MEY 882J

Forum for Davrian topics and questions...
User avatar
Nugget
Posts: 161
Joined: Wed Dec 18, 2013 8:26 am

MEY 882J

Post by Nugget »

I've not been on here for a while and things are bit quiet so I thought I would copy over a resume on work to date on my Davrian, there's a bit of repetition from previous posts but for ease of copying here it is:

I've had my Davrian now for about 2 years and honestly can't remember if I've started a readers thread so in case anyone is interested I thought I would post a few photos and briefly tell it's story.

The car is a Mk5 with a Mk6 front end that I bought off of a fellow Imper from Frome (Bruce Gardener), it had been off the road for about 7 years when I bought it and Bruce supplied it with a tweeked and running sport engine, my plan for the project was to get it running and have some fun with it so I removed anything metal from the shell had it shot blasted, strengthened the suspension arms and cross member and repainted it all with black smoothrite, I also renewed the complete braking system, fitted a Fiat Cinq rad, renewed all the coolant hoses and pipes, renewed the headlamps and sorted the rather reluctant electrics, oh and I fitted some new windows and I removed the horrible glass sunroof and glassed over the hole, 3 days after I had finished the essential stuff I took it for its MOT which it passed and a week later I took it to Castle Combe for a track day where it performed flawlessly on its new Tim Duffee supplied AVO coil overs

A couple of photos of the car as received and how it looked when first back on the road:
Attachments
Dav 1.jpg
Dav 1.jpg (48.29 KiB) Viewed 8715 times
Dav 2.jpg
Dav 2.jpg (47.74 KiB) Viewed 8715 times
User avatar
Nugget
Posts: 161
Joined: Wed Dec 18, 2013 8:26 am

Re: MEY 882J

Post by Nugget »

Moving on from the last post (with photos in the wrong order why does it do that?) I did a couple more track days in May this year when on the last one I had a annoying rattle on the back end, undeterred I finished the day got the car home and jacked it up and found that a brake back plate bolt had unscrewed itself so I sorted that walked around the front of the car only to find a pool of petrol under the car, a quick investigation confirmed that the L/H fuel tank was leaking so I had no option but to remove the tank and as a precaution also the R/H tank, it's a crap job and took an evening per side but once out and after a good wait for the new tanks I fitted a pair of foam filled aluminium tanks, its a tricky job as they are set in expanding foam and have to line up with the apertures in the front panel, some more photos:
Attachments
Dav 3.jpg
Dav 3.jpg (67.54 KiB) Viewed 8714 times
Dav 4.jpg
Dav 4.jpg (53.77 KiB) Viewed 8714 times
Dav 5.jpg
Dav 5.jpg (81.26 KiB) Viewed 8714 times
Dav 6.jpg
Dav 6.jpg (60.52 KiB) Viewed 8714 times
Dav 7.jpg
Dav 7.jpg (50.95 KiB) Viewed 8714 times
User avatar
Nugget
Posts: 161
Joined: Wed Dec 18, 2013 8:26 am

Re: MEY 882J

Post by Nugget »

While it was off the road awaiting delivery of the new fuel tanks I addressed another issue which was the very low front end and excessive negative camber which although good for the track was a bit tricky on the road firstly because of clearance issues and secondly its tendency to tramline, I did this by working out the triangulation of the front suspension and calculating how much I had to lower the upper shock absorber mounts to give the desired slightly lower (rather than a lot lower) at the front stance, so with the new 15mm lower mounting holes drilled and tghe suspension bolted back on that was that job done, while I working on the front end I also fitted one of Colin Valentines excellent 13" disc brake kits which I'm extremely happy with.

A few more photos of the discs and of the car sitting a bit more sensibly:
Attachments
Dav 8.jpg
Dav 8.jpg (54.92 KiB) Viewed 8714 times
Dav 9.jpg
Dav 9.jpg (43.44 KiB) Viewed 8714 times
Dav 10.jpg
Dav 10.jpg (52.65 KiB) Viewed 8714 times
User avatar
Nugget
Posts: 161
Joined: Wed Dec 18, 2013 8:26 am

Re: MEY 882J

Post by Nugget »

Thankfully the work done on the front suspension height also corrected the negative camber so with new fuel tanks, sorted suspension and disc brakes I did a couple more track days and the Davrian was awesome, a tad underpowered but the handling and braking was fantastic, it is an incredible package and the need to not slow down (much) meant that I was pulling 6700rpm on the start finish straight at Castle Combe and keeping up with my mate driving his tuned 200bhp, disc braked Healey 3000, not bad for a tired sport engine.

