A mate's considering buying this Westfield, anyone know the car?
Any opinions / comments? Worth the money? Spoke to the owner and he seems dead genuine. He reckons the engine's a belter and very strong.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/WESTFIELD-sei-2l-fiat-twin-cam-/290947190824?pt=Automobiles_UK&hash=item43bdcdd028#ht_352wt_1156
I quite like it, but the passenger has to press START!
Ha ha, never noticed that. Could save on fuel if you're on your own though
i dont normally comment on threads like this as i dont like to run down peoples cars. but to me,at that price id say it could be a money pit and a
heartbreaker!
its not a standard westy. 20xe,zetrec,duratec etc and for not much more matts 206bhp duratec mnr could be had. just my opinion!
quote:
Originally posted by daniel mason. but to me,at that price id say it could be a money pit and a heartbreaker!
its not a standard westy. 20xe,zetrec,duratec etc and for not much more matts 206bhp duratec mnr could be had. just my opinion!
if it was me. i would spend my money on something else! westfields are for sure worth a look and have strong residuals, but id go for a zetec or duratec variant if funds allowed. just never been a fan of that fiat twin cam powerplant, and can see it bieng a money pit!
quote:
Originally posted by daniel mason
if it was me. i would spend my money on something else! westfields are for sure worth a look and have strong residuals, but id go for a zetec or duratec variant if funds allowed. just never been a fan of that fiat twin cam powerplant, and can see it bieng a money pit!
that was my exact thoughts!
go take a look, have a good look around the engine. if all seems good it may prove a bargain. if it needs another £5k rebuild then maybe not.
having said all that.if budget does allow.a westy should top the list. you could buy one,run it a couple of years and probably sell it for the same
money!
Sounds as if all the right work has been carried out on the engine.
Power is about right for that set-up and that should be reliable.
The routeing of the hose between the cam covers from the rear pick-up point (which used to be the heater hose) to the thermostat housing means
some-one knew what they were doing.
Fiat/Lancia Lampredi engines are quite long stroke so won't rev highly but should last well.
They were developed over many years/models and spares are still quite readily available from the likes of Guy Croft..
HTH.
Cheers, Pewe10
Used to run a Fiat Twin cam engine in a MKII escort many many moons ago, the engine was bulletproof, I even ran it dry of oil after I holed the sump,
fixed the sump filled it of oil and it was a sweet as a nut.
As said longish stroke so didnt rev that high was but it made belter gobs of power with a pair of dellorto's on it
If the guy can produce receipts for the work and the work can be confirmed to have been done to the motor by cross reference with the engine number,
then it would be fine. and yes a lot will advise a zetec or what ever because it is all they know.
Old school yes but a decent enough motor, you only need to look at the venerable pinto as proof of how good and old motor still can be, don't
write it off instantly through ignorance, go look,listen and try to get a drive in it to decide for yourself.
Thanks guys
You're confirming my thoughts on the choice of both Westfield and engine, I think we may be taking a look 
The 'old' twin cam may not be a rev monster in std form with its relatively long stroke but give it some forged pistons and the right cams
and it'll 'sing' past 8Krpm all day long
At that money it is a bargin. The fiat engine is strong and was popular when it was one of the first Twin cams out there. It was a regular swop into
cars that were performance based.
You would not get a VX or Duartec for that money. As with everything, if it looks good, drives good then if you are happy buy it.
The fiat twin cam is a very very strong and light engine, if he likes it then go for it. The engines got to be a better choice then a zetec/pinto, well no worse and very light. you can get some great books on tuning them by guy croft also.
and if the engine ever did go bang who says you have to put the same kind back in its place
Guy croft engines(Lincoln) highly respected.......
quote:
Originally posted by Volvorsport
Guy croft engines(Lincoln) highly respected.......
It looks right as rain to me also . Only way to tell what it is worth is to see it.
Only thing to watch as with all hemi engines over revving can too easily result in bent valves.
quote:
Originally posted by mcerd1
and if the engine ever did go bang who says you have to put the same kind back in its place
The more I think about it the better this car is for not having the usual motor fitted.
I want it 
always wanted a red westy. (dont tell the F27)
Morning all,
I'm the guy who's interested in it and am planning to view it in a couple of weeks, once the owner is back from holiday.
It's interesting to read the feedback from people on here, as obviously it's a little different from the norm which is what I tend to like
in cars 
I'm on the look out for anything like this at the moment and am looking to spend £5k-7k, more for the right car, so if anyone does know of
anything out there I'd be interested in hearing about it.
Phil
quote:
Originally posted by Magic Beans
Morning all,
I'm the guy who's interested in it and am planning to view it in a couple of weeks, once the owner is back from holiday.
It's interesting to read the feedback from people on here, as obviously it's a little different from the norm which is what I tend to like in cars
I'm on the look out for anything like this at the moment and am looking to spend £5k-7k, more for the right car, so if anyone does know of anything out there I'd be interested in hearing about it.
Phil
quote:
Originally posted by franky
quote:
Originally posted by Magic Beans
Morning all,
I'm the guy who's interested in it and am planning to view it in a couple of weeks, once the owner is back from holiday.
