SanderGA

https://bringatrailer.com/2022/01/07/2021-bat-success-story-of-the-year-cast-your-vote/

Buyers and sellers can send Bring a Trailer a success story which they will run on the site. Here's my tale of a 5,100 mile cross country drive home in my '93 HPC with the 218hp engine: https://bringatrailer.com/2021/05/19/bat-auction-success-story-seven-went-down-to-georgia/ At the end of the year, they ask for nominations for the best success story. The link to that article where BaT members can make nominations in the comment section is below. If any of you BaT members would be so kind to nominate me, @sanderga, I would greatly appreciate it. I already have several nominations so I suspect I'll be back in a few days asking for votes. https://bringatrailer.com/2022/01/03/2021-bat-success-story-of-the-year-cast-your-vote/ Many thanks. Sander

Sale pending.

I’m in the process of getting my 1993 Caterham HPC with a 218 HP Swindon engine ready to sell. It has a silver body with red nose and fenders and just shy of 17,000 miles on the odometer. I bought it in June of last year and drove it 5,100 miles cross country last October. That trip was chronicled here (Going Coast to Coast without a Clue) and in a BaT Success Story. Since I bought it, I’ve given it the most thorough shakedown imaginable and I would gladly hop in it with an hours notice and confidently drive it anywhere in the continental US. I haven’t taken photos or prepared a complete write-up yet but if anyone had an interest feel free to contact me. I’ll be posting photos and complete information over the next week. To see the car visit @caterhamchronicles on Instagram or read the feature titled Seven Went Down to Georgia on Bring a Trailer.

Took the car to the mountains with the plan of doing about 1,000 miles with the Rennsport Dragon Rally. I had to abandon it because I strained something in my shoulder lifting myself out of the car. But I got 300 miles in. Car runs much smoother with the new ignition system. The best surprise was that my MPG is up 5+ MPG. Couldn’t care less about MPG but that’s an extra 40 miles between fill-ups. I had the carbs rejected but the guy that did it didn’t seem to know what he was doing and I thought I’d have to do it again as it still ran rough. Since he leaned it out, I suspect that’s a significant contributor to the mileage increase. It runs so smooth now, idles nicely, doesn’t smell of gas, and never stumbles so I’d be crazy to touch the carbs.

The toe in looked wrong to me so I thought I’d have someone check it before I drive 1,000+ miles this weekend. Drives fine though. Butler Tire, a high-end independent tire shop in Atlanta, was kind enough to check it. The toe in was about one degree off and they put that right. The camber was off about a half a degree without a driver and we elected to leave that alone rather than pulling suspension parts off to add washers. I’m all good now. It’s been a busy week: new ECU, coil pack, battery, and an alignment. My Porsche is in the body shop so the Caterham and I are gonna go terrorize Pcars at the Rennsport Dragon Rally in North Carolina this weekend. Hope I can keep up. :-o

I think I need an alignment but I need it TODAY as I have plans to go to the mountain for the weekend. Any chance a regular tire shop will do it?

I got my new distributor-less ignition system installed. The complete kit was specified and supplied by SBD Motorsport. Total cost was around $1,400. Installation was very easy and consists of the following: Mount the new ECU. It's larger so tough to fit it in Cut a hole in the firewall for the wiring harness to run through because the plugs are big. A 1 3/4" hole is sufficient. Cover the edges of the hole to protect the wires. Run the harness through the firewall. Properly connect the wires on the wiring harness to the plug for the coil pack. Don't forget heat shrink and confirm you are following the right diagram. Just because it says Bosch doesn't mean it's right. Count pins. Remove the ignition coil but leave the wires in place. Connect the two 12V wires on the wiring harness to one of the old 12V leads that connected to the ignition coil. Replace the crank position sensor. Only two bolts but access is difficult. Remove distributor, insert a plug for the exhaust cam if necessary and install the blank to cover the hole left by the distributor. Install coil pack. Run spark plug cables from the terminals on the coil pack marked "1 4" to the first and fourth cylinder. Run the other cables to the terminals marked "2 3" Plug the coil pack, 12v power source, and crank position sensor into the wiring harness. Note that I added a connector for the 12V power source. Connect the green wire to the tachometer. A resistor, or a new tachometer, may be required. I haven't connected mine yet. I lost the resistor they provided because it's so small Connect the grey wire to the shift light. If it's a small light, no relay is required. A large shift light requires a relay. Connect the ground. That's it. More detailed instructions are attached. I have a drive scheduled this weekend and will report back. C20XE ECU Replacement.docx

Thanks guys. Great tips. I’ll let you all know how it goes.

