A tiny (398kg) car that'll leave a 600 super bike behind...

This is always the risk with sending a car somewhere else to have work done. My Elan has only left its workshop once, in order to have the roll cage fabricated. I was there every day for four weeks (being retired does have its advantages) and paid at the end when I was happy with result.

You have been bitten once, be very wary about being bitten again.
 
:( Embarrassed to admit it but was so wrapped up in the excitement of being told that things had moved forward that I sent the money requested already...

Before posting in here... ?-/

Wish now I'd replied with something like; that's great to hear that things are happening, as I can't visit right now in person, please send me some pictures of work completed so far and I'll then transfer some more funds..."

Ah, hindsight is always 20:20
Yes should have been more wary after having been bitten already.

But having said that this guy has gone out of his way to help me, stored the car for free and and a very high work load because he has such a good reputation (doesn't even advertise!) apart from not keeping to timelines he's given me no reason to distrust him.
I have to remember that he's a one man team (with young apprentice helpers for donkey work) and is working in my project as well as juggling his other customers for regular mechanicy stuff too..

Do feel even more foolish than I'm sure I now look, I just have to hope that I do not regret having done so.

The car is 'supposed' to be back on the road and ready to collect by mid September...

Too late now :( just have to hope I'm proved right in trusting him...
 
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image2.jpeg
 
Pretty much, though guess I was expecting to see shiny brackets polished brackets.

But once it's on and working I get to play with it, can always set about making it look prettier when she's in hibernation over the winter...

But wow do I feel better for seeing the pictures of things actually having been done!
 
Going to be finished with quad exhausts too!

Bought four of these beauties...
musarri_aluminum_shorty_exhaust_kawasaki_ninja_250_r_300_r_2008_2009_2010_2011_2012_2013__02778.1363489742.1280.960.JPG

To be mounted something like this...
image3.jpeg


Hoping for a kind of four part harmony exhaust note that'll sound amazing...

Have to wait and see.
;b/;b/;b/
 
How are you going to configure the four silencers? One per cylinder or 4 into 1 into 4 or 4 into 2 into 4 ?
 
2 into 4

(1 into 1&3, 2 into 2&4)

I'm sure there are puritans who might criticise for having four cans on a V-Twin powered machine, but I've played around with loads of different ideas and concepts and in the end stuck with this because I like the look of this the best.
 
I must have missed something :) I thought engine was 4 cylinder but looking at the photos I see it is a twin :)

Hmmm. OK, each to his own, but a little chavy IMO :) I assume it is for looks rather than performance so if that is what rocks your boat GFI. At least the cans will keep back pressure to a minimum if they are straight through units :)
 
You're quite correct OG, it was originally going to have an in-line 4 from a GSX-R1000 installed and was going to have a 4-4 (1 can per cylinder) set up.

But when Z-Cars went belly up, the engine and dry sump set up 'vanished' along with all of the money I'd sent them to carry out the work.

Decided to switch to a V-Twin after conversation with new/current engineer.

But yes, the decision to retain quad exhausts is purely cosmetic, back pressure however was s consideration and should be about right because the exhausts I chose are designed to fit a 250cc sports bike. 4x 250cc = perfect!

And they have removable baffles too.
 
That was a real bummer. A painful and expensive lesson.

It should make an interesting sound :)

Contrary to popular belief, engines don't like back pressure so the freer flowing the exhaust the better.

The trouble with removable baffles is that every wannabe spotty faced oik removes them from their 250 and you can hear them for miles!
 
Well I've just picked up my new car (normal car, not little one) but used the opportunity to take a trip up to Northwich and paid a visit to my QT...
Had a chat with the engineer and all is looking well for collection in September!
The engine will retuain the chain drive, and in order to make that work effectively, the engine mounting system has 15mm 'play' built in to facilitate final chain adjustment...
Chain drive will run very short and be connected to another sprocket mounted to the shortest prop-shaft in the world which sends power through a limited slip diff from a Sierra Cosworth (with aluminium housing/casing)...
R888R tyres have just been ordered too and I've now seen the (x4) exhausts to be used... (They are gorgeous, and should sound amazing!) we offered one of them up to the car when discussing how and where etc.
After much, heartache and wallet ache, it's finally taking shape!
So excited, and so thank you a for your moral support along the way.

Fingers crossed, next pics will be me picking the little one up!!!!

Going to video my reaction the first time I drive it ha ha!

By my calculations it'll have around 389bhp/per ton!

