African Muscle Cars - Forum

Getting there smartly. As Face said.... I love it when a plan comes together

Superb work Gavin, getting close now.

Yip Thanks guys

Hoping to finish it off this weekend and get some miles on it before going to the track.

Considering the idea of fitting an LS V8 into my other Rover project when the race car is finally done

Hi Gavin,

Can you lay your hands on some LS-series engines ??

Pieter

Waterhond wrote:Hi Gavin,

Can you lay your hands on some LS-series engines ??

Pieter

Hi Pieter

No unfortunately, need to have a look at insurance claimed cars, maybe finding a wrecked Lumina at places like SMD that sell accident rebuilds etc.

Gavin

Well after lots of delays etc etc and another 8 months down the line there is light at the end of the tunnel.

The beast has awakened it has now been 2 years 3 months since the complete refurbishment of the car.

http://vid143.photobucket.com/albums/r1 ... fwqjoa.mp4

Hi Guys

Been a long time since I posted anything. Last time was when I was hoping to finish the Rovers build. I had some health issues with my neck so not being able to race the last 4 years. February last year I had to go into hospital for a neck operation to fuse to veretibrae.

Anyway my Rover was finished and after being cleared by the Doctors I finally got to race at the Passion for Speed in February this year. It has been 6 years since the car was on track again but now in its new form. I had to borrow the motor out of my Rover Vitesse so that car has not been used for about 15 months.My original 3.5 has very high mileage so I did not want to break it by racing it this year that's why I took the 4.6 out of the Vitesse.

The Race in Feb this year was just a shake down to see how the car would handle and perform so I was not trying to break records or go for a win. It did a very easy 1min 22 around Zwartkops which was 2 seconds faster than it ever was (ok so the Vitesse motor is a 4.6l) I am currently having a brand new 3.9 motor built. It is a brand new block I bought from Land Rover SA a few years back so was still in plastic in a box. the block has been prepped so is ready to have all new parts fitted. I bought 2 extra 3.9 motors awhile back, 1 just for the fuel injection, (then sold the motor without the injection to a friend for his kit car) the other 3.9 was stripped and all internals machined and prepped for the new motor. The crank was still stock so only machined 10 under. Conrods all resized and I managed to get a new set of high compression pistons. All new bearings bought. I imported as new Piper cam kit from the UK, not wild but good fast road / track cam with new lifters and valve springs.

I took the heads off the 4.6 as they were big valve Vitesse Heads. )I put stock heads on the 4.6 for now) The Vitesse heads I sent to Anthony Taylor to do a clean up and fit the new valve springs and to just re shape the guides. The heads were fully ported in the UK and Anthony said they were perfect as is. SO all that needs doing now is to have all the balancing done and the motor assembled. Will have to wait now for lockdown to be over . With the new motor run in and fitted in the car I reckon I could get the time around Zwartkops down to at least 1min 18s . I have since managed to get hold of very rare Rovercraft intake manifolds and quad Weber carbs to fit on my new motor. Have wanted this set up since the 80's

I sold my red 82 Rover SDS to a friend who converted it to race as well, its first time on track was also in Feb this year which was great. My son now wants to race as he is 16 and can drive. I bought another 83 Vanden Plas V8 auto from a friend who immigrated and we are busy re doing that at the moment so he can learn to build cars as well. We have already fitted some new parts to suspension and the car will be converted to manual as I have all the parts, it will also have to be re painted. I will post pics soon.

Good to hear you are back on track Gavin. I look forward to seeing some pics of the cars.

Battling to upload photos, not sure why, will keep trying

Hi Gavin.

See i have been posting wrong ( long year)

Do you perhaps have a decent steering wheel for the SD1?

thx
jaco