) remove the 4 bolts holding the rear bumper internals (in the boot in the recesses at the sides), take it out, and fit the towbar. There's even a grommet ready and in place for the electrics! Took me 15 minutes, and I stopped halfway through for a cup of tea... HTH Dan

Single electrics is fine, and you will need a towball - that's the bit with the ball on which bolts onto the towbar and which you attach the trailer to. I fitted a towbar to my Passat a while back (got the towbar from Towsure) and it was joyously simple. An air impact wrench made it a 15 minute job, although this was a luxury rather than a necessity. HTH Dan

All the Cat Fireblades I've seen have used the Alcon 2 pots. The Ultralite2 is a nice caliper, but don't hold your breath if you're trying to get hold of one...

The problem with penetrant dye crack-testing on the Barnby Mags is how to get the black powder coating off IME. The epoxy is harder than the magnesium, so you can't shot or bead blast them, and the stuff they usually use to shift powder coat apparently dissolves magnesium... Dan

Lee, Not sure Honda do uprated ones - all the racers use standard ones AFAIK. Dan

The general conscensus among the Fireblade racers in the 750MC RGB series is that there's nothing really better than Honda clutch plates but that fitting uprated springs is usually a good idea. Try PDQ for the springs. HTH Dan

A Sierra-based disc brake setup is about 1.5kg heavier than an Escort drum brake setup - the calipers are seriously weighty. I'd imagine the figures are about the same for the Ital axle. Dan

The calipers are standard Sierra ones. The disc looks like a turned down 260mm Wilwood steel disc on an ali hub/bell. Dan