And just to put that into perspective (it's still not sink it with me yet either btw) check out this site...
http://www.autosnout.com/Cars-Bhp-Per-Ton-List.php

Here are a couple of choice motors from that site for comparison...

Lamborghini Diablo 5.7L V12 = 359 BHP/PER TON

Aston Martin Vanquish 5.9L V12 = 375 BHP/per ton

Ferrari 458 4.5L V8 = 374 BHP/per ton

SECMA QT-R1000 = 389 BHP/per ton!!!
 
That's got to be the understatement of the century :rofl:

And this is what will be on video when PP floors the throttle :eek: and there is a loss of steering when the front wheels head skywards.
 
a very interesting project . Nice to see a one off dream that looks like it will actually get finished
Power to weight obviously highly impressive -
It will interesting to see how easy it is to get that power transmitted to the black stuff.
It will sure be a lot of fun regardless.
 
muhuhahahahahaaaa!!! :lol::rofl::);b/;b/;b/
now I really am getting silly, but hey when you 140bhp into a QPOD... 'sensible' is definitely in the rear view mirror...

If you look closely at the first picture showing engine in place will have realised just how close to the engine cover that the throttle bodies are located and therein lies a potential problem...

Well when I queried that, the engineer advised that some kind of scoop would be employed to fix this problem.

Now, its a 50:50 OCD/personal preference but...
I think that cars always look better when symmetrical, to that end I said that i'd rather have twin (left and right) scoops so that the car looked symmetrical.

I thought about what this scoop might look like, and began looking online for options and then happen upon (what I think is) a pearler of an idea! Which I've decided to implement for my loopy project...

And that is twin stacks!!!

it occurred to me that the easiest solution would be to use a curved exhaust tip to facilitate an air-scoop, this would be both a neat solution and (at just £10 each) a cheap solution too!

Then realised that I would now no filtration for the air intake... not good, so thinking cap back on, more reading and researching and realised that the throttle bodies are 57mm so if I went for a 70mm exhaust tip, I could fit a small conical air filter snugly inside the exhaust tip at the base and presto! problem solved with a super neat solution!

and to feed my OCD-ness the right hand pair will feed the throttle bodies, the left hand pair will provide extra airflow into the engine bay and/or airflow for oil cooler.

And of course a bit of a nod to the quad exhaust set up ha ha!
Now don't laugh at my 3D drawing skills this is just a quick mock up...

But all the bits have now been ordered and shipped to the engineer!
Can't wait to post pics of the finished article!

But thought I'd share anyway :)
SecmaStacks.jpg
 
Now that's a lot of pipes on display there, are you sure you will be content with the look buddy?
At the end of the day, if you're happy then I'm happy ;)
 
Yeah, the thing is with this car is that so few people have ever seen the standard car that they have no point of reference to what it is 'supposed' to look like...

So as long as it has the performance to back up the noise and the outrageous looks...

Ridiculous as it is... It was born of necessity rather than doing it for the sake of it unlike so many cars I think our American cousins refer to as 'Ricers'.
From that perspective, yeah I like it!
The whole car is utterly ridiculous anyway!!!
Ha ha ga
 
First of all, the 3D drawings are very good, far better than I could manage.

I have a concern re the cone filter air supply. As the air slides down the gap between the tube and filter it will increase in velocity and reduce in pressure. The section of the filter closest to the bottom will get virtually no air, reducing its efficiency even further.

With four of them you will probably not have a problem, as long as the intakes are in a high pressure area.

If I was doing this, I would look at simply fitting a pancake filter at the bottom of each intake tube.
 
Thank you for input, and kind words OG.

You might be surprised with yourself...
Have a play with a free program developed by Google called sketch up.

Really great tool and once you get to know your way around if can be really fun to use but a word of caution...
It can also be quite consuming...

While playing with it to try to work out something on another project I got lost in time and before I knew it, it had gone dark outside and is lost a day to it ha ha
 
I will have a look at this.

Rethinking the filter issue, a simple piece of filter sponge in the bottom will work fine. The intakes are high up so no ground detritus to suck in so 10mm thick piece will be all that is needed.
 
Hmmm...

Bits already purchased and on way to engineer now .V(
Could've saved myself a bit, but hey ho.
K&N arguably best in the world, so it's done now, let's see how it pans out.
 
Downloaded Sketchup and it is pretty good. Certainly a lot easier to use than Inventor. I had a play and succeeded in producing a drawing of my proposed wing :)

 
Little tip (I should have shared yesterday...) when you do pretty much anything in sketch up, if you then enter numbers into your keypad the lady thing that you did will jump to that size.

