Evening all,

I hope you're all well?

I think this is the correct place to put this thread being as the car was a road worthy, SVA'd car when I started!

Well the story starts like this...

I've wanted to own my own kit car since my Dad built his, but never really had the money to do so. I'm in the forces and after a long tour in Afghanistan I thought I'd treat myself when I returned home in July this year.

So after a 'wanted' thread on here I was jetting off from Luton to Glasgow to pick up a car that I'd only seen in pictures! Is was one hell of a day driving down, whilst on the way, the starter solenoid broke, so I made lots of friends in the services asking for a push! The fuel tank was leaking from the sender if I filled it up too much, and there were horrendous fuelling problems with the throttle bodies. But anyway, pretty much exactly 12 hours after I'd started driving, I was home in South Oxfordshire and the proud new owner of a Tiger based Locost.


Pick Up



The car, like I said above, is a Locost based around a Tiger chassis design. It has a 2.0l zetec engine, with GSXR throttle bodies and MS. An Mt75 box, and granada running gear.

My first job was to get it running better than it was, so that I could see out the summer and enjoy a bit of driving, so with a bit, actually, ALOT of help from gsxr_matt, we got it running reasonably well.

I had always wanted to strip the car down and completely start again, so the end of september came and the strip down began. Alot of parts were surplus to my needs, like the windscreen, the servo assisted brakes and such like.

The garage isn't connected to my house, and during my haste to start stripping, I forgot my camera, so I've only got pictures of my current build state...
So this is where I'm at now:






I've removed so much metal, it's unbelievable! The top mounted granada pedal box has gone (I've just ordered an OBP floor mounted item witht he christma discount), the servo brackets have gone, and several other brackets that I now don't need. Obviously I've not played with the structural integrity of the actual chassis at all.

If you take a look at the second picture (of the built car) the top of the boot is very high above the arches, I'm not too sure why, but an extra 3" had been added to the height of the rear of the car. I thought it looked pretty silly, so I've pretty much rebuilt the rear end and it looks much stronger than before, and when the car was on it's wheels it sat much better. I want the car to be as light as possible to take it from a tourer to a track day/fast road car.

I've just finished roughly painting the chassis today, I've still got alot of welding to do, like the steering rack and column brackets, I just dont want it to rust over the winter.

Inbetween this, I've painted the engine block, changed the oil, fitted new gaskets, changed the cambelt and removed the hulk of steel that was the original alternator bracket and replaced it with one I welded up.


Engine Cleaned

New Alt Belt

New Alt Brkt

I'm hoping that the car will be ready for next summer, but I'm away to Afghanistan again in February so I'm not too sure whether it'll be done, but we'll see, I'll keep this updated as I go.

Any comments, tips, questions are welcome.

Thanks for taking the time to read my thread!

ATB Chris

I am hoping to have mine ready for summer hope to see you at a meet over the summer period

Good luck with the build... give me a shout if you need anything I will do my best to help

Good luck with the rebuild keep us updated!

Afternoon all,

Just a quick update; over the last week or so I've cleaned up the half shafts, bearing carriers and hubs ready for new bearings and fitting back onto the car. They've all been completely stripped and rebuilt and painted. The CV joints were taken apart and inspected, regreased and new gaiters fitted.

There are some before and after photos below:


Half Shaft Before


Rear Bearing Carrier Before


HS, BC, Hub After

The chassis is almost ready for the floor to be fitted and the panels to be made.

Again, any comments or tips are appreciated.

ATB, Chris

Looking good Chris,

Give us a shout when you return, I'll pop over for a blast and keep you motivated

ATB Dan.

Look very nice....

Good to see another local build coming along well. Hoping to have mine on the road this summer.

quote:

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Originally posted by scutter
Looking good Chris,

Give us a shout when you return, I'll pop over for a blast and keep you motivated

ATB Dan.

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quote:

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Originally posted by mikemph
Look very nice....

Good to see another local build coming along well. Hoping to have mine on the road this summer.

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quote:

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Originally posted by ChrisLeary

quote:

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Originally posted by mikemph
Look very nice....

Good to see another local build coming along well. Hoping to have mine on the road this summer.

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They look alot better than I could've hoped for to be honest with the condition they were when I started.

We're going to have to sort out a monthly meeting soon, it appears there's a few of us from the area now.

ATB,

Chris

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Yeah sorry, I used to run one, but it kinda died a death. I'll start in Feb again.

And where is Mr Russell these days?

ATB Dan.

[Edited on 26/1/12 by scutter]

quote:

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Originally posted by scutter
Yeah sorry, I used to run one, but it kinda died a death. I'll start in Feb again.

And where is Mr Russell these days?

ATB Dan.

[Edited on 26/1/12 by scutter]

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quote:

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Originally posted by scutter
I'll start in Feb again.


[Edited on 26/1/12 by scutter]

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quote:

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Originally posted by mikemph

quote:

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Originally posted by scutter
Yeah sorry, I used to run one, but it kinda died a death. I'll start in Feb again.

And where is Mr Russell these days?

ATB Dan.

[Edited on 26/1/12 by scutter]

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He is back in the uk now. I see him most weeks as I work with him. Just needs to do about a couple of weeks work to get the zx12 beast of an Indy sorted.

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quote:

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Originally posted by scutter

quote:

---

Originally posted by mikemph

quote:

---

Originally posted by scutter
Yeah sorry, I used to run one, but it kinda died a death. I'll start in Feb again.

And where is Mr Russell these days?

ATB Dan.

[Edited on 26/1/12 by scutter]

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He is back in the uk now. I see him most weeks as I work with him. Just needs to do about a couple of weeks work to get the zx12 beast of an Indy sorted.

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We had a couple of days work to do to it before he went swanning about the states.

ATB Dan.

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Evening all,

I hope you're all well?

I thought it was probably time for an update, I've not got much to show you, but I've been very busy.

A fair few panels are now fitted, the pedal box is in, the steering column is in, the engine was fitted last weekend to test the mounts before welding, they fitted, so I finally welded up the wishbones and the the engine mounts ready for more parts to be fitted.


Lower Wishbone


Upper wishbone


Eng Mounts

I don't want to get ahead of myself, but I really can see things coming together now.

I'll post more pictures as the car progresses.

ATB,

Chris