Available for questioning!

Hi,

I'm new to all this forum business but thought now is a good a time as any to get into it.

I am happy to say that I own and drive a 1800cc K-Series powered Mini. The project was about 18 months in the making and hit the road in December. Its been "fairly" reliable since then, after all it is still a Mini!

I'll be happy to answer any questions any one may have who is planning a similar conversion, either put them here or re-direct me to another topic.

The brief spec is as follows:
1984 Mini Sprite shell with 100mm steel front extension.
Home made subframe (based on original mini)
1800cc 120ps K-Series sourced from ebay for £600. Came with gearbox, ecu, spare cylinder head, inlet manifold, 2 exhaust manifolds (why?!) and annoyingly a blown head gasket!
Now runs a Rover 45 Turbo Diesel gear box (taller ratios).
Metro radiator
Metro Turbo brakes
Coilover suspension
One-off driveshafts

A few mods have been made to the engine since installation:
FSE Power Boost Valve
52mm Throttle Body
Green air filter
De-cat

I have also bought a pair of MGF "135" cams with higher lift and longer duration but they are yet to be fitted.

As I said all questions welcome, answers given to the best of my ability! In the mean time, if any one would be kind enough to tell me how to start a new gallery I will quite happily put some pictures up!

Cheers
Andy

[duck]

Send some pics of your conversion to DarrenW or MattG and they will make you a club member, once a member you can upload pics to the gallery.

[BassAddict]

Welcome to the club Andy - sounds like a nice little conversion there with the 1800 unit !! :)
Rich

id love to know more about your subframe, get some pictures up :D

[evolotion]

would love pics around the PG1 gearbox :P as im currently running a bolted-diff R65 box and it was enough of a squeese to get that assembly in width wise without fouling wheels and such.

Thanks everybody!

I have now got an album up and running in the gallery. Only consists of 6 pics at the moment. The remainder are on a different machine but I will put them up soon as i can.

Enjoy!

[Geehawk]

Good to see you're finally here 8)

Can't wait for the bigger, better, badder pics.

Graham

[trickey]

Welcome aboard Andy :D
Its always good to have more people on the rover forum!

I've had a look at your gallery pics, and i like what you've done with the brake servo and master cylinder, any chance of some pics of it in better detail, as i've been toying with an idea along similar lines.

Trickey.

Trickey,

Just scanned through my phone (read digital camera!) and the only other picture I have of the servo is now winging its way to my e-mail and will be put on the gallery shortly.

To describe it, two pieces of 50mm angle plate were welded together to make a "[" shape. This accomodates the original teardrop setup from the Mini. A plate was then attached to the bottom to use the original studs from the pedal box, the end of the pushrod was obviously cut off and re-welded 90 degrees round. At the servo end, a 3mm plate was cut and drilled to fit where a LHD's pedal box would bolt to. Two smaller pices of angle plate are welded to this and go either side of the master cylinder and use the master cylinder - vacuum unit studs to support the unit. These are not at 90 degrees to the plate, as the picture will show, the servo points down towards the new teardrop arrangement. A solid round bar was also attached to stabilise the angle plate. Despite this, we have recently had to attach a brace bar going between the teardrop pivot and the top stud on the servo. The harder you pressed the brakes, the further the two spread apart and thus you weren't getting any more braking power - not desirable! The servo plate was also drilled to allow the heater pipe through as it was originally. Last but not least, a longer pushrod is needed to connect the two. Easy enough, a piece of 8mm threaded bar will do, or if you want to be neat (like me) a piece of 8mm rod with about an inch of thread either end. A 40mm length of 1/2" diameter bar drilled and tapped to 8mm and a few nuts to lock it all up and hey presto!

If only it was that easy! It was a lot of trial and error but I'm very pleased with the end result. Incidently, the bias valve was also moved to the servo side, and two clutch hoses were used to connect it to the servo (the braided ones available from Mini Spares that will do either a verto or non-verto clutch and have a banjo fitting both ends).

Hope this helps, good brakes are always handy with a 16V Mini!

Cheers
Andy