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Clare Snyder

On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 13:24:30 -0700 (PDT), wrote:

On Saturday, October 19, 2019 at 3:12:14 PM UTC-4, wrote:
On Sat, 19 Oct 2019 07:42:27 -0700 (PDT), wrote:

On Wednesday, October 16, 2019 at 4:48:55 PM UTC-4, wrote:
So when I retire in a few years I want to build a sports car from
scratch. I have the equipment and knowhow except for the bodywork.
Which means I would get to butyand learn how to use an English wheel.
I don't know which engine to use though. So I'm looking for
opinions. I want to use a 4 cylinder engine. The engine needs to be
fairly common and parts must be available for hopping it up a bit and
for general rebuilding.
Very important the engine needs to look great. So I'm looking for
opinions here. A great looking engine that's fairly common, can be
hopped up some, and won't break the bank to work on.
Thanks,
Eric

"Looks great" caused me to slam on the brakes. g As for your other requirements, it's hard to beat Hondas for most of them. Japanese law required that engines be changed at 40,000 miles a decade or so ago, which put a lot of used ones on the US market. Moderate speed equipment is readily available.

I rebuilt two Alfa Romeo 1300 cc engines in the late '60s. They were beautiful. One had a Veloce head with twin side-draft DCOE Webers. I don't know of anything that looks that good today, but it's hard to tell until you get all of that plastic junk off the top of them. I own a 2018 Subaru Crosstrek, and I've seen it with the plastic off of it. Not exactly a thing of beauty, but I do like the engine.

If you want real sports car performance, avoid turbos. The turbo lag is antithetical to sports-car type responsiveness, unless you spend megabucks. Garden-variety turbos are not sporty engines. They just wind up -- eventually -- and put out a lot of power. In a light sports car, you don't need that much.

What you need is great throttle response and good breathing. There are a lot of good engines out there today. Your project is one I've dreamed about off and on over the years, and having done some sports-car racing between 1967 and 1972, I have a good idea of what I'd want my engine to be good at if I ever did it. I'd look at Honda, Toyota, and Nissan. If one dropped in my lap, I'd look at a 3-Series BMW. But I'd make sure that aftermarket parts are readily available for anything I chose. Oh...and make sure you can mate it up with a transmission for rear-wheel drive. Maybe an engine that's used in a small pickup.

Good luck and have fun!
I am also considering motorcycle engines, though I dont know how I
would marry one to a transmission. But a V twin, a BMW boxer twin, and
a 4 cylinder boxer engine have all crossed my mind. There are some
older foreign engines I really like but then that may make parts hard
to get and expensive.
Eric

Well, there have been some successful ones. In the early days of the Locost, at least one was powered with a Honda Fireblade (CBR 1000RR, 998 cc) motorcycle engine, and the report was that it was faster than a Locost powered by a Rover V8 (essentially the old 215 cu. in. Oldsmobile aluminum V8).

It's all a matter of what you want in a car of this type. When the original Lotus 6 (soon to be Lotus 7) came out, you could put any engine in it that you wanted. Lotus would deliver them with 948 cc Morris engine or a Ford Anglia. Neither one put out more than 50 hp in stock trim, but they were race winners.

My college roommate has one of the 50 Lotus 7 Mk. 4s delivered in the US, and he has a 1600 cc Ford Pinto engine it it. That's essentially the same engine as the English Ford 125E New Kent -- probably the most common engine in Lotus 7s. I've driven it; it probably doesn't have more than 100 hp, but it weighs less than 1300 lb. and it goes like hell.

So decide if you want a wild thing or something that's a little more relaxing to drive. It doesn't take much power to make those little space-frame club racers really run. But it has to suit *you* or it isn't worth the trouble.

Have fun!
A Toyota 3tg would be nice - or a twin-cam ford Escort or Zetec from
a ZX2. The 3TG is hard to find over here but was a HOT engine in the
Celoca RT series rallye cars - - -1600cc of DYNAMITE