Kitcat

Looks like a late 50's Testa Rosa 250. It has knock-off wire wheels wh/were the style back then. If so, it's worth around $5-6M. A '62 just sold for $10.5M!

This lovely car is probably too modestly powered to be a dominating track car-respectable yes, but not an ultimate track-rat(of course you cld add some FM turbo power). So I wld be inclined to go for the more aggressive roll-over bar and full weather kit and skip the cage. I use my Caterham as a semi-daily driver and have put abt 8K on in in my 14 months of ownership. There have been very few days during that period when it wasnt at least somewhat likey to rain. On yesterday's 300 mile trip it rained 4 separate times. This Westfield seems to have the same potential to be a car that can be reliably driven to work and on trips yet hold its own, tho not dominate, as a track car.

Andrew7, nice to meet up w/you & your dad and see your amazing Lowcost BEC. The vintage races were amazing as were all the old, and sometimes oddball, cars. Great to meet Bart Lami too. What a resource for info on Caterhams he is. The 300 mile trip back to Cincy was uneventful, except for the 1 hour monsoon (I pulled over) and the 3 cloudbursts, which I motored thru. I loved the BeaveRun race track and my new goal in life is to do a track day there someday. Maybe even with Bart as instructor? Mike

Andrew7: E-mail sent. I will likely attend this Saturday's a.m event at Beaverun (as a spectator) in my Caterham. Mike Mooney

I wld love to do a track day. They are not cheap. Typical cost is $200-500 a day depending on amount of track time. The more people who do it the more the per car cost goes down, but get too many people and the track becomes crowded. Some of the big clubs (Porsche) will pack in 160 cars, spread over 4 run groups of 40, categorized by speed/experience. Others will run as few as 2 run groups, with just 20 cars per group. I would be (pleasantly) surprised if more than 10 people are interested. Maybe tie in with someone else doing one? Or open it up to other marques? Also good to have a newbie group so folks can get acclimated without feeling the pressure to be fast. Some basic instruction helps too. For what it's worth, an auto-x is a lot less intimidating to the average enthusiast. Mike

The Caterham's so expensive that the cost of assembly by the vendor is relatively small. If you buy a pretty basic Cat kit it will cost $40-45K, add around $4-5K to have it professionally assembled. So you save maybe 10%. Buy a used one for 1/3-1/2 that, already assembled and titled-much simpler. Or order a Super Stalker kit, they seem to be much less than the Cat kit. The Flyin Miata Westfield comes in about 1/2 between those two. Many members here enjoy building things so for some the build was part of the fun, more than a financial thing.

My State Farm policy excludes wheel to wheel racing. When a friend wrecked my Miata at an auto-X a few years back, they paid for everything. I was totally honest about how it happened. I recently read my policy and, again, it seems to exclude competitive events only. Track days are not competitive.

First photo is terrific! Almost worthy of inclusion on a calendar. 1000 miles, v impressive. I took JohnK for a ride last weekend. Tho he is building an Ultralite he'd never ridden (or even seen) a Caterham. At one stop lite he said:"Why IS that woman smiling at me?". Then, "Oh, we are in a Caterham!"

Sorry, it says "POS" to me. On the other hand, it's always fun to be dismissed as being just that and then kick butt performance wise.

Given that virtually everything that can break on a car has broken on my Caterham (Or is in the process of breaking, is thinking of breaking, or will break in the next 12 months:)), I gotta say I love my car but it would be very hard for an "imitation" to be less reliable. And getting replacement parts is an iffy, slow, and always expensive proposition. And when I compare specific components of my car with their counterpart on, say a Birkin, it seems that the Birkin is at least my car's equal (if not superior). Plus the used car prices do show that after an initial hit, all prices stabilize. The reason I am driving a Caterham today is that it was the cheapest Seven I could find when i was looking (at $22.5K). If a "worthless" Westfield had been available, I would have snapped it up.

There is a state park in KY, just across the river from Cincy, called Big Bone Lick. Beaver Road runs past it (I couldn't make something like this up-I stumbled across it on one of my Seven blats).

With all the skills you have, a Seven is a perfect fit! They are wonderful awe-inspiring vehicles but are often in need mechanical TLC.

I think the predicted horsepower gain of 12-20 is fanciful. When I had a Miata, losing the cat was worth 2 hp.

So, given the above scenario, why would anyone attempt to buy one from you in the future? And what is your business plan if, as seems to be the case, the market will only pay you 1/2 of what you need to make a fair profit?

Other than some gas spray on my passenger clam, my Crossflow isnt givin up any secrets about my occasional driving indiscretions:).

There may be more, or less, to this than we think. Hard to tell when you only hear one side. I don't think Shiva is saying they kept his money. Rather that he lost money due to exchange rates and cost of converting curency (Euros are more expensive to buy than you get when you sell them, for example). I had rented a van and trailer and had money set aside and a date to pick up a Seven before I got the one I have. I had airplane ticket. But.... We didn't have a final deal, just a 99% final one and the last 1% was its undoing.

Awkward looking styling, to my eye at least. Probably a blast to drive tho.

I order my 20-50 oil on-line from Summitt. They have everything.

What about just using some straight 50 weight oil?

Add caster to the equation too-the more positive caster you have, the more the wheels will want to point straight (tho it will increase steering effort too). That and adding some toe-in should solve the problem. Positive caster is illustrated by the front wheels of a shopping cart, which due to that "alignment", point straight naturally as you push. I should add that I was unable to fix my handling woes with alignment tweaks: it was all the tires' fault and when I upgraded to Toyo RA1's, all was better.

More details? Well I can offer that he has been described as "ruggedly handsome" by a top American car magazine. Thanks for the link to your website-I definitely need more Seven related places to surf!

I get 22 mpg on the highway at 75 mph. I have the 5 speed w/overdrive 5th. It really helps to put more air in the tires (I went from 15 psi to 22 psi and got about a 10% mpg improvement). Around town, short trips, lots of cold starts 12-15 mpg. I took my wife's '03 T-Bird on a road trip over the weekend and got 25-28 mpg at 65-70 mph with its the big lumbering V-8. I get 45 mpg at 75 mph with my Prius.

Lucky guy! Keep us posted on how you fare. I will be interested in knowing if anything can stay with it at the track

Where are the Seven photos? I know there were 3-4 at Putnam:).

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