Author Topic: tricikel (Read 12708 times)

krv3000 · « **on:** April 17, 2012, 06:44:46 PM »

HI this is not my project but i seem to be spending a lot of time on it so her is sum pics it started out in life as a reliant three wheel car the only parts of the car bin used is the engine gearbox and back Axel all the rest is hand made will get beater pics soon

Brass_Machine · « **Reply #1 on:** April 17, 2012, 08:45:53 PM »

So it is a custom framed trike? The engine is from a 3 wheeled car?

What size is that engine?

Eric

krv3000 · « **Reply #2 on:** April 18, 2012, 02:18:52 AM »

HI the engine is only a 850cc

Fergus OMore · « **Reply #3 on:** April 18, 2012, 03:15:41 AM »

I seem to recall a Reliant Rebel700cc somewhere in my history book. FOUR wheels and if I have it right the engine is or or was an Austin 7 variant. Came from an old girl friend for £25. Not sure if it was wise but I took the head off with a garden spade( the car not her)

Sure was an interesting project- well, both were

Hint, she could tell where in County Durham someone lived from the spelling

Have fun ( I did, from both)

Norm

HS93 · « **Reply #4 on:** April 18, 2012, 05:31:39 AM »

Norm, Have you got any pictures of you taking the head off with a garden spade Please ?

Peter

Fergus OMore · « **Reply #5 on:** April 19, 2012, 11:43:57 AM »

This, Peter, was on a 1968 Reliant Rebel and I doubt that photography was invited then.

Norm

And I'm keeping quiet about 'last years model' as well. Well, that is how my wife describes her.

Raggle · « **Reply #6 on:** April 19, 2012, 12:46:06 PM »

I like this project! You could set the tappets on your own without the two assistants needed in the original car.

In a past life my now deceased one-armed mate and me had a workshop mostly dedicated to Hillman Imps and their variants. I had (was almost given) a Bond 875 which was a 3-wheel four-seater mostly of aluminium with a rear mounted Imp engine. You could do wheelies in that if you were brave.

One day a chap asked us to replace the cylinder head on his Reliant (Plastic Pig) 850 - if only we'd realised it was easier as an engine out job. A year or two later and he had someone do some chassis welding on it and it caught fire after the welder had gone home. The owner watched as the whole car disappeared in 7 minutes.

Interesting history though, Reliants ...
but I'll shut up now ... unless anyone WANTS to know?

Ray

Fergus OMore · « **Reply #7 on:** April 19, 2012, 01:33:26 PM »

My wife and I have just returned from near Newark on the A1 and noted a gold coloured J Reg Hillman Imp in the Travelodge car. We passed it going North just short of Newcastle- full of two other old bats

and luggage galore.

Hillman Imps- digressing, he says- were buggered up by Prince Philip opening the Scottish plant- near Paisley?

Come to think of it, the Hillman Imp was the motive power for the Clan Crusader made by David Hassauer at Washington, Co Durham.

Three hands wasn't the A Series SV but the Morris 8 which I passed my test on.

One of those really nice cars with a blind which pulled down to avoid being dazzled by 6v Lucas lights

and the laugh was on them if you chalked 'Don't laugh , your daughter may be inside'

Having got on to such things, anyone recall the use which the rope grap handles got used for on the little Austin 7?

No pictures- who would dare? Perhaps a word with your parents might reveal something.

Cheers-- and Thanks

N

Raggle · « **Reply #8 on:** April 19, 2012, 01:54:02 PM »

If that use to which you refer was like the leather ones in 2-door Morris Minors, but absent in the 4-door, the answer was to use the wind up windows in the 4-door

Ray

hopefuldave · « **Reply #9 on:** April 19, 2012, 04:19:32 PM »

The "stirrups," in the Austin 7, would they be?

That reminds me of the advertising campaign - "You can do it in an MG" - not unless you're a bloody contortionist and so's she, mate!

A Zephyr with column gearchange, however...

Back to the Imp, the little Coventry-Climax (ooer Mrs!) its motor was derived from was a cracker

Dave H. (the other one)

millwright · « **Reply #10 on:** April 19, 2012, 05:17:41 PM »

"Stirrups" I always thought they were ankle Straps.

doubleboost · « **Reply #11 on:** April 19, 2012, 05:42:27 PM »

Hi
They used to race that engine years ago in single seaters (formula 750)
A decent cam and head job with webber carbs gave good performance
John

Raggle · « **Reply #12 on:** April 20, 2012, 11:44:09 AM »

Coventry Climax FWA fire pump engine - became the Imp 875. The only car cylinder block I could hold above my head.

