169 replies to this topic

[MiniLandy]

I think it'd look best with standard steels, banded out wider, sprayed black, with the chrome hubcaps and sliiiightly lower profile tyres.

...but of the choice, i'd say superlights

[oli8925]

Superlights win 7-2

I'll be calling up today to get some prices but I'm now having second thoughts on the tyres.

If I stay 13x6, I'll need the same back spacing as the standard steels as there's not much space between the rim and the top arm, and my rudimentary measurements by means of cardboard and gaffa tape suggest at various degrees of turn there will only be about a half inch gap between tyre and body work, if not less, using 175/70R13.

Or I could go slightly lower profile tyres but I wanted to stay as close to original as possible.

Or I could go slightly lower profile on the front only but this would add rake, when I didn't really want any, it's already got some rake, and the front already has the least ground clearance.

Or I could go 13x5.5, but it's something I don't really want to do...like admitting defeat

A guy from VVOC recommends 185/60R13 on the front but this will give an overall diameter nearly 1" less than the 175/70/13s, so roughly another half inch off the front ride height.

My head hurts

Amazing attempt at mocking up a tyre


Top of arch, right lock


Rear inner arch, right lock


Top of arch, left lock


Front inner arch, left lock

[oli8925]

After much fiddling, headache and help form some of the guys on the mini forum, I've decided to go for 13x6 ET+23 Superlites. This should give a backspace of 111mm according to Superlite, so by my calculations things should fit...or at least have the best chance of fitting without going lower profile.

So now on to the tyres, nice chunky 175/70r13s
My options are:
Continental Eco Contact 3
Pirelli P4 Cinturato
Michelin Energy E3B Green X
Dunlop Street Response
Goodyear Duragrip
Bridgestone B250
Or Yoko A-Drives if I can find any.

Any opinions on the best rubber for the job? Want fairly sticky but fairly good lifespan at the same time. Considering the car's 850kg with sod all power none of them should have too many difficulties.

This will give a look of this...

Chunkeh!

[oli8925]

Yet another change in plans. Due to the offset I need, the only places I've found to do the wheels are Minilite and Superlite. Minilite, being the real deal, want nearly £500 for a set of 4 which thinking about it seems silly for my 3rd choice wheels that I'm not even that sure on. I haven't managed to get hold of Superlight but I don't think they'll be much cheaper.

So, the new plan is to *ahem* "borrow" my girlfriends unused Sportspack wheels until I can get a set of steels banded as per original plans, or find the right set of Slotmags. I will still get 175/70r13 to fit on the Sportspacks so I can just swap the tyres over to whatever rim I end up with next. While not exactly what I wanted, it should still look pretty good, be fairly unusual and best of all they are FREE!

So now all I need to do is get the tyres and have them fitted. Here's a pic of the Viva trying the sportspacks on for size

[MiniLandy]

Sweet!

To be honest, this is the only low'n'slow car that even vaguely tempts me away from my mini. And the only reason my mini's still here is because it's quick.

Nicely done

[oli8925]

Cheers MiniLandy

Not hard to make them fast though, pretty easy to drop a whole host of engines in

Got some new shows today







13x6 ET+22, 175/70r13 Yoko A-drive.

So far the fronts don't catch on the arches at all...just fingers crossed!

Edited by oli8925, 21 April 2011 - 04:10 PM.

[yeti21586]

looking good!!!!!!

[longtimenomini]

Thats great.......or as the young uns say....its the nuts!

[oli8925]

Long time no update.

Although not much interesting has happened since. It's more been working through mechanical failures (which saw me drive a Corsa for half a month! Eurgh!)

First oil pump went, and that's in the sump that has minimal access without removing the engine. The dizzy is driven off the oil pump, and my own idiocy messed that up. At the same time the 3 month old coil started to break down under heat. At the moment I'm having difficulties with fuel pumps and carburettors, although at least it runs fairly well at the moment.

