MadaboutKitcars

Hello,

My name's Damien from France, 26 years old and I’m restoring a Mini based kit-car called Mosquito (some of you probably know that car but with the name of Triad, but it’s the same car.)
I bought that car from my English friend Chris, about 3 years ago.

I'm looking for informations about those cars. I'd like to be in touch with other owners or any other person that could give me informations, pictures, articles, etc. about Mosquito and Triad.

You’ll see here the different steps of the restoration …


Here is the Mosquito when my mate Chris bought it, back in 2002 I think. It wasn’t that bad after being stored for 11 year in that garage...




The Mosquito is complete, there’s nothing missing. Exhaust pipes are quite rusty and we can recognize the Mini MkI rear lights.



The interior is a bit small but the two small bucket seats give the game away. The interior is very simple.






The engine bay shows the little 850 A series.



Only the spare wheel has got space in the boot, near the petrol tank.



The frame is very rusty, like the wheel.





Here is the Mosquito, in front of Chris’ garage.



The bonnet took off when crossing a lorry on the road! As you can see, another lorry that was following the Mosquito… The bonnet was completely broken, with no possibility to buy a new one at the local Mini shop! So, Chris made one by himself…



The back of a washing machine will do the job…




And a square of metal set found in a scrapyard will do the rest!!



Witt little cutting…



And here is the brand new bonnet! As the bonnet need to be painted, Chris changes the colour of the Mosquito: red.




This picture shows how low is the Mosquito

Chris doesn’t like the rear lights from. The Mini. They will be changed for simpler lights.








As the red colour wasn’t enough, some grey flames are painted on the front end of the car…









Here is the Mosquito, finished. Chris used it daily for 6 months even when the weather was bad, which does not happen often in Uk





It’s at this time that I arrive in the story of the Mosquito. At this moment, I was working in Uk since two months and Chris was my flat mate. During the months, I asked for him to sell me the Mosquito. Chris doesn‘t want to sell it, unfortunately.
One night, I was coming back from work, and I saw the Mosquito in the middle of the street, in a bad condition. Children have destroyed it, as you can see on the pictures bellow.
When Chris saw that, he told me: « You’ll probably be happy, I don’t want it anymore, if you want it, it’s yours for £400 » It didn’t take me that long to answer « YES! »

A few weeks later, I came back to England with my father to pick it up. I was as excited as a child in front of the Christmas tree…







Here it is! The Mosquito has arrived in France and I quickly started working on it.





I like the following pics. It looks like a giant Lego game…





As you can see, the chassis is very simple. I noticed some weak points that I’ll have to repair.





Long and boring job: the floor is off now!

Chassis and front frame are split







Chassis is repaired and reinforced in some points.





Then, it’s sandblasted and painted in « primer » (is it the right word?)



It‘ll be the same for all the parts



By the time, I decided to make a kind of boot behind the seats.




A new battery box is built as the old one is too rusty.

And then, I started painted the chassis and the rest of the parts…



















When finished, the Mosquito will completely change. The exterior colour will be the « Opalescent Silver Grey » from the E-Type Jaguar, the interior will be in red leather. The dashboard will be covered in alloy (I don’t know the name in English but when you look at it, it makes circles).
The floor will be made with quality red carpet, and the steering wheel will be a woody one, Moto Lita.
For the exterior, the rear window behind the seats will be removed, like the windscreen,. This will be replaced by two Brooklands aero-screens. Very British! It won’t have anymore doors or hood, just a tonneau cover.
The wheels will be changed to Cooper S reverse rims in 4,5 », painted in Old English White with A032R Yokohamas…

Time to build the car has arrived. It’s the best part of the job.









On the front drive assembly, everything is replaced by new parts.




A nice Aston filler cap is fitted to the petrol tank… nice…



New brake pipes




The steering whell takes place.



New floor is fitted, 196 holes!






To avoid vibrations, silicone is spread between the frame and the alloy panel.

The floor is finished




Good job, I’m happy




For more comfort, I fit an inner floor. It looks better.






Now the rear suspensions is re-fitted





As the 850 engine will be replaced by a 1275, I replace the drums by Cooper S front assembly. Everypart is completely reconditioned.




By the time, some friends tell me to upgrade the brake circuit. So I did a double one.

The original engine is really in a bad state.









Not a problem, it will be completely replaced by this 1275 A+ that will be completely reconditioned.




I keep the gearbox that comes from a 998 Cooper. Fitted on the 1275 engine, it will be great.



The block is controlled by a friend, is painted.






By lack of time, I decided to store the Mosquito until I have more time to work on it. It became quite dusty… It was about… 2 years ago…!

Here are the wheels, nice…





A few days ago, I’ve started working on it again and the first job was to clean it!

Yeah! It works!


Now it’s clean, I’ll start very soon to work on the engine with a friend. I’ll show you the whole restoration.