I got my 93 Caterham a year ago. It was well maintained and the aluminum was very bright. There’s definitely been some oxidation since then. I notice the metal finish of the bonnet is more dull than the rest of the aluminum. My plan is to hand polish all the aluminum with Mother’s Aluminum and Mag Polish. I just want to check and make sure that’s ok. My biggest fear is that the aluminum is coated in some way to stop oxidation and the polish will damage the coating. Any words of advise would be appreciated.

I need to polish my Aluminum skinned Caterham. Did you settle on an electric polisher? What process and polishing compound(s) do you use?

If I was in that spot, I’d get a Motogadget M-unit. Watch some videos of it on-line with an open mind and I’m guessing you’ll see it’s a great solution. Several people on this forum have installed them on later cars and that presents more difficulties but on an early model such as yours it should be very easy.

Check the Success Story on BaT for the story.

I had wondered that and then I found the explanation. A few weeks ago the Bidens visited the Carters and they posed for a photo with the Carters in the middle and the Bidens on either side. The Internet blew up because the Carters looked like little-people next to the Bidens, who looked like giants. Turns out, a wide angle lens makes objects on the edge of the photo look larger and objects in the center look smaller. While this photo is unedited, I think that may explain the disparity.

Bring a Trailer published a feature on the cross-country drive I did last October. Enjoy https://bringatrailer.com/2021/05/19/bat-auction-success-story-seven-went-down-to-georgia/

I bought a 93 HPC last June with 10,015 miles on the clock. Interestingly, that’s almost exactly 1 mile a day for 27 years. It’s around 16,000 miles now after my jaunt last year.

I’ve had great luck with SBD Motorsports in London for my C20XE motored Caterham.

On the topic of Weber carbs, I called a guy who referred me to a guy who referred me to a guy who finally said, "Oh yeah I do that". So once I have my new ignition system installed, I have a place to take it to address the carbs. The key, as suggested above, was seeking people who are involved in the vintage racing community. I found the people using webers in the vintage racing community by sending an email to Pegasus Auto Racing. They sell Weber parts so I figured they would know who deals with webers in my area.

I’m worried about getting this wired up right so I asked SBD about it and here’s the response I got. Sounds promising. Dear Sander, There is no need to worry, the system is the simplest possible to install out of all the systems we do. In theory there are only 3 important wires to fit. The ring terminal goes to the chassis ground or somewhere earth on the body. There are 2 x 12 volt feeds on the interface connector. One powers the coil and the other powers the ECU. These can be joined together and taken from the 12V feed that powers the coil on your current installation, or the ECU or to your ignition circuit whichever is the easiest. The tacho wire which is green connects to the rev counter. There are various places on the car that this can be connected, but maybe the easiest place is on the back of the rev counter itself. The CAN interface connector is purely there if you use the mapping kit to talk to it. Otherwise it is not used. Hope this helps.

I checked and I can add the throttle position sensor later. I’m going to get the car running first, see how it does and decide whether to add it.

SBD can log in and check the mapping remotely. @coffee breakgave me the name of someone local that has done some work on his car. That individual may be able to help with tuning. To date, I’ve had very bad luck finding someone willing and capable to work on the car in Atlanta. I particularly need someone to tune the Weber carbs. Haven’t found anyone that seems to possess that black magic.

Wise words. Thank you.

You are correct. There’s no mention of a TPS. I don’t have one currently and this new setup works without one.

Thanks Graham. I have thought of doing something like that. I know there are a host of aftermarket ECUs that can be adapted to my car. I just can't imagine I'm going to have a lot of success doing that on my first attempt. As I noted above, they seem to be offering a near turn key package that has exactly what my car needs. I'm inclined to go that route this time and maybe be more creative next time.