It's interesting to read the feedback from people on here, as obviously it's a little different from the norm which is what I tend to like in cars
I'm on the look out for anything like this at the moment and am looking to spend £5k-7k, more for the right car, so if anyone does know of anything out there I'd be interested in hearing about it.
Phil
I don't see how you'd get more for your money than that car.
Remember this? I certainly do! And it seems the answer to the original question was probably no
My mate Phil bought it in my absence and made a few school-boy errors, not checking the things on the 'must-do' list I left him.
The engine was supposed to have 200bhp and built at great expense. Anyway, alarm bells started to ring with me when he said its performance
wasn't blowing him away when it should've gone like a stabbed rat in my opinion!! A quick compression test showed a lowly 125psi across the
board and it was also overfuelling massively, hence the poor performance. He then added insult to injury by dropping a grub screw down a carb and
fired it up, embedding the screw firmly into the head and damaging the piston too!! So off with its head, and give it a good sorting -
We formulated a plan to get the best out of this engine without spending a fortune. It's easy to plough £4-5K into making the old Twin Cam really
fly. Not an option!!
The owner Phil was off to the USA that week and a nice set of shiny HC pistons were 'smuggled' back in his suitcase. These should bring the
CR up from the std 9:1 to nearer 11:1 which should really help the cams work-
The old damaged head could've been repaired but when I inspected it I was less than impressed with the porting job that'd been done on it so
that won't be reused. Instead I've donated the Volumex (bigger inlet valves) head off my Monte to the cause. This head made a healthy 150bhp
on std cams and CR, up 30bhp from std.
The cams in the old engine are going to be reused and are a pretty aggressive Piper Rally/Race profile of 290deg with 11.2mm of lift which have to be
timed in very carefully to avoid the valves and pistons clashing. Powerband's quoted at 3000-7500rpm.
It's been an interesting build with a few challenges to make all the bits work together. It's been finished off with some top quality parts
from Guy Croft i.e a 'refurbed' better than new oil pump, competition Turbo head gasket, 12.9 head bolts etc etc.
It's now all back together (but Photobuckets just packed in!!) and seems to be running sweet. I took it out for a quick drive yesterday and
although I couldn't thrash it due to its 'newness' and lack of set-up it certainly feels like it's coming on cam very strongly,
much better than it did before. Hopefully, once it's setup it'll be much nearer to the car that Phil thought he was buying.
As an added bonus, it's been a good few years since I've driven a '7' type car, and even though this narrow bodied Westy is snug
for a 6ft1" 16st bloke I still really really enjoyed it So, it should inspire me to crack on with my roomier Haynes!!
glad its worked out in the end! wouldnt have been my choice but what do i know!
hows the monte carlo rebuild coming on?
quote:
Originally posted by daniel mason
glad its worked out in the end! wouldnt have been my choice but what do i know!
hows the monte carlo rebuild coming on?
quote:
Originally posted by Nickp
No probs, ta for the input. Others around the same money seem to be either Pinto or x-flow, which just doesn't do it for me (or him).
If it ain't broke don't fix it The old CVH was never a classic engine but with the right bits will go pretty well in a '7'
its a very easy upgrade from CVH to Zetec given the commonality between the two engines.
How to gain hero points as a Dad?
Do the school-run in your mates Westy to get a few more miles on it
One happy / slightly windswept 9yr old-
Must've been slightly scary as he couldn't even see over the scuttle!!
Despite the agro, I think it's a great car.
quote:
Originally posted by TimC
Despite the agro, I think it's a great car.
Phil took the car to 'Torque Tune' in Notts yesterday for an initial set-up to get it run in. It was running mega rich so we thought it best
to get the fuelling right so as not to damage its 'new' engine. We chose this place as it's only 10 miles from his house which probably
saved him from hypothermia but mainly because it specialises in bike carbs / inj on both bikes and kit cars. Anyway, as suspected, it was way rich
especially low down. They rejetted the mains down from 195 to 160 and along with a few other tweeks got it running much cleaner and crisper
everywhere. Apparently the operator was well impressed with the engine and described it as a 'Monster' when it comes on cam, and much better
than the usual 'lumpy cammed' / 'bike carbed' Pintos he gets in They kept the revs down as it only had 100mls or so under its
belt and has std mineral oil in, but they did record a very respectable 150bhp at just 5.5krpm just as it was getting into its stride. I reckon
it's going to peak somewhere near 7krpm possibly more so it should make some decent numbers when let off its leash
BTW- he's ditching the filter socks as they were clearly not flowing and richening the mixture, not good!! It's got rather long trumpets on
the R1 carbs so we're looking at this option from Jenvey, any comments? -
http://www.jenvey.co.uk/home/accessories/airhorns-filters-and-boxes/jenvey-dynamics/airbox-backplate-50mm-deep-abb2-50
http://www.jenvey.co.uk/home/accessories/airhorns-filters-and-boxes/jenvey-dynamics/air-filter-430x140x100-abf2-100
^^ ITG ones are good and cheaper than those
https://www.merlinmotorsport.co.uk/s/itg-air-filters/itg-megaflow
quote:
Originally posted by mcerd1
^^ ITG ones are good and cheaper than those
https://www.merlinmotorsport.co.uk/s/itg-air-filters/itg-megaflow
the ITG filters come in different heights up to 100mm internal
https://www.merlinmotorsport.co.uk/p/itg-filter-jc40-100-itg-jc40-100
(I'm assuming a JC40 be wide enough, but that depends on the spacing of your carbs)
they reckon you only need a min. 1/2" gap from the trumpet to the inside of the filter
the dimensions are here:
https://www.merlinmotorsport.co.uk/app/webroot/Technical/pdfs/itgmf1.pdf
if thats not enough you could fabricate your own deep backplate - how about using part of the R1's airbox ?
