You seemed to sneak on here quietly....or did I miss an intro?

Your's is a project I've followed for a while...glad you joined us on here..

Looking forward to your input.

I've had the Rat on the road now five years. Still tinkering with stuff. I've spent the Southern winter building a new motor from parts. 2175cc aircooled VW. Then I had to make mountings for an oil filter, and a huge oil cooler. Then I had to move the gearchange linkage to make room for the cooler, then I had to make a scoop in the body for the cooler. The new garchange linkage has a universal joint with a velocity ratio increase.. to narrow the shift gate. This worked well, but I lost the reverse gear lock-out. Much gnashing of gears. So I made a remote lock-out device with a bowden cable to the gear leaver. Very Heath-Robinson.. but seems to work OK. have to fine tune the spring tensions a bit. So.. the fibreglass is still a bit rough, but I'll deal to that later. On Saturday I'll start swapping in the new motor. I'll keep the old one in a box at home so I can have it couriered to me should the new motor let me down in distant places. I do enjoy this site.

Cheers, Brian

P.S. Here's the story of the last five years..
http://www.geocities.com/roadratccc/5yrsoftherat/5yrsoftherat.html



[Edited on 2/11/04 by Ratman]

Hi Brian,

I've followed your progress for a number of years. Love the little rat! What a great little beast. I can say it was one of the cars that has served as inspiration for my La Bala project. So thanks!

Welcome to the forum!

Steve Graber