slomove

I think no matter what the brand, it depends on the build quality. But owning any Seven will require some occasional wrenching (or a skilled shop and some money). These cars are just not precision designed, mass produced and super reliable products. The price range is from - about $15k for some home built Sevens (there are nice ones) to - $20-30k for a good Seven of the less known brands or an older Caterham to -$30-50k for a newer Caterham to - over $100k for a brand new custom spec Caterham with all the bells and whistles. Pricing from general observation and what I remember. Some folks here have much more insight into the market

Sure you can do it. I knew a guy who commuted for several years with his Birkin from Altadena to Oxnard on the 101 (65 miles each way). However, I would not do it. Dense freeway traffic, stop and go is a pain in the arse in a Seven (even more than in a "normal" car). Hot summer temperatures or pouring rain won't help (no show stopper though). I take the Seven to work occasionally but I have only 6 miles one way on surface streets and do it usually because no other car is available or to try out something. However, if I would live out there in the sticks and had nice empty roads to commute, I would use the Seven every day.

Oh my...I would starve doing that. While practical, my contraptions are usually made without regard of time and money. It's a hobby, after all. This is one of the first mods I did after I bought the car. Over time I tweaked the tension mechanism but otherwise I used it unchanged for the last 11 years. The nice thing is I can open and close it while sitting in the car. I am too old for the contortions required by a fixed roof. I do have a taller roll bar than stock which helps to get the clearance for my head. - The front support is an aluminum U-channel, mitered and bent to conform with the windscreen top frame. It is locked down with stainless adjustable draw latches left and right. The rubber cloth is glued (contact cement) and riveted to this channel. The front inside edge has a weather strip to seal. Very important or the wind driven rain will come in under the channel. - The rear support rod is hinged and the hinges are strapped to the roll bar with hose clamps. When that bar is pulled down with a lever and draw cord it tensions the cloth so that is does not flap at speed. When closing the front latches the tensioner must be loose or the latches won't close. - The center support rod is spring loaded, so that is rolls up the rubber cloth by itself when opened. It does need additional stays with ball end joints. - When not in use I hold the rolled up roof with short ball-ended bungees. I hope the pics explain it a bit more. If requested I can also take some close ups. But then I better start a new thread and don hijack this one any longer.

Since you mentioned my side screens/half doors - I have posted a few pics a while ago but not sure which version. This latest one is from 2010 and hoping it is any help I just post it again if you don't mind. I used round 1/2" dia very thin walled (I believe 20/1000") stainless tubing for the frame. It is rigid enough to keep the shape but can be shaped by hand with a tubing bender or around a mandrel. And it can be welded. The square aluminum tubing may work as well but I suspect the square cross-section may put up some resistance to bending in certain directions. The round tube also allowed hot "wrapping" the clear plastic sheet easily. This is the bare frame. It is shaped to trace a conical surface so that a flat plastic sheet can be flexed to conform. Since I did that free-hand, pulling the tubing over a wooden edge it took a while but you can check the fit bending a rigid piece of cardboard over the frame. I used 1/16" clear PETG sheet for the "glass". Almost as impact resistant as Lexan, cheaper and easier to bend hot. I cut the edge into tabs with a cutting wheel and wrapped them one-by-one with a hot-air gun around the tubing. Looks much cleaner than the screws I used in the old version. Result is a very good protection against wind buffeting, flying rocks and rain. Together with the bikini-style sun roof we survived heavy rain for hours getting only wet from the flying water mist. I suspect it may even reduce drag...yay. It has served us well for many 10k miles. View from behind...

Having just lost an engine due to a fatigued valve spring retainer I would be cautious about aftermarket "performance" stuff. My retainers were aluminum and lasted only about 40-50 k miles. The maker (Kent Cams) did not mention that they are intended for short term race use. If you get titanium retainers these are (AFAIK) not as bad as aluminum but I read they are still not as durable as steel ones. For that matter you can get lightened steel retainers for some engines. That said, the SVT is supposed to be the performance model of the ZX3 series and given normal durability requirements of such a car I would hope that the stock parts are sufficient for a stock power engine. If anybody, these guys will probably know: http://www.focusfanatics.com/forum/svt-performance-2002-2004/

Depends also on your ECU setup. Especially aftermarket systems without idle air control valve may need a little gas pedal nursing after start and have a bunch of settings that affect starting based on sensor input or time like startup enrichment and advance, coolant enrichment and advance or the low speed maps in general. No matter what I do, my engine with Emerald ECU needs a few seconds after start to settle into a stable idle.

