10 inch wheels... could it be done?

[Latka]

Hi folks - just stumbled on the site. Thankfully someone finally brought all us crazy ones together. :)

Was thinking of doing the B16a2 swap into a Mini of mine that has 10" wheels. With the stock motor I think you're makin' like 111lb/ft of torque - I've been in A series powered Minis that make more power than that, so I think the 10s could handle it... am I correct? or just crazy? I figured if there were any problems that the final drive could be modified to "lengthen" out the gears a bit.

My A-series powered car has 120bhp and 121ft/lb of torque :twisted: , I'm running a 2.9:1 final drive and 4 1/2 x 10 Minilites with 165/70/10 Falkens and it will still spin its wheels in third. It's almost undrivable in the wet, but entertaining..if you catch it! I'm running drilled S discs and standard S calipers, with EBC greenstuff pads, with a modified Metro Turbo servo so it stops....just!

But....

Here's the rub...It's gonna take ages to get that crease out of the drivers seat!

The colour of fear is brown!

:lol:

Gaz

[Latka]

LOL well there goes that idea. :) Might have to step up to at least 12s then... the additional brake size won't hurt me either.

[16b]

widest 12 inch road going tyre is 165 -

same width as widest 10 inch...

[Mark D]

I think yr mad, mines on Yoko 195/45x14's with a standard b16a2 motor but over 200lbs/ft of torque (dont know how) and i want more rubber. Even on 14's you need a bucket under the seat, or is that just my driving !!!!!!

Mark D

[Latka]

If I'm not mistaken, the B16a2 makes only 111lb/ft of torque out of the box. How in the hell are ya makin 200? :) The VTEC engines aren't sump pullers. heheheh.

I'm leanin towards 12s now. Maybe a tall set of gears will help.

[Mark D]

I,ve no idea. I had it onthe rollers at Mini In the Park last year and he said it had 174BHP and about 216 LB/Ft of torque. I find it a high figure and dont really believe it, like you say if it had been 116 it would have been more believable and i think he prob got his hundreds mixed up. It does go though and no way on 10 inch rims. If i built it again 15,s would be the minimum

Mark D

[Latka]

Wow... 15s? I think the Civic Si here in the US came on 15s or 16s... can't recall which one. I was hoping that I could run the 10s, but it sounds like I'd have to get a really really tall final gear ratio. It might be doable... I'll have to throw the stock ratios into a little car calculator i've got to see what comes up. For some reason I think the top speed would be about 80. Lol the same as my stock 998 :D

I was hoping to do this project on a MK1 car. I know a lot of people will cry foul, grab the torches, and picket my house...but it's a 66 S. My goal was to keep it looking as much like a 66 S as possible - that's why I wanted the 10 inch wheels. Hmmm. Going to have to do some serious calculating and planning to find out if it's even possible without turning it into a beast.

-Andy

[FeEBLeUK]

mark! if it was you that overtook me prior to racing a BMW cooper S on the moterway on the way down to MITP, then i saw it wheelspin when you dropped a gear and flawed it, that was at about 65mph, with insane looking negative camber and bouncing from the coilovers allover. Also, if it was you, your foglight was hanging off!

[MiniMike]

Latka, are you finaly going to do your VTEC? I used the 12" rims, with the same idea as you, to keep the look as original as possible. Take a look at my site and see how you like the looks. I used low profile tires, so the overall diameter of wheel and tire is not much more than the 10" tires and rims. I can spin the tires in the first three gears, so more rubber would give me more grip, but i still like the look better and have adjusted how much throttle I give to keep the tires in contact with the road, rather than spinning. Under normal spiritied drving it is fine anyway, it's only out on the track that the larger tires make the difference. my 2 cents anyway!

[Latka]

Mike,

I'm sure tryin' to, that's for sure. I'm still getting some resistance from the missus, so I might have to wait a while until I can get a clubman to do it to... we'll see.

[Latka]

One thing I'm kickin around in the 'ole brain bucket...

Do the engine swap, keep the 10" gear on the car. If it's not drivable - then upgrade to the 13s. What do ya think?

[Mini1380]

I also am planning on trying to keep the 10 inch wheels and Cooper S brake setup. Since I don't plan on racing the car, I don't think that there should be a real problem with the 10's.

[Latka]

I'm hopin to get more into the SCCA racing out here. Definitely Pro Solo II (Autocrossing) and maybe the occasional "track day" sponsored by one of the local speed shops here. We'll see... I know bigger tires would be easier to get here. Even getting Yokohama A008s was kinda a pain until I found an online supplier. Can't get the AO32Rs here in the US. :( Gotta order 'em from the UK...which seems kinda silly, as they're made in Japan...shipped to the UK...and then shipped all the way back here to Hawaii!

[Mini1380]

So do you think that you can get into an SCCA race with the Cooper S brakes, but with a VTEC engine. Not sure about the classes, but I am not sure that it would be possible.

[Latka]

I'd go into one of the "crazy" classes... Modified somethin or other. It's possible...but I'd be competing against purpose built racecars then. Thankfully there's like ONE that shows up - an old Datsun 510, and I think if I got my suspension right i could take him :)

[Mini1380]

Sorry. Missed the part about solo II on the last read. For some reason I was thinking like GT-5 or something.

I do think that a lot of it has to do with car setup and skill of the driver. This is what I remember of one day at the Mini Meet West in 1985. The third fastest drive of the day went to Crazy Mike Kimball. He was driving a mini with an 1100 engine, 5 color paint job, cardboard air dam. Can't remember some of the other stuff, but the car was pretty stock looking. He was beat by a GT-5 racer (Al Beebe), and the Canadian National champ. Mike was class C, and the other 2 cars were class AA. Mike beat all the 1275's and larger.

I would think that for autocross, you shouldn't lose much time (if any). On a big track, that would be a different matter altogether.