I'm looking to build my first kit car. I'm thinking something along the lines of a locost, but have a couple of questions.

Motorbike or car engine? I take it the car engine will be more reliable and cheaper but have slower acceleration?

What donor should I use? Old Escorts must be fairly hard to get hold of now.

Are there any books out there for the complete beginner? I already have the build a sportscar for £250 by Ron Champion.

Thanks

The Haynes manual for your donor would be a good one to have.

Cheers

Mark

should have mentioned I'm also after simplicity, and an easy build considering it's my first one.

Generally speaking, the more money you spend the easier the build. What budget do you have?

Also you should give some thought to what you actually want to do with it when you have built it - this will affect what engine you decide to put in.

Cheers

Mark

Budget is going to be low. But I don't mind spending time looking around for parts.

Car will be used a fair bit, proberly not just as a summer car, so it needs to be reliable.

you're right that bike engines are usually faster, but car engined ones could never be called slow! My 1600 is 112bhp, and beats nearly everything ive come across - 2nd gear off roundabouts is phenominal

I think maybe a car engine would be the way to go for you - a bike engine is great for a track day car but a car engine is probably better for everyday use and will give much better performance than most 'normal' cars

For a low budget a single donor like a sierra or (if you can get one) a RWD Escort then a kit from one of the usual suppliers MK MNR Luego etc etc would be a good way forward.

The single donor can be had for as little as you want (possibly free). a comprehensive kit including chassis, bodywork and wishbones etc starts off at around £2500 earth pounds you will need to budget for seats and other stuff too.

Hope this helps

Cheers

Mark

'spose I don't want anything too powerful anyway seeing as I'm only 16, and it will be finsished when Im about 18, otherwise insurance will cost too much.

You should go for a 1300 or something to start with then.

Cheers

Mark

You could buy an abandoned project. I've seen a few on Ebay usually comprising a chassis and a box of bits for about £400.
The easiest in my opinion is to base it on the Mk2 Escort. There are still plenty of bits around. I didn't manage to get hold of a donor myself but I found all the bits I needed on Ebay. Mine has an Escort 1300 cross flow engine. You can pick these up for about £20 to £40 and then it will cost you about £200 to convert to lead free but you could always not bother and use additives instead.
If you need any more help this is the best place to come. What ever you want to do you can almost guarantee someone on here has already done it!
If you like. I could give you the spec' of my car which was cheap and fairly easy to build.
Hope that helps. Good luck.
Cheers
Jon

I think an abandoned project may be the way to go.

I'll u2u about your cars spec. It sounds like the sort of thing I'm trying to build.

Thanks for all the help everyone.

An abandoned project may well be a good start but take someone with you who knows what they are looking at - I have seen some rubbish out there that is only fit for the bin and would be harder work than starting from scratch.

Good luck

Mark