I hope you declared the merchandise at the border!

I suspect you are right. But it looks cool at an auto show.

The Honda bike department was involved in the design. I guess that is not an issue for these guys. For that matter, the "cockpit wall" of a Seven is more a visual than a practical protection in case of an impact. That is what roll cages are made for.

Honda project 2&4 concept car with bike engine on FAA in Frankfurt. Some weird details but I find some vague resemblance, at least the front view. Some more info http://cdn3.spiegel.de/images/image-894292-galleryV9-kdqq.jpg

Ever tried a cylinder leakdown test (will bubble out of the coolant filler if a leak is there) or a cold pressurization of the cooling system ( Another idea.... many coolant caps come in 2 versions. One that has the inner rubber seal spring loaded (non-vented) and one that has it loose (vented). You can see the rubber disc of the vented one wiggle when you shake it. This will not allow pressure buildup with slowly expanding coolant because it leaks readily out to the overflow. It will only close and start pressurizing when there is a steam burst or rapidly expanding coolant. For my Raceline water rail only the non-vented one works properly but it MUST be installed at the very top of the cooling system.

Is the cap locked now? If not why do you need a cap key? Nobody is going to steal gas from a Seven. I have a cap without lock and it never came to mind that I might need one.

Yes, I agree. The trailer started life as a tilt-bed dual motorcycle trailer and weighed maybe 700 lbs. Then I expanded the frame and built a 5-6' tall shell on top of it which got it to 1500 lbs. Add 2 spare trailer tires, the battery and some other small junk and you end up at over 1600 lbs. But it is extremely practical with the tilt-bed (no ramps needed), protects the car and tows really stable now. The Hyundai with trailer in tow gets 16-17 mpg which is not too bad. Not visible on the photo, it has a v-nose for better aerodynamics. I used it also to camp out at the racetrack.

Another confirmation of the tongue weight importance. I have a small enclosed single axle trailer for the Birkin (w/ electric brakes), about 3000 lbs with car on it and tow it with a 5000 lbs Hyundai Santa Fe. When I had only 200-250 lbs tongue load it tended to fishtail seriously going downhill at speed or passing trucks and I had to use the manual brake override occasionally. After moving the load forward to make 330 lbs on the hitch that was all but gone. But the real difference made the sway bar that I installed this year. The rig is rock solid now at any speed or downhill grade. A little weird with the sway bar groaning loudly when turning at low speed but it works great.

Yay, the car is running again. Unfortunately much too hot here in SoCal right now to really enjoy it. The "new" SVT engine started at the first attempt and the ECU maps were not that far off (which I would have expected, given how close the performance specs of old and new engine are). Two tuning blats with the wideband lambda logger fixed the difference. I had to come up with a new alternator bracket and belt tensioner due to the different pulley locations and the old MSI alternator kit no longer available. It ended up a bit like a blacksmith job but it seems to work and has better pulley wrap angles than the MSI kit. And I suspect it is ample strong and not so fatigue-prone like my old alternator configuration. My new clutch scatter shield (Nylon webbing). I slathered it generously with gasket maker silicone for oil protection: Alternator bracket: New serpentine belt and tensioner: Everything back in place....

FWIW, I collected the swarm intelligence of the Birkinowners List, the FocusFanatics forum and local owners as well. Apparently such a jiggle is common and the idler tensioner designed to do that. At least several other people with aftermarket as well as stock sprockets reported the same. That said there may be some engines that happen to be exactly on the money with the sprocket runout so that they don't do it. For now I decided to just leave it alone. Not much I can do about it anyway. GB

As you may have seen on the "Big Sky Tour" thread, I damaged my old Zetec silvertop engine by means of a dropped valve to the point that I replaced it now with a ZX3/SVT engine. Little more work than I thought but I got it running now. I also replaced all the wear and tear parts since I had the engine out (clutch, release bearing, motor mount dampers, exhaust wrap, coolant hoses etc). Still need to do the fine tuning/adaptation of the fueling map. Now, I noticed one thing that may or may not be O.K. My old engine had a timing belt tensioner pulley that was set manually and then bolted down. Obviously that stayed put and did not move. My new engine has a spring loaded tensioner pulley and I see that indicator tab jiggling a little while running, obviously due to the combined runout of the 3 sprockets, the idler and the tensioner pulley. I do have aftermarket Esslinger cam sprockets and replaced the intake cam phaser with a precision "VCT delete" bushing (not the crappy one from Massive Speed). Please have a look at the attached clip and (hopefully) confirm that this jiggle is normal for a ZX3 engine. Thanks! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3yx3KUaJFcg

