MEY 882J

Forum for Davrian topics and questions...
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Hal Mercier
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Joined: Sat Apr 16, 2011 9:02 am
Location: SW France
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Re: MEY 882J

Post by Hal Mercier »

Not having the 1200 alternator to compare, I have no idea, but I wouldn't have thought a 50% increase in output would necessarily equate to much, if any, increase in external dimensions.
I wonder if anyone has dimensions on the 1200 60amp unit?
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Nugget
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Re: MEY 882J

Post by Nugget »

Hi Hal,
I was comparing the 40 amp alternator on the K100 engine and the hole required to what might be needed for the 60 amp alternator fitted to the K1100, its one of those things where it might not be much bigger but when it going through an angled panel the hole required could be quite a bit bigger.

This is why I took a punt and bought an engine for £100 just to check out the feasibility of the conversion.
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Hal Mercier
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Re: MEY 882J

Post by Hal Mercier »

You can't go wrong at the price. The K100 in our Grinnall is very lively, I've beaten most of the field in slalom with it.....but I really fancy the 50% power increase I'd have with the 1200RS unit for the Davrian.

Apparently it's easy to chip the K1 (16 valve 998cc) unit up to something like 115bhp.....and I'm sure that applies to the K1100 as well.
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Nugget
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Re: MEY 882J

Post by Nugget »

That's good to know Hal, if the K100 is a good one and supplying its 90bhp I'll be 40bhp up on the estimated 50 that I'm getting out of my tired tweeked sport engine, plus it came with a K&N filter element and I'm currently making a better flowing exhaust, both should provide minimal gains and if I can chip it 100bhp would be ideal and give me a nicely balanced car.
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Hal Mercier
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Re: MEY 882J

Post by Hal Mercier »

This is probably what I should be doing with the Mk 7! After all, one can always upgrade to an 1100 or 1200 later.
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Nugget
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Re: MEY 882J

Post by Nugget »

I thought it was about time I posted an update on here about my Davrian.

Just to recap having bought the car and sorted the running gear with Tim Duffee supplied shocks and springs, a poly bush kit, renewing the brake seals and linings, the radiator and hoses, track rod ends etc and then had some fun with it on the track and road, I then took it off the road again last year when I discovered that the fuel tanks were leaking, so I replaced them with a new pair of foam filled tanks courtesy of Tim and at the same time I fitted Fiesta Mk3 front calipers and discs, and went out and had some more fun at a another couple of track days in the Autumn of last year with the old Imp Sport engine that came with the car

I then took it off the road again at the beginning of last winter to sort out the various cracks in the GRP also to have a look at the foam in the sills, as well as a few other smaller jobs. So I whipped the glass out and stripped the rest of the shell and got stuck into the cracks with my weapon of choice a 40 grit disc on an angle grinder, and over a period of about 3 months prepped the car for paint, I also cut out the tops of the sills to see what the foam was like in the voids only to find soaking wet foam in both sides which I removed and then reinstated with new expanding foam before reglassing the tops again.

At this point all was looking good, I also changed the design of the air vent in the bonnet as I wasn't happy with the old boxy design, and I deleted the door locks, with all this done I started thinking about more power, a visit to Mark Maynard concluded that to rebuild my 998 engine to achieve circa 80 bhp would cost me IRO £3k by the time I had added the cost of carbs, manifold, exhaust, distributor, set up etc, which I was kind of prepared to reluctantly spend but then I found out via the Imp Club about Clark Dawsons BMW K engine conversion, a quick look at the stats and I was sold on the idea, an all alloy engine weighing only 3kg more than the Imp engine, 100+ bhp, fuel injection, 9000 rpm red line, a good torque curve, and all mated to a modified Imp gearbox and easily reversible. Luckily I found a K100 engine locally which I bought for £100 to offer up to the Davrian and it looked like it would fit, that was followed up with a call to Clark and I duly sent my Imp gearbox, flywheel and BMW bellhousing to him to carry out the machining work.

While that was away I started painting the shell, at first I tried a product called Plastidip, the sales blurb on this product sounded good, a flexible, removable liquid wrap that wouldn't crack, chip or blister, long story short in reality its crap, not fit for purpose and I didn't like the finish (which cannot be cut in), so I peeled it all off back to primer.

