325 replies to this topic

[johny:)]

It was money that I didn't won't to spend but I wonted a tidey cage in there before it goes on the road I did have one but it had no strength In it and it sat about 4-5 inches under the roof so it was abit pointless

Bright pink with raceing stripes lmoa should be geting it into primer soon before this weather gets Evan more cold

[johny:)]

Hi all i have abit more of an update to do not much just been keeping busy

to start off my cage came a few days after my last post so i got that bolted in really easy to fit with out the rear bins in the car so i was happy with it


Fits nice and tight up to the roof so should stop me from banging my head on it

after that i decided to finish the engine bag i have stoped sanding down for now as its gon far to cold to paint it in my garage to i will tinker with other bits for now and i ran out of sand paper lmao. So i got the wiper motor fitted some thing that i kind of forgot about when making my bulk head box so it had to be moved over tighter to the inner wing that it would have been but i made it fit in the end
i need to re root the petrol line now but that is no problem


i got my radiator back of Mr thumb on Friday who kindly moved the hose over for me so my radiator now cleares every thing (kind of) any way i had a test fit


turned the wheel to full lock and it cleares the rad witch is good i still need longer track rod ends tho as mine are still to short


I had to extend the top hose as it was not long enough to reach the rad on the honda the rad would have been much lower down and further away from the engine but yet again they have 10ft of engine bay to play with easy fix tho i had a piece of pipe witch was a perfect fit of the hose


The bottom hose needed to be shortened but that was also very easy i chopped around 3 inches off and it worked perfect i like those jobs


I then had to chop more of my front end away to make it sit over the radiator i wont have much front end left soon so i cut the least that i could


I had my old mpi radiator sitting around so i stole the electric fan of it its only 10 inch but it realy is crammed in there i could not fit a bigger one on there and Kam this could be a solution to the grand pre starts you was talking about

this fan is designed to be on the front of the radiator pushing air back through the radiator asif you was driving witch is obvious I could not fit this on the front of my radiator is it had to go on the back only thing is its going to push air through the opposite was wich will be pushing the hot air away from the air filter it would only work from a standing start if you had the fan runningjust a thought any way

as you can see its quite packed in there now


I also had to chop the head light bowl down allot i bent the spring over i dont think it will work tho i had to bent the prongs over on the back of the bulb as they where hitting the radiator
this is the back of the head light dont now if you can make it out


thats all for now abit more progress through the week and i will get another update just a few piks of the car i love takeing photos :)

[Kam]

Nice work

Yep that fan idea could work, end of the day on the move is not a problem, ram air is doing its job at that point, but up to about 15-20mph there shouldn't be any issues with air flow, after that speed you shouldn't really need the fan as the ram air takes over, worse case scenario the hot air wont go anywhere at a certain slow speed as the fan is trying to push against what air is trying to come in but thats gonna take you a few weeks of testing it in hot weather to find out, it'll just take longer to cool thats all, good move though

That front end cut does look close to the rad, depending on what your mounts are like you won't know until you hit the tarmac if the rad is clipping the bodywork, remember your using less mounts than what you get on a honda so the ones you have will be working harder to hold the lump in place, if you don't want to cut any more out then don't, test it first on the road and see where you stand or if your impatient like me get a pry bar and start rocking the block!

I can see where your coming from re the headlamp shenanigans, I have no headlamp bowl atall



I've got 90 degree spade connectors on the back just for some extra mm's clearance! Fun fun fun, its what we signed up for

Keep up the good work, liking the progress

[johny:)]

The fan was just a thout from a standing start it would push the hot air away from the air filter but as you say after about 15-20 mpi winds its no good I could always run the fan back words wich would pull air through but to words the airfilter

The prongs on the back of the bulb I had to bend over at 90 degrees as they where tuching the radiator can I ask kam what did you do with the spring that hold the head light in ??

[Kam]

The prongs on the back of the bulb I had to bend over at 90 degrees as they where tuching the radiator can I ask kam what did you do with the spring that hold the head light in ??

Hard to describe on here exactly how I've done it but basically as I've got no bowl I've got no spring so the back section is screwed onto the front, so when I need to use the two headlamp adjuster screws to align the headlight I need to loosen off the 'third' holding screw

[mk3 Cooper S]

^{Are you sure you want to put the intake right behind the radiator?}

[johny:)]

Hi well it would be better some where els but there is no room for it to go any where els I do have a new plan to stop the hot air geting to it all will be reviled soon

[Kam]

^{Are you sure you want to put the intake right behind the radiator?}

You don't really get alot of choice in a mini bay, you use the space your left with after everything else you need is in place, not as easy as it looks in pictures...

[miniblade81]

don't you just hate having room in the wrong places i don't think you would notice much performance lose from that its a vtec in a mini for god sake lol and its easy to bring up the obvious keep going mate good build to get this far is something to be proud off you can change it at a later date if needed i did think of putting rad in back but its weight for me so i just used a uprated mini one im sure someone will be saying its too small or something just feed of the positives mate

[johny:)]

I learned the very hard way it's not as easy as it looks in the picks

And thanks mate it's been a tuff build and like you say it's a vtec in a tin can the car when it was running the mpi engine was 55hp at the wheels and had a top speed of around 98mph flat out down hill lmao it now has around 160hp and will be tuned up to over 200 one day a little bit of hot air should not affect the preformance to much

[KernowCooper]

how do you overcome the manifold down pipes so close to the front panel, tape it with heat tape?

[adamt117]

Just read through the whole thread. Looks really good, Japs the way forward lol.
Im in the process of putting a 4efte from a Glanza in my mini. Having to have the turbo poking out the grill lol

Whereabouts are you in Wales? im near Barry

[johny:)]

Well my exhaust is doing to stick through the grill as well so yeah I think heat wrap will be the best option to stop any nasty burns lmao

Jap is the way forword I had a tit full of mini engines I won't to do a glanza mini when mine is done if I was you look for an LSD gt turbo box my glanza is proberly as heavy as two minis and when boost comes in i find that I can't get traction any where not Evan in the dry still loads of fun tho just chews through tyres

[Kam]

a little bit of hot air should not affect the preformance to much

Yeah I wouldn't worry about it too much for the time being, my filter is currently smack bang behind the alloy rad and my manifold aint heat wrapped either and the bonnet has no gaping holes so the under bonnet temps on mine even after a short run are crazy insane. I'm gonna have to get a thermo in there one day to test how hot it gets as put it this way - after a drive you can't touch anything in the bay and I need gloves to lift the bonnet

Remember mine aint stripped out, it still has full interior, underlay carpet the lot, need to get it weighed sometime but I'm guessing it weighs just a bit more than a 90's factory carb mini, so the heat might be costing it a few horses on mine but you wouldn't notice when you plant your foot from standstill, as mentioned already above, its in a mini, so in a stripped out one your laughing

Air filters can be boxed in and cold air feed pipes can be fitted, but worry about that after when you know what space you got left, I'm not running any but then again the car aint suffering for it, will install it at some point though

Will keep an eye out for this solution of yours with the hot air/filter jobbie

Keep at it

[johny:)]

Love your replies Kam lmao. I was going full steam ahead on sorting every thing out then it decided it dont won't to start every thing is earthed it sparkes the pump primes and there is fuel coming from the retern pipe but nothing it was back fireing realy bad and I mean bad ears ringing for at least 10 minits. Any way I have been trying to sort it buy using pin outs should crack it soon if not i can see this car being pushed off a cliff or into a skip