Otherwise I've fitted Magnum/Chevette indicators with sidelights



Replaced the 9 month old steering coupling...less than pleased


And have finally got around to removing the engine in the red Viva so I can rebuild it with my special bits (285 cam and 4 branch manifold added to the stage 3 head and weber 40), and the shell is up for sale, which will fund some more nice bits/a carpet/banding some steels.

Next week I'm starting a job a 10 minute walk away and should soon have the Saab MOTd and on the road, so the Viva may have a bit more time and care spent on it...may...

[oli8925]

Today turned into engine strip down day

Started off by degreasing, it was beyond caked in the stuff.




Took the clutch, flywheel, crank pulley and timing chain cover off, flipped it over and too the sump off.



Very gunky, removed oil pump and pick up pipe and the bearing caps. There's some scoring to the crank so it might need a slight regrind, but it's not too bad. Will see if I can find a better one.





One thing I noticed when stripping the engine was a lot of crank float. About 2-3mm of travel, so something wasn't right. This would be why




And with it all stripped


There is a slight lip on the bores. I'm hoping a hone will take it out, if not I'll have to find another block as this one's already been bored +0.030.

If anyone has any engine bits that could be of use to me, please get in touch. I can't find anything at the moment!

[oli8925]

Well it's been a while. The car was having a tonne of problems starting and running in November and with other things on my mind and insurance on another car it got left to go green on the road. In late November I moved out of the parents house into my own with my partner and were lucky enough to get one with a driveway, so I managed to work through the dark to get it running one last time just before the MOT and insurance ran out to stick it on the new driveway. Again, I've left it alone since then and have had my time taken up with a new family and a family car to get running well.

The partner and I are both car nuts and met at a Mini show, and with both fun cars off the road we've been really missing them. However I was thinking maybe it was time to let someone else play with the Viva and to get something more suited to me at this time. With my age increasing, insurance slowly coming down and a 2.0 turbo for a daily drive, the bumpy, slow Viva wasn't interesting me too much. After much searching I was stuck with a decision between keeping the Viva, but actually getting round to doing the tidying up it needs, or tidying it up suitably, selling it and with the proceeds buying an E30 318is/325i or my number 1 choice, a mk3 Supra. Good looks, 80's J coupe, 3.0 engine...now I was interested. But I just can't decide if I want to get rid of the Viva.

Anyway, whatever I choose, the Viva will need a bit of work, so I figure if it goes well and I still enjoy working on it, I'll probably keep it, finish the engine build and start collecting parts for a 160VVC K-Series conversion. If I don't enjoy it it'll be replaced by a Supra.

As a tiny little side project so that I could start immediately, I decided enough was enough and the crappy Stromberg carb was going to go for good. In it's place I've been modifying an old HS4 I had lying around from my Mini days to be used on the Viva manifold.

Today I finished off rebuilding the carb with parts meant for an 80's 1275 Mini and finally stuck the set up on the car with a new fuel pump I also conveniently found lying around the garage and a slightly larger Chevette fuel line to match the pump and carb. Unfortunately I couldn't try to start it as the Viva battery is completely flat and the Mini battery I pinched isn't quite charged enough, so that's a job for tomorrow. It also needs a new slightly longer throttle cable and a new/modified choke cable, and needs the vac and breather pipes sorting. I'll probably also modify the standard Viva air box to work with it if it will still fit as I figure a cone filter isn't a great idea directly over an exhaust manifold.








