hi all,
the problem with building a longitudinal engined middie appears to be the transaxle. a locost option comes by the way of the vag passat/audi 80 unit etc, so i bought one of these chaps hoping to mate it to a zetec and be flying. thing is, appears the making mounting adaptor is a bit of a tricky number, esp given limited maching capabilites at moment. can buy but not exactly "locost".
a seperate issue is the an 1800 zetec, whilst nice, is not exactly a pulse racer.
so, to cut a long story shor(ish), what is the audi 2.6 v6 like? comes with transverse/axle gearbox, v6 (bit of a personal favorite) and quite a few about for locosting. any reason why not more of a middie favorite?
should i give it go or has anyone "been there, done that, dont bother"?
cheers for any input
zane

Personnaly I like the idea of an Audi V6. If it is the same as in the Golf VR6 then it seems quite a nice engine - though not that wild.

Other options might include :

Audi 1.8 turbo / Audi transaxle

Any engine / beatle transaxle (I believe the dif can be flipped to make it work for mid rather than rear engine)

Alfa 33 flat 4 / Alfa transaxle (the Alfa engine hangs out the front like the Audi engine thus is an easy move to mid engine. this has the advantage of a low C of G)

Most front wheel drive installations can be adapted to a mid engine layoud - I guess you have thought of this but rejected it.

I can think of one problem with Audi parts - the elctronics that go with it.

I have an old A6. To have a new key cut requires a special key provided by an Audi dealer at great cost. I believe that several electrical systems in the car 'talk' to each other - if you change one, then you need to tow the whole car to your friendly Audi dealer to re-program the system.

so go megasquirt..........

its my plan

An aftermarket ECU (MegaSquirt) would solve that, but like you said, not exactly Locost.

You beat me to it!

[Edited on 2/23/05 by kb58]

can definatly see potential electronic problems. was planning on using megajolt as ive just build one which was going to be for zetec, but can easily change tor edis6 to make it all go. then would prefer carbs if manifold available but could always go megasquirt (megajoltnsquirt is 1 unit?).
electronics not unsurmountable, just wondering if any other pboblems eg v on side formation or anything crazy like that??
cheers anyhow, keep up the good work!!

ok,

lets talk car eletronics as the kit car/ self builder moves forward we are going to have to deal with the problems or find we are using a smaler and smaler veriaty of engens.

so all cars in the uk since 98 I think have OBD II port witch will alow you to do a limet amout of stuff i.e. it will alow you aces to the drive train data. the OBD port is located with in a meater of the drivers seat.

as welll as OBD / OBD II the car will have a dealer spesific diagnostic ability. in the case of audi part of the VAG Valtswagen Audi Group also including seat, scoda, lambo and maby somother I cant remember.

all the VAG cars use the same set of coms systems and many shared engins ther are also a numbber of good free tools out ther that will run on youer PC and interface them.

A number of the VAG engins are also very easy to tune electonicly by loading in difrent maps.

I know it is not conventionla thinking but with a bit more mony and time I would posiby be looking at usig a VAD TDI engin
(prepering flame profe cote)

blake

also with systems like mega squert you have a totaly ajustoble route if you dont feal like sticking with the exsisting eletronics.

i belive the oil burning version has a lot more go than the petrol version