In Sport Imp/Stilleto form with twin Strombergs it was 51 bhp - bored to 998cc it was close on 100 bhp with suitable treatment

A great shame that vehicle production was moved to Clydeside, where the good folk were happier building ships, robbing the Coventry folk who must have been looking forward to making it. They made all the bits for the car but transported them north.
Then it transpired the Paisley folk were being paid less than Coventry folk and went on strike. Thus we had a new word in labour relations - "parity"

Ok - rant over

Ray

philf · « **Reply #13 on:** April 20, 2012, 01:02:40 PM »

Quote from: Raggle on April 20, 2012, 11:44:09 AM

Coventry Climax FWA fire pump engine - became the Imp 875. The only car cylinder block I could hold above my head.......

My wife just asked me what I was photographing and was quite amused (or rather bemused) when I told her it was a Coventry Climax Godiva fire pump diagram.

We had one at work at some time during the firemen's strike (time of the Green Goddesses - 1977-78) and when it was scrapped I didn't have the heart to throw the manuals away.

I wish I could draw as well as this:

Phil.

doubleboost · « **Reply #14 on:** April 20, 2012, 03:57:37 PM »

Quote from: Raggle on April 20, 2012, 11:44:09 AM

Coventry Climax FWA fire pump engine - became the Imp 875. The only car cylinder block I could hold above my head.

In Sport Imp/Stilleto form with twin Strombergs it was 51 bhp - bored to 998cc it was close on 100 bhp with suitable treatment

A great shame that vehicle production was moved to Clydeside, where the good folk were happier building ships, robbing the Coventry folk who must have been looking forward to making it. They made all the bits for the car but transported them north.
Then it transpired the Paisley folk were being paid less than Coventry folk and went on strike. Thus we had a new word in labour relations - "parity"

Ok - rant over

Ray

Hi
Ray
I thought the top of the range imp had twin 40 webbers or delortoes
They did go well apart from boiling up
And head gaskett problems
I can remember the police using them

hopefuldave · « **Reply #15 on:** April 20, 2012, 04:16:29 PM »

I think it was twin Strombergs in the Imp Sport... Dunno why I think that though! *Might* be cos I had one!

The twin Stromberg set-up was roughly the equivalent of the twin SU's on the Mini Cooper S - never had one of those, but the 1275 --> 1380GT was a fun car to have just as the yuppies were getting the Mk1 Golf GTIs - de-striped, with Clubman 1000 badges, me and my mate with his Lotus Cortina (175 BHP full-race motor, painted in duck-egg blue, no badges...) used to run rings around 'em

As for Shane's Morris minor with the supercharged 1275 Sprite motor, well, you can guess what that did to some inflated overpaid egos...

The Coventry-Climax also had a good run in the then Formula 3 (early 60's?), with considerable tuning... If I remember right, it was also one of the options in the pretty little AC Ace, that Carrol Shelby stuffed a V8 into to make the Cobra?

Dave H. (the other one - and unashamed petrol-head!)

doubleboost · « **Reply #16 on:** April 20, 2012, 04:30:32 PM »

Hi
Dave
It was twin strombergs i remember the rubber diaphrams

I had a 970 cooper s with all the propper bits
I wish i had it now

hopefuldave · « **Reply #17 on:** April 20, 2012, 05:28:23 PM »

Ah, if only, eh?

The Imp Sport was fun, handled like a Porsche (in fact I only parted with it because like a Porsche, it went backwards through a hedge...)

I really *miss* that mini though - but kids came along, along with boring bigger cars

Now the kids are mostly grown - and I'm old, of course - I can have insane motorbikes - some compensation, I guess

Dave H. (the other one)

Raggle · « **Reply #18 on:** April 20, 2012, 08:05:23 PM »

My unidexter mate had a full manual licence as he passed his test in a Berkeley 4-wheeler which he'd converted to foot change. This was an intersting story in itself in that he obtained a brand new foot change box from Excelsior after asking their advice on the conversion he'd been trying 4 times. They were winding down and let him have it for a tenner and said it was unique. The driving examiner pondered what class of licence he would grant for a while before writing "manual cars with suitable adaptation".

Later in his career he drove a 1956 split-screen Minor from Sydney to England with the suitable adaptation of a forklift knob on the steering wheel. The car was 20 years old but had a new bottom half 1100 engine at a bargain price from BMC who were closing operations in Oz in 1974/5.

He had a Stiletto for a while but sold it after saying "it wont leave me alone!" - far too many gear changes in town driving. We've all been there but most of us have a right arm to steer with.

Head gaskets were our mainstay for customers when we set up the workshop, along with kingpins and gearboxes. The Imp was a good weldable car with its double skin body and very stiff. We eventually realised that most of our clientele were pensioners (people my age now) who were always pleading poverty and bringing their bangers to us. We must have got a reputation. Tom was a whizz with Strombergs and SUs, all with a pair of ears, a pair of eyes and a left hand.

He was a natural toolmaker, trained before the bike accident, and still as good after it. Cancer got him in 1999 and I still find myself asking him, "How do you do this?"

Ray

krv3000 · « **Reply #19 on:** June 05, 2012, 06:27:27 PM »

hi more pics

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Author Topic: tricikel (Read 12708 times)