Things I want to do in the coming months:
Finally learn to weld - I now have my partners welder down with us so this can begin following Tony's guide.
Clean up the engine bay and move the battery tray out to fit a bigger battery
Take up the seats and carpet, treat the floor for any rust (only a little bit of surface rust) and repaint.
Tidy up the wiring running down the car and behind the dash and wire in the reverse switch
Repair the rear arch seat belt mounting points and a little patch in one rear arch
Sand down and repaint the rusty patches around the car, mainly the valences with a little around the arches and wings, but it's all surface so no bodywork needed, just need to find a good paint match.
New carpet and if I keep it a cars worth of sound proofing.
Front suspension still needs some sorting as it's running on bump stops.
Might try to do something with the exhaust but god knows what.
Finish swapping steering wheels about and get the DTV wheel refurbished.
And as of today I need to sort a second hand Tex mirror as my N/S one snapped off I can buy new but they're £50 each and it'll look silly with one new and one weathered.



Alternatively I can get bullet/torpedo mirrors for £20 each, but I'm not sure they'd look right. Opinions please?

[miniman24]

I reckon bullit mirrors on the wings would look very good! Good luck sorting out the problems :)

[oli8925]

Solved the mirror problem. Found a mirror on ebay with the same attachments, so with a bit of swapping around I had a half decent mirror again



Also made some progress with the engine. After days of tweeking and not getting anywhere, I'd all but given up until I found the bit of wire I'd used to mock up the live connection between battery and coil ages ago. Thought it can't do any harm so threw it on and turned the key. It spluttered a few times and after a few more attempts I got it running for a second or two. Tomorrow, with a freshly charged battery and some more daylight, I'll attack it once more and give it a few more tweeks to trying and get it to stay running.

Made a start on getting the carpets up too. Rear seat out, fronts are nearly out and then I can take a look at the whole floor pan. From what I remember of doing the audio wiring not long ago, the drivers floor pan has surface rust but should be solid, and the passenger side is almost perfect. The bit that worries me though is the rear arches. I'll have to make a start on getting my welding, grinding and fabrication juices flowing, with some help from tonyBMW, now I have my partners unused welder to play with, a Clarke Mig 160TM. Apparently fairly good ...

Anyway, the rear arches




The other side is as bad but already has a plate very poorly welded in, so that will need redoing. It scares me!

Once the floorpan is done, I'll treat, prime and paint it body colour. Then comes the Silent Coat, Cloud 9 underlay and a Coverdale carpet in Wedgewood Blue.

[Juju]

Mwahahahaaaa! You ain't selling that Viva, Mistah!

It'll look all spangley again & be the perfect family wagon!

Quick tip: don't mix DIY car mechanics and ALL THAT BOOZE. Even if it is Tetley 'n' Tesco lager.

[oli8925]

Not yet it seems, although I'm pretty set on keeping it now I have some interest and a few plans for it Not sure about the perfect family wagon, too loud, bouncy and un-seatbelted.

Anyway, an update - more rust...

Had another go today. Can't remember what I did now but I got it running for approximately 3 whole seconds. After that though all it would do was cough on the 2nd or 3rd crank and stop spinning. Couldn't get it to catch again. It feels like I'm missing something obvious, but I have no idea what...

Also got the seats and carpets out. Drivers floorpan looks worse than I remember, but it doesn't feel crusty so I think it should be alright with a grind down. I've also taken pics of all the areas I know need welding...

As the carpet was coming out


Passenger side


Drivers side


Battery tray. I have a NOS one that will be modified to fit much closer to the outer wing, giving space for a decent battery. Or if that doesn't work I might put it on the opposite wing.


Passenger side where wing meets bulkhead


Spare wheel well


Behind OS/R shock


I also want to redo the parcel shelf. It came to me with two holes hacked into it, which I then tried to tidy up and open up for the current speakers, but found out how difficult it was and ended up hacking it again :-[ I'd like to make two patches, replicating the grooves and shape of the parcel shelf, cut the holes for the speaker nicely and then weld them in



To go with that I've also got a fairly good condition parcel shelf trim. The current is the blue which is quite beaten up. These things get really fragile so I want to make a light metal frame for the new one and rivet it on, so it keeps its shape and rigidity and can hold the speakers. It will then be covered in vinyl to match the seats when I find some. Not quite sure of the best way to go with the frame though