Thanks for looking

If you have anything about the history of this car, I'm interested.

Damien

Hi Damien, welcome aboard and thanks for sharing your rebuild. I love seeing pics like that, makes me want to clear the garage and make some space

Can't specifically help other than post some general information about the car which you probably know already.

Production was believed to be originally in 1976-7 by a company in Hereford (company name not known) Production of around 5. As you say later revived in the 1990's as the Triad by Malvern Autocraft, Worcs

(source - Classic Kit cars by Chris Reece)

Don't know anymore than that. Ferg maybe along as he is into the old stuff so may be able to help.

Keep up the good work,

cheers John

Hi Damien,

As a threewheeler fan, i think you did a great job in restoring this kit, but have you thought of about updating also the Wheels, with some nice 13 inch Minilite replica wheels?.

It will give your kit more presence on the road, look classy, and drive better, especially over bumps.

Will follow your project, and please post more picture when you have them.

Good luck with the rebuild.

Ciao
Italo

Hello Damien!

Fantastic collection of photos of a very worthwhile project.

I can't add anything to what John has said about it's history, but I do recall seeing a white Mosquito at Stoneleigh around 1985 parked next to a Stimson Scorcher.

Have you seen this page:
http://www.3wheelers.com/mosquito.html

Not much there, but interesting.

By the way.
Alloy with circles - I've always called 'machine turned'

and 'Primer' sounds like the right word to me!!!

Cheers,
Ferg

Thank you all for your replies.





I think I'll keep the 10" reverse rims, I like those wheels.



I had already seen that web page about the Mosquito. Anyway, thank you
3-wheelers.com is a great website.

Do you have any picture of the white Mosquito in Stoneleigh in 1985? If it was a white one, it could have been mine. They were not so many and most of them were red or blue. A simple registration number could help a lot.

Thank you for your help.

Damien

I've just discovered that my gerabox is a 3 synchro and not a 4 synchro. The 1275 engine won't fit. So, I'll fit a 998 engine but with some modifications:
- probably a stage 2 or 3 cylinder head,
- cam kit
- big carb, etc.

So... to be continued!

Damien

Damien, thank you for sharing your story so far.

I really enjoyed looking through all the photo's.

You have to finish it now after all the work and the history of this little car!

Hello everybody

As you know, I'm restoring my Mosquito, but I'm also looking for informations about Mosquitos and Triads. I want to create a database with all those models listed.

To help me in that mission, I've created a website, in French and in English about those cars.
I need your help. What I want you to do, is just to have a look at my website. If you know or if you have ever seen one of the cars in pictures, please, send me an email (see on the website). If you know someone that has a Mosquito or a Triad, please, let me know as well.

Any info or picture would be great.
Please, send that link to all the people you know and who could help me in my project.

Here is the link:

[SIZE="6"][url]www.mosquito-triad.euro.st[/url][/SIZE]

Thank you very much.

Damien

There you go, I'm sure quite a few now will visit your website and send you info.
http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?t=351618&f=30&h=0

I hope it helps
Ciao
Italo

Hello,

Thank you very much for creating a new topic on the Pistonheads forum. That's a great idea. Thank you again for your help

Damien

Hello!

I've updated the website and the address is now [url]www.mosquito-triad.com[/url]

Please, visit the link and send it to all your contacts interested in kit-cars, Minis and three wheelers.

Thank you all for your help. I really want to know everything about those kit-cars.

Damien

I've worked on the engine for the last few weeks.

The 1275 cc engine will fit on the gearbox after a few modifications.

You'll find some pics here.

http://www.mosquito-triad.com/uk-restauration5.html

A few weeks ago, I sent emails to Kit-Car Magazine, Which kit car?, and Total Kit-Car Magazine concerning the Mosquito and my website. For a few days, I'm having a lot of visitors from UK on my website. As I don't have those magazines in France, can someone tell me if there's an article concerning the Mosquito and Triad kit-cars in the last issue of those mags?

Thanks

Some news...
I'm actually working on the body. Some parts need some work. And some holes have to be tapped before painting the complete body (ie: holes for aeroscreens, etc.)

Of course, all pictures are available on [url]www.mosquito-triad.com[/url]

Hello you all!

The restauration progresses quite fastly at the moment. You can see the evolution on the restauration pages of my NEW website [url]www.mosquito-triad.com[/url]

C'ya

Hello you all...

A little news from my project... The body shell is being repaired. The guy works really well.

The complete car comes back home on Monday. I'll take some more pics.

There's no more flames on the bonnet

I'm very happy, I've just finished the first part of the new dashboard of my Mosquito.

I make the same than the original one, in fiber glass, but this one is in machined alloy. Instruments will be fitted as in classic Minis.
I've fitted the chrome ring to add a "Mini touch"

You might wonder why the dashboard is black... It's just a black plastic fitted to protect the panel. I don't want to remove it as long as the dashboard isn't finished.