I've posted what SBD Motorsports recommend below. It's about 850 GBP of parts and includes an ignition only ECU and harness, elimination of the distributor and a new coil pack, and a new crank sensor. I know this will fix the problem and my car will be much more reliable. Will it be more tunable or perform better? I'm guessing the answer is it would perform the same if it's properly set up with the old arrangement or the new arrangement though it may be easier to tune with this setup. I realize there are other solutions that are cheaper. I could get a used MBE ECU and adapt it or any of a host of other aftermarket ECUs and set it up myself. If I had a garage where I could work on the car for three months and cobble together the parts as I hit hurdles, I might go one of those other routes but, this seems to be a package of exactly what I need and will probably save me $1,000 worth of time and frustration. Plus, I can call these guys to walk me through it when I run into problems. I welcome any thoughts, and I already have the thought "that's expensive and there are much cheaper routes." Thanks, Sander And here's their email: Dear Sanders, Thank you for all the photos, very useful. I can see that yours is a very early installation and my suggestion would be to replace it with a kit that I have quoted you for. This gives 2 advantages. First of all the original system is distributor driven with a coil pack and a king lead. So any of these components could be a fault or create issues if not now but in the future. By replacing everything there is nothing else left that can be faulty. The second advantage is you have got rid of the distributor and mounted a coil pack in its place, so no moving parts. What I have done to make it easier for you to see what the kit includes is to attach links below to everything that is detailed in the quote. If you scroll down the page within each link, there are additional photos. Effectively you will unscrew the distributor you have, we provide a ball bearing in the coil mounting kit which blanks the oil fed camshaft. Then the mounting screws in place of the distributor and you fit the new coil. We have included new HT leads as they will need to be slightly longer and the originals are also likely to be coming tired from their age. There is a photo of a cylinder with the coil pack mounted with the HT leads fitted, so you can see that when it is finished it will look fairly similar to what you have now. You will then get rid of your original coil pack and king lead. The new wiring harness is self-contained and there are links within this section that describe how to wire it. In theory you should be able to find the 12 volts going into your original ECU and connect to it, but you may prefer to start again, but this is entirely up to you. I have also included a crank sensor and an extension lead as we discussed on the phone yesterday. Your original one may be ok but again if you have issues it is one less thing to diagnose. The only optional extra which is not in the sales order but listed at the bottom, is the basic CAN mapping kit and adapter. These are not essential, but useful. It allows either yourself or somebody at a rolling road to interrogate the ECU and see if there are any faults. It can even be used by us and we can log in with Team Viewer remotely and advise, but in theory this is more of a luxury and with a relatively simple system that you have, not essential and can easily be ordered at a later date if you wish. Have a look through the links and the quote. We can then finalise the quote, include the shipping and add the PayPal fee if you wish to pay by PayPal as you did last time. If you have any specific questions by all means call as this is sometimes quicker than lots of emails. MBE9A4I ECU https://www.sbdmotorsport.co.uk/MBE9A4I-mbe9a4i-ecu--ignition-only-up-to-4-cylinders.html LM9A4I-IC-WS-01 https://www.sbdmotorsport.co.uk/LM9A4I-IC-WS-01-Ignition-Only-Wiring-Harness-for-MBE9A4i-ECU.html COIL-4L https://www.sbdmotorsport.co.uk/COIL-4L-bosch-4-pin-coil-to-suit-distributorless-engines.html COIL-4-MNT-02K https://www.sbdmotorsport.co.uk/COIL-4-MNT-02K-2-0L-XE-COIL-4-Mount-and-Head-Blank-Kit.html HT-LK1-SBD-03 HT Leads kit. https://www.sbdmotorsport.co.uk/ht-lk1-sbd-02-2-0l-xe-sbd-ht-lead-set-dless-engines-1.html CRK-SEN-VX2-K https://www.sbdmotorsport.co.uk/crk-sen-vx2-k-sbd-2-0l-xe-competition-crank-sensor-kit.html LM-CRK-EX https://www.sbdmotorsport.co.uk/lm-crk-ex-vauxhall-crank-sensor-3-way-to-3-way-extension-lead.html Below recommended Option to allow for fault diagnosis & tuning on rolling road (NOT INCLUDED IN QUOTE) . MBE-MAP-KIT-3-CAN https://www.sbdmotorsport.co.uk/MBE-MAP-KIT-3-CAN-basic-can-mapping-kit-for-mbe-can-based-ecus.html MBE-MAP-KIT-3-CAN-ADP3 https://www.sbdmotorsport.co.uk/MBE-MAP-KIT-3-CAN-ADP3-adaptor-lead-obd-to-4-way-amp-superseal.html Best Regards Steve