My 1.4 Road rally/Enduro car project

[crutts]

Now I know alot of you will be thinking, 1.4? Too slow!! But for me its ideal, as I want a cheap cost effective way of doing some road rallying this year as I am going back to uni and cant afford the big bucks that some of you have spent on your amazing machines.

I got the car of ebay :lol: for £420!!!! Its a 2000 and has just had the rear arches sorted and the cambelt changed so I couldnt refuse.

The first job will be to change the oil etc and make sure it is running right, as the car will be my daily driver too :grin:

Im going to start by putting it on a diet, putting some bucket seats/harnesses in, and then fitting the spot lights. That way I can use it onroad rallies while doing other jobs on it.

Will post some pics later

 

[slayllian]

Nice one, got that for a good price! the car cost nearly as much as a cambelt and water pump change! k:

 

[crutts]

That was my thinking. Just need to sell my micra for the price I want and ill be making money

 

[yippeekiay]

Nice one. k:

Bugger all wrong with a 1.4 if you need to keep costs down. Makes sense to me as it's still got the great handling :thumbs:

 

[Flying Scotsman]

I was contemplating a 1.4 engine for mine.... there is nothing wrong with that at all.... its not santa pod where it will shine.

I have however opted for a 1.6, i think i could get better power from it.

 

[PumaNoob]

Oooh, this should be interesting, not many people do anything with the 1.4, what are you planning to do?? It's not about engine size, it's about what you start with, and what you end up with!! I believe the 1.4 is about 85bhp?? So if you strip the car out completely I'd imagine you'd be looking at around 900kg, so it's still going to be nippy. The only problem with the 1.4 is that it's relatively un-explored, so you will have to find your own ways of making it faster, I'm pretty sure all the bits from a 1.6 fit it, cams, exhaust, inlet are the same. Would be interesting to see what it would do with a set off ss4 cams and frp inlet!

Either way, well done for doing something original!! :thumbs:

 

[fatdonger]

Should be interesting to follow your progress :wink: The S1400 cars achieve about 148/149bhp but unfortunately s1400 cars cost around 10k, at least you don't have to worry about the nikasal liners and VVT on the 1.4 engine :lol: .

 

[crutts]

For the 1st few months it will be basically a strip out and get the weight down, fit a roll cage and try to sort the brakes. Then when I have finished uni I can spend more money on getting some trick bits. Going to try and make fibreglass tank and sump guards at uni too

 

[fatdonger]

So 3 year project lol

 

[crutts]

No it's last year this year so hopefully a 7 month one

 

[crutts]

Finally had chance to upload a couple of pics, they are taken from the ebay ad (I collect the car tomorrow)

 

[PumaNoob]

If you are are on a budget, loosing weight is free, the best power to weight upgrade per £!!! Id also recommend the mondeo mk3 calipers & pads with st170 discs, so much better then the standard puma brakes, and you can pick them up pretty cheap! Not sure on what you are planning on, maybe something better then that, but just thought id throw that out there as an idea! If you are good with fibreglass, why not make some moulds and some bits too, you could save a fair bit on weight making a fibreglass bonnet.

 

[crutts]

Not too sure on the rules of road rallying, and whether fiberglass is allowed.

I was planning on Mk1/2 mondeo brakes. With the Mk3 brakes would I have to machine anything down and what size wheels?

Joe

 

[Voa]

Yes Mk3 brakes require 16 inch wheels or some grinding down of the caliper edges - to be honest if you rally you wouldn't want a stone getting stuck in between the really tight clearance between the wheel and caliper.

The other options are fiesta st150 brakes or escort cosworth brakes under a 15 inch wheel . I have seen fibre glass bonnets on rally cars?

 

[dtq]

The maths I used in the other thread suggested st150 brakes werent as good as Mondeo mk1/2 v6 mondeo brakes which are also slightly more effective than mk3 brakes (although the difference is small).

As far as fibreglass goes I cant see a specific exclusion for Road rallying (stage rally cars are a very different kettle of fish as far as technical regulations go)

There is the following in the bluebook section R18.1.

Bodywork must represent the manufacturer's original profile and may include any optional extras available directly from the manufacturer.

To me that would suggest things like bonnet vents would be a no no.

As far as losing weight goes you have to be VERY carefull with road rallying.

Blue book section R 18.1.4

All major internal trim as fitted to the body type by its original manufacturer when offering it for sale must be retained. This trim will include headlinings, inside door panels, carpets and rear seats.

You can probably get away with removing under carpet sound deadening etc, but I have known people turned away over missing internal trim.

 

[ScubaSteve]

you can give me some of these maths, is it possible given the force reading of the front brakes to set the backs say for a 60-40 split

eg if the fronts were 400lbs whats the maths to work out what the backs would be for a 60/40

 

[ScubaSteve]

nevermind figured it out would be 400/6*4

 

[dtq]

nevermind figured it out would be 400/6*4

Yep. sorry wasnt around to help with that. Have you got the valve on the car now?

 

[ScubaSteve]

yeah loads of pics in my project thread

 

[crutts]

Well, went to pick the puma up last night. It WAS an awesome car to drive until it broke down!

Seems the timing may have slipped and it's detonating at wrong time or there is a problem with fuel getting from the rail to the cylinders.