68 replies to this topic

[alexcrosse]

i think you will find its not these kind of guys that are wiping themselves all over the road and other peoples cars to be peeled off, its the complete chavs and show off who havnt got the braincells to do something like this. If someone can build a zcars mini themselves, and restore a mini shell for it too, they have good mechanical still and SENCE in my oppinion. Its the people brazing dustbins to their exhausts, getting 4 other chavs in a metro with em and going street racing that does it.

im 19, so ive only been driving for 2 years, but before that i had 2 years karting experience, ive had quite a few friends dying in car crashes, and one brain damage. The most that has happened to me is being rammed in tesco's car park, which wasnt my fault because i wasnt moving!

If someone sayes i havnt got experience, thats fair enough, but they dont no me, and you dont no them.

Besides, there not gonna be able to afford them without severe parental funding, and as lukey said, he is just the builder.

[Jammy]

1. Driving in fields doesn't mean you can drive. My best mate has been driving in fields since he was a wee nipper, now he has his licence he drives like a muppet. My mates and I are just waiting for him to crash.

2. Your obviously building this with someone else (at least I hope you are, since if you don't know the answer to your question, your really going to struggle with the conversion!). Learn from them.

2. Biggav is right about the cost. We've all watched a good couple of dozen conversions on here now, and one, maybe two of them have come under the 10k bracket and thats with getting a lot of stuff second hand. If you really want to spend less than 10k then get the B16 Honda kit when it comes out.

[lukey1019]

I emailed Chris at Z-cars and he said you need between £8,000 - £10,000 to build a Z-cars R1 mini.. So 15k is alot of optional bits but you can build one for about £9,000 depends what u want it to look like and how far you want to go with it

[alexcrosse]

*if you have a perfect condition mini with race spec front end (neg camber etc blah blah at front)

[gizmo]

maybe someone should open a section on dumb a$$ insurrance questions some where..

[wilcooper]

lol gizmo, true.

seems people think an r1 mini is nothing, but with 0-60 times of 4.5 seconds, just think about it.

a db9 does 0-60 in 4.9. (ye it will go faster top speed and costs a lot more, but the r1 mini is still faster in acceleration)

a `182 clio will do 0-60 in 7ish seconds, and i doubt a 17yr old would get insured on that.


My friends dad rang up insurance to see how much it was for him (18yr old)to get insured on his dad's 3 series bmw, they quoted £8000 as named driver.

They didnt do it, but hes on his dads new rav4 for about £2000 named driver. (hes well off)

[cooperlooper649]

I have to agree with lukey about the overall price, sure you can spend 25 grand if you want everything new, but surely part of the fun in doing these projects is overcoming problems with affordable solutions, i'm damn sure mine isn't going to cost over 10k, and if it does i'll be disapointed. I've built lots of cars in the past and every single one of them have turned out to be good cars and people have admired them and often remarked things like " yeah but i bet it cost you as much as a new car " and stuff like that, and it's complete rubbish. Now obviously they all cost me a lot of my own time, which if you payed someone else to do the work would end up costing you a lot of money, but that's why I do my own re-builds/restorations. This is the whole point!!!

Insurance wise though, i'm with all the others.

[Jammy]

15k...... nah

kit cost £5200.. then a donor car say £1000 then paint aprox £700, engine aprox £1200, panels n body work aprox £500 (D.I.Y) say £1500 for bits n bobs

= 10.100

The kit costs £5200, but then ask to look at the list of 'optional extras', you'll find a lot of them are actually required, whether you source them yourself or not, they'll still add to the cost. Engine, unless your VERY lucky, or end up getting a beat up one, will cost you at least £1500. Paint will cost several hundred just for materials. A decent spray job just cost well over a grand. Panels and bodywork, I stay your right for material cost. Again, I'd say that material cost is a touch conservative, but doable if your happy with 2nd hand parts etc.

[Ro8bieg]

okay before people start sayin I must be gettin money off my parents it was an inheritance!

Because everyone doesnt think i would be able to get insured, has anyone been insured at either 17 or 18 on a 1.6 v-tech?

[Jammy]

to be honest, I think at 17, you'd be lucky to get insured on anything more than a 1.4, possibly at 18 you may get insured on a 1.6. Best ringing around kit car insurance companies and asking what age you have to be. No on on here will be able to tell you whether you'll be able to get insurance or not, as it will be different for everyone. Don't even bother with mainstream insurance companies, it's kitcar insurance companies your after.

[Ro8bieg]

Ok thanks... Is it definately kit car and not modified insurance?

[Jammy]

Nah, modified insurance will just rape you, kitcar insurance generally isn't too worried about modifications, etc, so can work out a whole lot cheaper.

[MiniMrMan]

I am 22 and have a zcars Vtech. I did a lot of ringing around. I could only get two quotes, one from Flux and the other from HIC. One was over £3,000 and HIC was £750. The only problem with that for you is that they will only cover people that are older than 19 and have no-claims. No one else would cover me at all.
I think you are going to have job getting any cover.

[Ro8bieg]

hmm... yours is a 2.0L though

[supermotolee]

think your missing the point....