Fiddling with engines

The K-series is now ready to mate with the box and aim at the hole sometime soon.

I removed the pulley's, VVC mech, cams all that lark tonite. All good bar one dodgy lobe on an the exhaust cam, bit of pickup marking and lost about 0.5mm off the tip, few marks on the cam follower too...I'll need to replace the followers with new ones anyway as they aren't good enough to planish off and also both cams will be replaced with 285H versions.

I think the standard VVC exhaust manifold from just about any 1.8 VVC engine (MGF, Elise, BRM Rover) maybe useable and it'll just fit round the engine mount and allow a cheaper solution to the exhaust issue..It will miss the bulkhead and aims at exactly the space I have left for a pair of secondary tubes between engine and chassis rail...The manifold is a bit crap as the primaries are short but it will still give 180+HP and can be ported out. I can always get a real pukka one made at a later date if I like the conversion.

Also the frontline chaps who do the Midget conversion sell an exhaust manifold...that way fit as the midget 1500 system is basically the same as the spitfire? Will check out that option too.

I will not spend a penny on anything atm. If the engine fits where I want it / once its mounted I will firstly get it all plumbed up leaving my main expenses as : Throttle bodies, trumpets, filters, ECU, Cams, vernier pulleys, blanking kit for VVC mech and getting a 2-1 exhaust piece made up to join the manifold to the rear section, which will be 2.5inch or 2.25inch bore.

I am sure the wiring will be fun!

Few more items to remove from the engine bay, take the seats out and I will need to chop the bulkhead...and get the engine in the hole on bricks...

The water system is a bit pants the thermostat is on the inlet to the engine from the rad...? With a 2nd pipe recirculating water from the oulet to the inlet to open the thermostat...Thats about emissions and minimising warm up time...

I will ditch all that lark..The engine will have the EWP on the drivers side on the side of the block pushing water in right by the pump, no thermostat will be fitted, or actually it will but with the thermostat mech removed..The stock pump impeller will be removed/ground off and EWP will run the cooling. I can't remove the pump completely as its needed for the cam belt.

Haven't done much more...Bloody cold! Wind changes and suddenly we are worrying about global warming!

I got the chills and sliced my finger open undoing a 8mm bolt when a spanner snapped. Kept on working and there is blood everywhere!

Not sure how long this conversion will take, but it won't be that quick, but then you never know.