This is a read-only archive of the old Madabout Kitcars forum. New posts and replies are no longer possible, but every thread is still here to browse and read.
As my hands on experience with building engines is limited to Rv8's and other rover units I'm hoping to get some good suggestions for which engine to use:
requirements are:
<2l N/A or once the 1.4x factor if turbo'd
good torque curve
as higher reving as possible
lightweight
compact
4, 6 or 8 cly
low centre of gravity (I'll probably dry sump it)
potential to tune
Not too expensive!
The engine will be mid mounted so I'll need to look at gearboxes too. Also not bothered whether it is 2 or 4 stroke, or from a car, bike, boat, plane etc or if it is water or air cooled, flat, inline or v
I have been thinking along the lines of a smart car engine, bike engine (but which one?) or a 2l V4 2-stroke from a boat outboard
It's a scratch built hillclimb/sprint car I'm designing, it should weigh between 300 and 450kg so I'm not too bothered with huge torque just enough so it doesn't bog down on the start line or coming out of a slow corner but i want it as high reving as I can so I can limit the gearchanges or in the future add bigger cams if I feel the need. As I said above, I'm only really familiar with rover engines so i just don't know what else is about whether it's from a car, bike or whatever so I'm just after some suggested engines to research.
the sub 2l limit is due to my race licence newbieness and obviously the lighter and more compact the engine and gearbox the better.
i'm not hands on familiar with what you need to do to a bike engine, but from initial surfing it looks like the initial expense would be rather high