Fast forward to now and I've taken it off the road for the winter to sort the bodywork, there are a lot of stress cracks, the paint is dull and stained and the front bonnet vent is ugly. I've already made a start and have repaired prepped and painted the bonnet and engine cover, both panels took about 100 hours to prep so this is going to be a big job especially the front end, I've previously restored a G15 so I know my way around GRP and was taught by a master who manufactures GRP models for F1 teams, however I also know that no matter what you do GRP will eventually stress crack again so this time I'm going for a more robust finish using a product called Plastidip which will flex with the panels, once applied it can be left in either a satin finish or a gloss coat can be applied, its a bit of an experiment and the product does have some limitations but I'm fairly happy with it in its naked satin effect, more photos:
Attachments
Dav 11.jpg
Dav 11.jpg (32.17 KiB) Viewed 8714 times
Dav 12.jpg
Dav 12.jpg (16.97 KiB) Viewed 8714 times
Dav 13.jpg
Dav 13.jpg (20.23 KiB) Viewed 8714 times
Dav 14.jpg
Dav 14.jpg (39.63 KiB) Viewed 8714 times
User avatar
Nugget
Posts: 161
Joined: Wed Dec 18, 2013 8:26 am

Re: MEY 882J

Post by Nugget »

So that brings me to yesterday.

In the quest for reliable, cheap, lightweight, power I have decided to convert the Davrian to K100 power courtesy of Clark Dawsons kit and knowledge so I whipped out the old Imp engine and box and jacked the BMW engine into place, the result is that it will fit with a bit of fettling of the rear bulkhead so I'm going for it.

So the development continues, the list of jobs for the winter are to sort the remaining bodywork to include fitting some more appropriately sized and shaped front indicators, carry out the engine conversion, paint out the inside of the car (hand paint in white) and make some new door cards out of 1.5mm aluminium as unfortunately I made my first ones out of 3mm which is far too heavy.

My next track day is 10th March which looking at the list of jobs doesn't seem very far off, something may have to give!!!

A photo of the K100 engine jacked into place (sort of):
Attachments
Dav BMW1.jpg
Dav BMW1.jpg (56.25 KiB) Viewed 8714 times
User avatar
Nugget
Posts: 161
Joined: Wed Dec 18, 2013 8:26 am

Re: MEY 882J

Post by Nugget »

Been busy with the air saw this morning resulting in this:
Attachments
Dav 15.jpg
Dav 16.jpg
Dav 17.jpg
Dav 18.jpg
Dav 19.jpg
User avatar
Hal Mercier
Posts: 182
Joined: Sat Apr 16, 2011 9:02 am
Location: SW France
Contact:

Re: MEY 882J

Post by Hal Mercier »

I'm hoping I have a bit more space available in the Mk 7.
How long are the arms on you engine support A frame, measured from the face of the foot plate on the bulkhead to the outer edge of the rear crossover section? I think it may be shorter than on the Mk 7.

My right A frame leg seems to be 445mm

Why is there the smaller hole to the left of the large one?

Image
Last edited by Hal Mercier on Mon Dec 14, 2015 3:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.
User avatar
Nugget
Posts: 161
Joined: Wed Dec 18, 2013 8:26 am

Re: MEY 882J

Post by Nugget »

Hi Hal,
I just posted a pic on the Imp Club forum, my R/H leg is 400mm long, the other hole is where I had to continue the angled chamfer to enable clearance of the fuel rail, the R/H buttress moulding on mine is already chamfered to clear the Imp thermostat housing so I just had to remove a bit more along the same plane resulting in a hole.

I've been thinking about how much of an aperture I'm going to cut and have decided to go larger again which will enable me to make a more subtle and less angular hump and also will provide greater clearance which will be required if ever I go for a K1100 engine which has a larger 60 amp alternator.

Photo as requested:
Attachments
DSC_0064p.jpg
DSC_0064p.jpg (95.38 KiB) Viewed 8667 times
User avatar
Hal Mercier
Posts: 182
Joined: Sat Apr 16, 2011 9:02 am
Location: SW France
Contact:

Re: MEY 882J

Post by Hal Mercier »

Do you reckon you can squirrel the OE airbox and filter box in between the A frame members?

From the pix it looks possible...

It will be interesting to see how much depth of extra clearance you need for the alternator, I'm wondering if the extra 45mm depth on the Mk 7 might just be enough?
The other difference is the shape of the bulkhead between the two mid A frame mounting plates. On your 'interior boot' car, it's flatter, mine has the external boot and is rounded at the back. Much easier to chop a hole if I need to though, it can be done while standing in the engine bay.
User avatar
Nugget
Posts: 161
Joined: Wed Dec 18, 2013 8:26 am

Re: MEY 882J

Post by Nugget »

Hal Mercier wrote:Do you reckon you can squirrel the OE airbox and filter box in between the A frame members?

From the pix it looks possible...

It will be interesting to see how much depth of extra clearance you need for the alternator, I'm wondering if the extra 45mm depth on the Mk 7 might just be enough?
The other difference is the shape of the bulkhead between the two mid A frame mounting plates. On your 'interior boot' car, it's flatter, mine has the external boot and is rounded at the back. Much easier to chop a hole if I need to though, it can be done while standing in the engine bay.
I did think that I may be able to squeeze the airbox in, it will be a major bonus if I can but will be tight and is dependent on the final position, unfortunately when I tried the engine in place I left the airbox at work and now I've dropped the engine out and brought the engine back to work to make the exhaust so I won't know for a while.

Regarding clearance for the alternator because of Mk differences I really don't know, it does come into the cabin a fair bit and the other thing to consider is that the K1100 onwards run a bigger 60 amp alternator in comparison to the K100's 40 amp unit
Post Reply