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Hot Rod Projects you'll never do


eddyramrod

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1 hour ago, NorfolkNWeigh said:

I’m sure I’ve mentioned this before, but I’d like to create some British muscle cars , but not as hot rods but in the way the factories would have made them - in some cases they did experiment and built prototypes ; This Humber for exampleCA89F716-E5D8-41AC-8E9E-F2DE40C2B906.thumb.jpeg.5bcc78df4e66b7e3de2ab1f631a75076.jpeg

A few were made and used by Rootes management before Chrysler decided to send Valiants from down under.  But imagine a 180 with a 440 six pack badged as a Humber Dominator.

Cummins 6BT out of a Dodge Ram...

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7 minutes ago, chaseracer said:

Cummins 6BT out of a Dodge Ram...

Will pull a house down but have a disappointing torque band. My 2.0 "95hp" Renault can beat one from 55 to 90 simply because of aerodynamics.

Not saying you can't make them get up and go but that's at the heavy cost of engine life and Class 55 levels of clag.

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What I’m utterly fuming* about is that BMW never followed through with the hybrid powertrain for the 1 Series. Was supposed to be launched in 2013 (?) but they canned it. That would have got us a pretty decent hybrid motor and box for RWD cars like old Fords etc. 

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Something I've had in my head for many years is a Triumph Toledo estate.  I would use the 4 door Toledo body because the bootlid reaches down to the bumper, which the Dolomite doesn't.  The rear roof of a 2 door would extend the roof enough and allow a third side window, and the rear screen attached to the bootlid to make the tailgate.  For public consumption it could come in 1300,1500 and 1850 flavours, but you have to have a flagship, right?  Stag V8 auto I think!!

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I've had a million ideas like this, always fancied one of the last air cooled Tatra V8s out of a 700, in a Bay window bus.

Less hot rod, but still a bit perverse, is the idea of finding a 4motion Passat to raid the rear suspension, diff etc out of, and convert mine to RWD, but still diesel. It's north-south anyway, but I don't know if there's a suitable gearbox.

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2 hours ago, eddyramrod said:

Something I've had in my head for many years is a Triumph Toledo estate.  I would use the 4 door Toledo body because the bootlid reaches down to the bumper, which the Dolomite doesn't.  The rear roof of a 2 door would extend the roof enough and allow a third side window, and the rear screen attached to the bootlid to make the tailgate.  For public consumption it could come in 1300,1500 and 1850 flavours, but you have to have a flagship, right?  Stag V8 auto I think!!

Pretty sure the 1300 is real the Sprint not so much.

437C8CB3-78F4-419B-8236-06FC27553D93.jpeg.756d7ba6912d4cf5431466f9c99151a5.jpeg

5E78E824-479E-408E-BE8F-BAC210AB1ED6.jpeg.a9ed8315c117b086dd90182c97a72d06.jpeg

Id have started my potatoshop With a car that didn’t have a Websato  roof, personally.

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seen a few crazy builds, mk7 fiesta fitted with a 6 litre ford v8 now rwd, spaceframed mini with rover v8 and sd1 running gear, minis fitted with hyabusa engines, 1 even had 2 of them for 4wd, mini running subaru impreza engine and gear 4wd 500bhp. yeah i marshal sprints and hillclimbs where sports libre is go and be a lunatic, also the pro extreme builds in time attack are beyond crazy

my own lottery win dream is to take a ford capri 1.6, install focus rs running gear for 4wd, scrap the cart springs and live axle in favour of multilink from the focus wrc, engine, got to be a harvey gibb aluminium cosworth, say 800bhp

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a Model 70 fitted with a souped up version of its own engine is something id quite like to see done at some point :) 

take for example the 650TRII version of the Model 70's Steyr puch engine which made over 40Hp thats double the horse power the stock 493cc unit supposedly makes (although they dont half shift for 20 horse power!)

and im pretty sure people these days have the Steyr Puch flat twin making far more than 40Hp today! I know you can at least get to 762cc using some VW engine parts from what I have seen

(the Flat twin Steyr puch engine is considered to be much better and much more tunable then its Fiat counterpart and is a common swap into Fiat 500's)

at least 2-3 Model 70's where fitted with 650cc engines back in the day, one was used to test the CVT drive belt to destruction by belting it round a track until it broke, I bet the test driver had some fun! doing that! I remember talking to John the previous owner of my Model 70 about it and he said "yeah THAT one would do 80!" 

 

 

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I would like to take a two door Sierra, with the longer front doors, put the shorter front doors from a four door Sierra on it, then cut the shell shorter to fit up to the doors at the B pillar.

Overall, in my head, the result would be a shortened "Sprint" version of a Sierra, a bit like Audi did with the Coupe/ Quattro.

If someone could Photoshop this, then it would show what I am trying to describe.

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4 hours ago, New POD said:

And once the omega shell is available, some sort of GM V8 power can go in that. 

If I was going to do a project with an Omega shell I would do what one of the Omegatoy from OOF did several years ago.

He got a base spec  Prefacelift Omega and transplanted complete Lotus Carlton running gear into it. It just looked like an old  Omega with a set of big wide alloys on it.

Apparently it was ludicrously quick and he sold it in order to preserve his licence. It stood on someones drive in Cambridge for years until the shell was rotten, and then the owner sold the running gear, which is probably worth a small fortune by now

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I like this game too, and I've had a fair few ideas. The ones that persistently turn up in the workshop of my mind are...

