The 24 Hours of Lemons Forums → Our Crappy Race → 3 working weekends left until Buttonwillow!
I just realized that there's only 3 weekends left until Buttonwillow. We don't have tons to do but enough. Time to get cracking.
I checked the weather, yesterday it was a balmy 107! We're all going to melt. Hope your cooling system is in order:
ugh don't remind me. I had lofty goals to improve our theme but I don't think I'll have time since I'm working solo. I'd like to have our car look new and improved, but at least it still looks pretty ridiculous.
Sweet jesus 
Fired the motor on starter fluid and hacked together jumper wires last night. So much left to do
Sweet jesus
Fired the motor on starter fluid and hacked together jumper wires last night. So much left to do
Hooray! I assume you got the trans in?
Uh, we're really cutting it close.
The shell is, uh, still bare with a couple of cage tubes tacked in.
The engine is, well, a bare block in a stand, a crank sitting on the floor, and a bare head casting.
The transmission is without a differential:
The brake and clutch master cylinders are in pieces awaiting new seals
The wiring isn't even started yet.
No tires or even suspension yet.
But I still have confidence we'll get all done the night before.
Oh man do I feel better after seeing that 
Fantastic! What engine is it? 998? 1275? 1098? Watch the diff shimming! Do you have a late rod change gearbox? Great to see a real Mini racing again. I've owned four over the years, then I decided to let my knuckles heal. BTW, late twin leading shoe drum brakes are more effective than Cooper disk units....10-inch tires might be a challenge. Do you have the Vizard book? Check out the lower control arm trick....
Excellent build, my favorite car hands down. You will get it done, those cars are like gokarts. My father owns a 998, we have a nice 1275 just waiting to be installed. Just awesome cars.!
Ok Spank! You gotta get working! Slap the pistons in! Throw in the gear set and put two cans of BonAmi cleanser in the crank case and fire it up! Hold the throttle at 5K till the radiator spews and you are not only ready to go but the bores and gears will be broken in ( i learned that one from a old school english mechanic). Don't stress on the roll cage PVC tubing from HomeDepot will work fine just put a bunch of roll cage padding around it and fill the back seat with booze for the judges will let it pass and on the track you go.
Aw Shit! Sorry i thought it was for the Tijuana race we run! You may have to use cast gas piping for the roll cage here.
Just pedal really really fast and you will make it.
Mega Maxi Pendejo
Oh man do I feel better after seeing that
I was thinking the same thing lol.. We have like 4 things left to do
It great to see the difference between the East Coast Teams, and the West Coast Teams. It's too bad that neither coast will witness each others vehicles.... on the same track that is.
Well, the front cut we got to complete our car (for $250-- see pic on Jalopnik) is a 998, so that's what we're using. All 38 hp of it. Bores were rusted up so it needed a hone and re-ring. New bearings aren't in the budget, so we're going to reuse 'em all. Thought about turbo-ing it, but got to get it built before we can do stupid $hit to it, so might not happen. Maybe for the arsefreeze-a event, should we get into that (and the car survives enough to be repairable)
Gearbox is an old 3-syncro (selling the rod change tranny brought $$ to the build). Not expecting we'll need a synchronized 1st gear anyway. And no bon ami, no way... the gearbox bearings run the same oil from the the engine (no tranny fluid, all engine oil goes through meshing gears then through rod/main bearings-- an Achilles heel of the mini-- in addition to massive cooling issues aka its Achilles heel of the other foot).
For roll cage tubing, actually bought proper 1.75 x .095 DOM so those mistakes we've made thus far weren't/aren't cheap mistakes. But the thought of a 60s Pontiac Catalina T-boneing us means I want proper spec tubing and design around fellow club members who will be behind the wheel.
--Spank
How's your rear subframe? Is it a US or Canadian car? We had Minis up here until 1981, so we received some of the Mk3 improvements....and smog equipment. Twin small bore SU's improve the hell out of the power, even with the stock combined manifold....just saw off the intake
rear subframe? Uh... we put paint on it to act as a bonding agent for the iron oxide particles... we like to call it "lightened".
If you can poke a screwdriver through it, it will likely break.....If that happens, the rubber springs will decompress and let the rear wheels up into the wheel wells, hopefully not in a corner.....you can cut away all but the front bar, cut out the trunk floor then weld a bar across the top of the shock towers...two cheap coilovers bolted between bar and the trailing arms and you're set. It works. BTW, definitely get rid of the Lucas alternator! I used one from a '74 Malibu (Delco 12si?) and it was easy to convert...just my 2c....
The 24 Hours of Lemons Forums → Our Crappy Race → 3 working weekends left until Buttonwillow!