TRR Motorsport News
Projects
Find out what we've been up to and what we're about to be up to.
This is a new section we've set up for everything other than our Motorsport exploits.
23rd June 2009
It's been a while since I updated this part of the site so here goes. The Orange Scamp is finished and has made it to both the Stoneleigh and Newark kit car shows. The car has not been without it's problems including an incorrect driveshaft being supplied and having to fit new bearings in the rear beam (thanks Spoox Motorsport for helping out on the latter). I'll get round to posting some hi-res images on here soon but this one should wet your appetite.
26th March 2009 - The dash is in!
Well I've made a new dash for the Scamp. The centre console is the result of my new sheet metal bender (what a great toy that is!) and twintex (a carbon fibre like material). It's not finished in the photos with the bolts & rivets to paint black.
The wheels are now painted and lacuered and the front seats are fitted also. One slight problem though, the gearbox doesn't appear to have a neutral position and I'm worried that there's a problem thats going to mean I have to fit another box. :-(
28th February 2009 - Only the engine bay & dashboard left!
Two days of hard graft have seem the rear end completed. The exhaust was finished as was the re-fitting of the fuel tank the other week and the rear wiring loom has been tidied up (it was originally quite a snakes nest). The seat bealts are all in and the rear seats cleaned and re-fitted. The gearbox is also in, allowing us to now concentrate on finishing the engine bay. Oh, and the small matter of having a new alloy radiator made to fit in the hole at the front!
8th February 2009 - It only bloomin' fits!
The new engine was dry fitted to see if it missed the brake master cylinder. Good news, it does! 160BHP? Ooh yes! Mind you, it took 4 of us to lower it in to make sure we didn't ckip the paint. Sad eh? Thanks to Reg, Rob & Russ for lending a hand on their day of rest.
The rest of the build is coming along nicely and the car now has a hydraulic handbrake for planty of sideways fun. :-) The underside is now white and the suspension rebuilt and re-painted.
17th January 2009 - It' s Back! The Scamp returns from the spray shop
The photos really don't do it justice. The Scamp's paint is like glass and the new colour glows. Thanks Keith. It's a lighter shade than the old orange and isn't far off the orange used on McLarens. We've already removed the rear axle since it arrived and the underside should be painted by Monday night. Then it's on with the build :-)
29th November 2008 - Our Peugeot powered Scamp goes off to Keith Bird Motorsport for it's new paint job
After 7 years of hard abuse Leanne's trusty Scamp told us that enough was enough and that it was high time that she had some TLC. She's been stripped down to a rolling shell and rubbed down ready for paint. The new colour is Ford Signal Orange, a more striking orange than before and nearer to the Bruce McLaren orange that I wanted in the first place. We'll put some photos on the site as soon as we get it back. Little Harriet is also helping on this project and has helped rub down the paint in her favourite Chrysler Sunbeam overalls. :-)
November 2008 - Rob's Sunbeam leaves the 'shop
After fitting the engine and gearbox (supplied by Rob) we also fitted the exhaust system and sorted the mountings for the cage, our side of the project was done. Whilst we had space in the workshop I was happy for Rob to work on the car at his own pace. The Car isn't far off an MOT so it's been delivered back to his unit so he can put the finishing touches to it.
May 11th 2008 - Simply-Sunbeams starts another XE conversion
It's been a while since we updated the 'Projects' area of our web site but we started another XE conversion for our good friend Rob today. It's going to be a good project to follow as it leads on nicely from our contribution to Practical Performance Car's Sunbeam article in the January 2008 issue of the magazine.
Rob's car is a lovely series 2 Sunbeam in a almost identical blue to our rally car. The car was delivered to us less engine & box and using a 7 degree bellhousing and a pair of our old 'wet sump' mounts we proceeded to dry-fit the engine today.
Rob originally wanted to fit a Pinto and a so called 'Expert' had pigeon sh!t welded the mounts to the chassis legs. we had to cut these out to start with and I left Rob to do this whilst I attached the bellhousing to a mule gear-box.
We use the common 'chassis mount' kit as it is a neat fit with little modification to the Sunbeam's chassis legs. Note that at this stage we've only tacked the mounts to the shell & the fabricated mounts will be shot blasted & sprayed prior to final fit.
January 21st 2007 - The MK2 gets BIG carbs!
Well the MK2 Scamp has finally started her long road back to stardom. She was last on the road back in late 2004 but has done the odd trackday since. The 1380cc engine we built was managing around 105BHP on a single HIF44 carb (this is pretty much the limit for a single SU) and at high RPM drivability has suffered. We had intended to fit a Weber 45DCOE to up the anti a bit but we found a pair of split webers on e-bay and they were fitted this morning.
The carbs foul the bulkhead and we need to fit a silver top fuel pump & pressure regulator and tidy up the installation i.e. Chrome coolant pipes. The sound is mental though and the car is louder at the front than the back :-)