the R1 airbox just has 4 round holes in it:
these rubbers are glued into the holes and clamp onto the carb's - giving a small extra offset from the carb to the backplate
obviously they fit over these standard rubbers quite well
but sorry I can't give you any sizes for these bits anymore - I sold the ones I had when I ended up with ZX9R carbs instead...
Ta mate. I reckon his trumpets are at least 100mm long so that's why we're looking for a deeper base plate. If it was mine I'd be
having a go at making one possibly from an old R1 airbox, but it isn't mine so I'm just presenting him with options at the moment
Just to drag this thread up (again!) I thought I'd introduce myself as the new owner of this little Westy. Being friends with Phil (previous
owner) and Nick I have a pretty good idea as to what I'm getting into! The below is pretty much a cut and paste from another forum but should be
a good little intro...
How not to buy a car, vol. 17:
Drive 2 ½ hours north in an MR2 with a freshly built top-end in Friday evening traffic. Arrive c. 9pm, kick the tyres a bit and have some pizza. Have
a quick whistle-stop tour of the purchase (“That’s your windscreen-wiper switch. Don’t forget that one.”) and then head off at 10.30pm in a newly
purchased car you’ve never driven before, in the dark, in a fixed seat that doesn’t fit you, to Scunthorpe. Panic about the amount of fuel in the tank
(no gauge!), get lost in Scunthorpe and eventually get directions off a pair of very jealous chavs in MacDonald’s carpark. Place cover (pond-liner
and bungees, crude yet effective!) over car, check into hotel and collapse into bed.
Next day: sleep through alarm, miss breakfast and walk out of the hotel as it starts raining. Drive newly-purchased and still very alien car (with no
windscreen!) to Blyton park circuit in the rain: terrifying. Feel silly for organising Toyota trackday and then turning up in a British car with an
Italian engine, then gingerly head out onto a patchy damp track. Dodge rain storms, damp tracks, faster cars, slower cars (not many!) and eventually
decide that I should probably point my plastic nose-cone down the 180 miles to home. Rains: get wet. Sunny: dry off. This cycle repeated pretty much
all the way down South, until I came off the M40 onto the Oxford ring road into a truly biblical rainstorm. Never been more wet or more terrified in
my life, aquaplaning at 50mph whilst looking up into the wheelarches of passing lorries is definitely not the one! Arrive home, car into garage
and drip my soggy way straight into a hot bath.
Oh what fun
So there we have it, I’m now the owner of a very silly and fantastically fun little Westfield. It’s a great little car with enormous potential, and my
plans basically are to tinker with it, improve little bits here and there and generally enjoy it whist keeping a steady eye on the weather forecast
:lol:
The engine is a recently-rebuilt Fiat Lampredi 2-litre twin cam running R1 carbs, high compression pistons, high-lift cams, a Volumex head and plenty
of other tasty little bits and pieces. It also has ARBs front and rear (rare for a kit, I understand), a front wide track kit, Quaiffe LSD and a
digidash. We think that it was originally built as a racer or sprint car and then later converted and SVA’d for road use – the underlying build seems
to be pretty good but a lot of the cosmetic bits are a bit slap-dash (uneven front wheelarches, wonky numberplates and loose mirrors are a bit of a
clue). I think the wiring needs some attention as well as the temperature readouts seem to vary depending on how many electric things I have switched
on, and the suspension is clearly set up for track use so that’ll need some attention and setting up as well to make it a little more supple over
Oxfordshire’s finest back-roads. I may also look at a couple of other things to make it a little more friendly, such as swapping out the GRP seats,
sourcing a tonneau cover and maybe even fitting a windscreen if I get excitable :lol:
Having spanked all my spare money on a pile of stone and mortar most of this will have to wait for a while, so in the meantime I’ll be doing plenty of
local (sunny!) journeys in the westy to get used to its little ways and see if there’s anything else that needs attention. I’m already having to
completely re-calibrate my ideas of what are acceptable cornering speeds
A few phone pics will have to do for now until I get the internet at the new abode (much shouting at BT to come still, I imagine!)
A rare dry moment at Blyton:
Obligatory petrol station shot:
The mule with its stablemate!
After a quick ‘Monte Wash’
Sumptuous interior:
Wonk!
The family all together:
Yes, ramps necessary!
Mixing with the big kids at Homebase
Italy’s finest (and god it sounds good!):
Welcome aboard Ben