If for example you extruded a box but wanted to extrude it by exactly 10mm, you can use the 'pull' tool to do that by any dimension, then type '10' on your keyboard and the shape will jump to that measurement.
 
Correct, I watched the tutorials :)

I am now attempting to make a 3D model of the Elan as I can't find one anywhere.
 
;b/Hey OG.

How's the modelling coming?

Just thought I'd post a mini update as I'm due to collect the 'LoonyPod' next week!!!!

Asked the engineer for an update gently reminding that I am expecting the collect next week. (Not finished finished, as there's more tweaks to do over winter, but road worthy and drivable ;b/).

Anyway, here is the reply...

"Hi David it's not looking good for next week Iam chasing parts the tyres should been here last week still haven't arrived.

I've got the supplier looking into it. Still waiting for an output sprocket to finish the diff off.

On the + side the gear selector is all mounted and working well. I've got most of the next week on yours so I'll see what I can do."
Please (all those following this post) keep your fingers crossed for me???
 
Not very well. I have traced the side, top, front and back but having trouble lining the front and back cross sections up with the side and top views. Lots of YouTube videos but none explain how to overcome my problem.

 
:( Car wasn't ready to collect for the show last weekend (due to engineer stuck waiting on parts he's ordered apparently).

Although I was a bit miffed at first I've realised that it probably for the best, it wouldn't have been 'finished' (as everything I want/imagined/planned completely completed) so I've said to the engineer (given the time of year) that it can wait until spring time before it goes back on the road.

At least that way it'll be completely completed with all the 'little bits' done too...
  • Smiths (retro look) white dial clocks
  • Cruise control
  • Heated seats
  • Bluetooth music streaming
  • Kick ass sound system
  • Interior leather/alcantara re-trim
  • Led headlights
  • LED tail lights
  • LED interior lighting
  • GRP half doors
  • Etc etc etc
The list goes on but you get the idea...

On the plus side though, the engineer said it is all progressing nicely now and apart from delays with parts it's coming on well and from the tone of his voice when last we spoke he's getting excited about getting to drive it too!

Good thing is, (unlike me) he IS a racing driver and instructor (having taught at various red letter days etc) so when spring time rolls around we'll be able to get some track time in together so I can learn to drive all over again ha ha!

Last weekend I attended an owner's club rally (even though my car wasn't finished I was invited along regardless). What a great weekend with a bunch of lovely people!

Reason I mention this is that I was fortunate enough to be taken out for a ride (and the got to drive) a fellow club member's Secma F-16 (my car's big brother)...
image.jpeg

560kg + 105bhp means 0-60 in under six seconds! It's is not slow by any means but being so low to the ground it feels even faster, great fun to drive but it did leave me with a more healthy respect for the loony-mobile I've created :rolleyes::eek::D when I sat down with a beer afterwards and realised that mine will have 35hp more AND weigh (+/-) 200kg less!!!

Anyways, thanks to all for continued good wishes, will keep you all posted as things progress.
 
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For those interested; I've solved the power dilemma with the loony Pod!

The best solution appears to be going the route of adding a 'Power-Commander' unit before setting up on a rolling road dyno

The latest generation PC allows he use of dual ECU maps, in its usual application (Superbikes) it allows for the use of peak performance on one map and 'pit lane' for the other usually with a 3000rpm rev limit built in.

You can even switch between the two different maps (on the fly)!

So I'll have something similar set up for the loony pod when we get to that stage, one map for economy (with say; 3500rpm limit) for use in wet and when letting others have a first go.

And probably me too for he first few laps of testing ha ha!

And the other for full performance, never fitted one to anything I've owned before but this (I think) is the best way forward.

Next 'milestone' and meeting with engineer will be when heart transplant is complete and the car is drivable (that doesn't mean finished, but drivable), will post more updates then.

Going to aim to have the car completely completed by March next year, but that'll mean ALL of the 'little bits' are done too!

It's 'finished' then, exactly as I've imagined it (well almost) could be when I started this thread what seems like an eternity ago!
 
It's 'finished' then, exactly as I've imagined it (well almost) could be when I started this thread what seems like an eternity ago!

Seems to me you’ve been strung along quite a bit with this project, milestone after milestone been missed and promises made but not kept. I've seen this in the car trade and the building trade before and I wish you well with it but I have my doubts.

Maybe you should change your last sentence to “IF it's 'finished' then, exactly as I've imagined it (well almost) could be when I started this thread what seems like an eternity ago!
 

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