You may have seen in some other posts that I destroyed my old Zetec ZX1 and replaced it with a "new" Zetec SVT engine. That leaves me with another ZX1 engine (from a '96 Ford Contour) that I have in reserve as a spare donor and can not use anymore. So, I am selling it (all prices plus shipping) This is an engine taken out of a crashed car with 56,000 miles in excellent condition, containing lots of difficult to get parts. It is completely disassembled to the last bolt and washer, cleaned, wax conserved, bagged and labeled. I put probably 10 hours of work into the dis-assembly and packaging. I paid $700 for the engine to the junk yard and that is what I am asking for it. I am not interested in selling it piecewise (but if somebody does not want to have some heavy parts shipped, I will just put them in the trash). I also have some other spare parts or parts removed off my old engine that may be of interest: - brand new right spinning coolant pump with ribbed pulley from a European Escort (the Contour had a left spinning coolant pump and a smooth pulley for the back side of the serpentine belt). Some of the early Birkins (maybe before 2000) had that short triangle belt configuration that needs such a pump. $70 - used right spinning coolant pump as explained above $30 - used oil pump with approx. 20,000 miles $30 - Complete head with valve drop damage to #2, shaved to 10.6 compression, ported with Kent FZ2002 cams, upgraded springs, pretty new valves (except the damaged ones). Engine builder told me it could be repaired but might be expensive and no guarantee. The cams are probably the more interesting part of it. Make an offer if interested I also have some questionable parts to give away. Let me know if somebody is interested. May be only relevant for local pickup due to shipping cost. Otherwise they will go to the junk yard. - Engine block in excellent condition. Slightly bored and honed about 20,000 miles ago. Needs larger pistons than stock. - Crank, ground for new bearings 20,000 miles ago GB

Totally agree that ft-lbs (while valid) would be an uncommon measure of energy. I was just talking about the principle. I come from a metric background and Nm is the common unit of torque as well as energy, although then usually called Joule (with 1 Joule = 1 Nm). This terminology is probably also to reduce confusion.

I guess you are both right John actually said that lb-ft (i.e. ft*lbs) is a measure of torque as well as a unit to measure energy which is correct. Bruce said, torque is only a measurement of angular force (measured in ft-lbs) and to be multiplied with angular displacement to get energy which is also correct. However, since angular displacement is dimension-less (radians do not have a dimension) the resulting energy is still measured as ft-lbs which is what John said. For the easier case of linear motion, the energy is the simple product of force over distance (in case of changing forces the integral of force over distance) and also measured in ft*lbs I hope I have now confused everybody. GB

I don't know...I have a Fuel Safe cell now for 11 years with the same foam. Recently I replaced the first filter between the tank and the (external) pump and cut it open because I was curious. And... nothing inside. The filter medium was a bit discolored but no particles, no clogging. Maybe I should not have said that to avoid jinxing but I don't know how you get the foam to disintegrate. Maybe it is the expensive California gas that protects my tank :jester:

For hot and moderate days I have the "Sun Runner Cap" to protect the neck and ears from sun but I tie the chin strap behind the neck to keep it more open and not obstruct the side view. I can wear such a cap because I have wide Lexan half doors that get the turbulence out of the cockpit. For really cold days I have one of the Russian style winter hats. http://www.outdoorresearch.com/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/470x500/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/80610_800.jpg

Unfortunately no US dealer yet. But looks pretty cool. I want one.

Nah, just black nylon strap. Actually carbon fiber would probably not be a good idea. Very high tensile strength but also very little yield. I suppose in case of a catastrophic clutch or flywheel event the retaining shell needs to give and be a bit elastic to decelerate and catch all the flying shrapnel. A rigid carbon shell may just crack at the impact point. I will re-install the bellhousing today but it is 96 degrees and humid outside. Let's see how far I get.

So, that is now my bellhousing safety diaper. Since I had it out anyway I did wrap it with 8 overlapping windings of the before mentioned shock proof nylon webbing (1" wide, breaking strength 3800 lbs), held in place by generous application of gasket maker silicone. Much slimmer than a separate blanket and probably much stronger. Not that I hope I ever need it but you guys have a way of talking people into things..... I will probably wrap it with aluminum duct tape to keep the oil out.