By now the bits had returned from Clark so I fitted the engine, this required a small amount of modification to the A frame to pick up on the twin mounts of the BMW engine, I used Mk4 Golf Anti Roll Bar drop links to pick up on the mount points, I also had to completely redesign the BMW air intake system to get it to fit under the engine lid, I tried a couple of designs, the final design is pictured below (I'm going to get it all made in aluminium this winter), the cooling system needed a bit of work too including a new header tank, and there was also the need for a new exhaust manifold which I made using the K100 primary pipes, a couple of 1 1/2" U bends and some 2" straight tube, the only other thing required is to mate the BMW wiring loom to the Davrian, while I was at it I ditched the BMW twin coil packs for a Ford EDIS single coil pack.

With all of this done and the Dav still in primer and having missed my deadline for the first track day of the year I resorted to rattle can spraying the car in VW Pearl (Herbie) White, I know some of you will think that to rattle can a car is sinful, however, its still very much in development and I had financially committed to 2 more track days which were fast approaching so it was my best/only option, it also give me the opportunity to run it for a year and see what issues arise in the GRP before committing money to a proper paint job.

So the day before its first track day I had it ready, the K100 engine wasn't running quite how I expected it to but it went ok and I made it to Castle Combe and then failed the noise test (106 dbs on a 100db day) and no option to modify it, so I sat it out and had a couple of drives in my mates cars instead. The return journey from Combe highlighted that it still wasn't running correctly with a sporadic idle and it getting very hot at low speed but I got home and after a bit of fault finding I concluded that the second (supposedly low mileage) engine I bought had a duff head gasket!!! With a couple of week to the next track day I swapped the engine for the first one I bought, fitted a different silencer and took it up the road, the experience was totally different, starting is on the button, performance and idling is excellent and no overheating.

So off for my second attempt at Castle Combe, this time it passed the noise test at 98 dbs, so of to the track I go.

Its quite hard to describe the transformation that fitting the engine made as it is totally different, where before throttle inputs didn't really need to be thought about I now had to concentrate on what my right foot was doing, the cumulative effect of speed build up around the circuit is immense to the point that I was seriously beginning to run out of talent and nerve (I forgot to mention I replaced the old hard tyres with new Yokohama A539's), and to be honest the afternoon session I had was not enough for me to really get to grips with the car, to say I was impressed is an understatement, the K100 which by BMW was modestly underestimated by BMW to allegedly comply with power restrictions in my car with a performance filter and more free flowing exhaust is probably producing IRO 100bhp so twice that of the old Imp Sport motor, it goes really well up to 7000rpm then it comes on cam and goes like f**k 8.5k, drive it properly and keep the revs up and progress around the track is rapid, very rapid, but requires a lot of concentration, its bloody brilliant and feels like a proper little race car.

Plans for the car now are to use it for the rest of the Summer and Autumn for a few shows, as a daily driver, and a few more track days, then this winter a rewire, fit a micro heater from T7, and perhaps sand back and repaint, oh and get the seat reupholstered, oh and make a new dash panel out of aluminium.

So that's about it, apart from a few photos, excuse the rattle can paint effect:
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Dav at Combe 2p.jpg
Dav at Combe 2p.jpg (87.73 KiB) Viewed 9585 times
Dav at Combe 1p.jpg
Dav at Combe 1p.jpg (97.58 KiB) Viewed 9585 times
Air filter 3p.jpg
Air filter 3p.jpg (61.69 KiB) Viewed 9585 times
Air filter 2p.jpg
Air filter 2p.jpg (63.12 KiB) Viewed 9585 times
Air filterp1.jpg
Air filterp1.jpg (99.59 KiB) Viewed 9585 times
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Nugget
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Re: MEY 882J

Post by Nugget »

A couple more photos:

Attachments
Dav Backp.jpg
Dav Backp.jpg (78.06 KiB) Viewed 9584 times
Dav Frontp.jpg
Dav Frontp.jpg (69.37 KiB) Viewed 9584 times
Soyuz
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Joined: Thu Oct 08, 2009 3:10 pm

Re: MEY 882J

Post by Soyuz »

Very nice, it's looking really good now.
davrian6140
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Joined: Thu Dec 23, 2010 9:32 pm
Location: Stedham,west sussex

Re: MEY 882J

Post by davrian6140 »

Fantastic great job. I look forward to seeing the DAVRIAN in 2017 meet
All the best
Dave
Dave Cooper
davrian6140

Mk6a DAV 373H
Minimole23
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Joined: Wed Apr 18, 2012 7:51 pm

Re: MEY 882J

Post by Minimole23 »

Well I never, having not seen this car since longleat in 1999 I drove past you on the A350 This morning. Looking and sounding excellent.
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