Astra Mk3 Turbo. All the Cavalier/Calibra bits in a Mk3 shell, made to look factory but with a few horsies added. Not too many, just enough to prove GM should've built it.

Manta FF. In a similar vein, the Grp B Manta they should've built. Probably chuck in a turbo'd 2.4 chain cam. The bits are out there, but getting hold of them could be 'interesting'.

Truck engined rod. The Blastolene 'Piss'd Off Pete' came close, but I'm reckoning on a Scanny or Merc V8, Allison auto box, and either a high speed diff from an airport fire tender, or a massively expensive custom crown wheel and pinion in the relevant axle. Bodywise, it'll have to be a 'conventional' rod, but scaled up to make the 16L engine look like a 350 Chev in proportion. A real mind bender, but plagued with myriad problems like tyre choice, wheel bearings, air brakes or hydraulic... Yes, I've thought this one through a lot. 

Current thinking revolves around minimalism: tiny bike engined two at the front trike for a start. Open cockpit '1970 GT' inspired by the Porsche 908 and other spyders of that era of Le Mans. A camper that amounts to a Japanese capsule hotel room on wheels. 

All that, and the small modern TDi engined bike idea, keep the mind and pencil'n'paper busy. 

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another one id like to see/that I think would be a bit of a giggle (which possiably has been done already? I know @Yoss  knew of one that had an AV690 engine but a normal 40Mph city diff which meant it could pull away in 4th LOL)

is a standard (well restored) Routemaster (RM or RML) but fitted with the large 11.3L AEC AV690 engine and high speed 70Mph diff from/for an RMA 

Imagine hanging off the back of the platform at 70 LOL and I can imagine a few people being caught out as a Standard looking/sounding Routemaster cruises past them at 70 LOL

I know one of the RCL's that later in its LT life operated in the central area, was fitted with a normal open platform RM rear end after a heavy rear end shunt, I wonder if that still had its AV690 engine and high speed diff? (although I dont know if RCL's had a medium speed or high speed diff I do know they did have AV690 engines but some of the ones that where demoted to bus work did end up with AV590 engines)

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On the RM front, surely the Daf and Scanny conversions open up some possibilities on the naughty side of 300bhp? Front exhaust and a totally unnecessary dump valve would add to the Q Bus fun...

See also early Neoplan with a much more recent iteration of the Merc OM442 in the back. Easy 650-700bhp and one of those GKN, ZF or Rockwell IRS diffs... If one defines 'fun' as a tyre destroying 100+mph mega camper with 5mpg running costs, it's a contender. Cheerio licence, it was nice knowing you...

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The turbocharged cinq was available from van Aiken fiat specialist my late friend Richard Brown a I rescued the development mule (circa 130 hp road tested in various mags,the ones sold where 110 hp)  in the late 00's.

I've done mx5 into MK1 escort & own 302 V8 5 speed mk3 Cortina.

Fancied a mid-mounted rover V8 in an Estelle ( sun strip would've read " very surprising Skoda") coupe would've had clamshell rear body work. & fiat 127 with 2.0 volumex back in the day.

Would love a MK3 Cortina beavertail & a crew cab dually

IMG_20200719_031609.jpg

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I never actually did it, but I bought my Cosworth Scorpio to transplant the oily bits into my 1.8L Sierra. I also had all the XR4I bits to make it manual. Other than de-badging and mild lowering it was stock, I was going to use 15" Mondeo steel wheels with hub cabs to keep it as a sleeper.

All got sold in the end but would have been a great sleeper

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I've a few combos I daydream about building:

Toyota 4AGE powered Kadett Coupe

Honda K20 powered Anglia 105e

2JZGTE Supra MK3

CJXB (Golf R/S3/Leon Cupra 300) powered Skoda Citigo

I tried a few engine combos in an old Civic of mine but they were all the same series so not particularly adventurous! 

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11 hours ago, NorfolkNWeigh said:

Pretty sure the 1300 is real the Sprint not so much.

437C8CB3-78F4-419B-8236-06FC27553D93.jpeg.756d7ba6912d4cf5431466f9c99151a5.jpeg

5E78E824-479E-408E-BE8F-BAC210AB1ED6.jpeg.a9ed8315c117b086dd90182c97a72d06.jpeg

Id have started my potatoshop With a car that didn’t have a Websato  roof, personally.

While you’re at it, make it 4WD. The 1300/1500 FWD gearbox has a power take off at the back. Put it in the RWD shell and you can make a 4WD. Triumph apparently made a prototype  mini-Unimog type of thing and had a real project going on with Autocars in Israel for a Jeep type vehicle that would have been called Pony. Didn’t happen. It seems like it would be quite easy* to do - and would be quite exciting as it wouldn’t have a centre diff.

In the 80’s a friend of mine put a 2 litre Fiat twin cam engine in his convertible Mini. Actually he welded a Mini shell behind a Fiat subframe and extended a quartered fibreglass Clubman bonnet to over the engine. Now that was mad. Very quick.

I’d like to make the Traction Avant body the Citroen didn’t. The short length of the Light 15 / Legere) width the wide body of the Big 15 / Normale. I just wrote an article on it for the Citroen club mags. I’d like to put the hydropneumatic suspension at the back too. Will never happen.

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