Car appreciation... the aesthetics, the engineering, etc

my first ever dream car

sunbeam stilleto

Dammit, wrong country of origin. that Dodge was a little closer to my thing. Dream car here.

http://www.superchevy.com/features/pre1977full/sucp_0904_1962_chevy_bel_air/photo_06.html

1962 Chevy Bel Air 409. Luxuries such as heater, radio, etc stripped out and deleted to save weight and go faster (sound familiar?).

Ah, fair enough.

I went to the MPH show at Earl's Court last night and my new dream car is this Napier Railton:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jrLq83aFUZY

Dammit. I can see why. Very pretty.

awesome car

W12 power, still holds the record at Brooklands.

In other news I'm vaguely planning some sort of silly build when I have done kitchen and bathroom in the place I hope to complete the purchase of next week.

I'm thinking modern Volvo T5 (or maybe T6) engine into a 1968 Amazon.

There should be enough room under that bonnet to fit a small block V8 (Ford 260?) if you fancied. Would sound great.

Converse Engineering do a 302 swap kit for the later Volvo's.

I'd like to keep it as close to 100% Volvo though, just because really.

There's a chap in Canada making 500 rwhp on a T6 with a pretty decent boost threshold.

If you are into Volvo is the P1800 too predictable? or not enough power (probably true).

Hugely expensive for a decent one, and have you seen the size of the engine bay?

One of the things I enjoy about the Volvo's is the unlikely nature of them- my 850 with some headwork and a less restrictive/bigger turbo and exhaust has around 325 bhp, but looks like any other sober estate.

So I quite like the Amazon, plus I think they look pretty cool when on the deck with roll cage visible behind the pillars.

Understood. As you can tell from the Bel Air above, I like the sleeper aspect of wolf in sheep's clothing, which the Amazon would be. But sadly as I have no driving license there is no old car in my near future (so I opted for a 1963 Mercian Superlight).

Hah! Nice choice.

To be honest I'm probably dreaming unless I manage to fit a welding course into the next few months, along with everything else.

Having to pay someone else for that aspect of the fabrication will push the price beyond my limit.

In my mind I bought probably 20 cars this year.

Hah! Nice choice.

To be honest I'm probably dreaming unless I manage to fit a welding course into the next few months, along with everything else.

Having to pay someone else for that aspect of the fabrication will push the price beyond my limit.

Feck the course man, go and get yourself an arc welder, don't bother with a mig unless you've got dorrah for a good one but you'll get a good arc welder for reasonable money, then get a shitload of scrap bits of metal and practise hard, you'll get the hang of it pretty quickly, a lot of bodywork is never fully welded anyway, just spots... I was fairly competent at welding with an arc welder at about 7/ 8 years old through practising on scrap and a few pointers from my old man, moved onto mig by 9... haven't welded in years though, must be rusty as fuck now!

Mike can you get two people and two bikes in the Porshce (ffs) ?

If so, let's see how many points you can get on your license to Newport/Manchester.

The only thing a car is useful for in London is getting out of London.

lol I can certainly get two people and one bike in.
I think 2 bikes would go if they were pretty much completely dissembled.

The fuel consumption seems fairly reasonable, on the motorways at least.

neil - i will be up at my milton keynes rockley factory today, from about 11:30, if you want head down and turn a wrench check out the space.

what colour, mike?

Ah, sorry to miss you Richie- I have to deliver sheet music to Brighton.

This is not a euphemism.

Tomorrow?

Feck the course man, go and get yourself an arc welder, don't bother with a mig unless you've got dorrah for a good one but you'll get a good arc welder for reasonable money, then get a shitload of scrap bits of metal and practise hard, you'll get the hang of it pretty quickly, a lot of bodywork is never fully welded anyway, just spots... I was fairly competent at welding with an arc welder at about 7/ 8 years old through practising on scrap and a few pointers from my old man, moved onto mig by 9... haven't welded in years though, must be rusty as fuck now!

It's not the body work I'm thinking about:

Both the T5 and T6 engines never appeared in a longitudenal/RWD application, both were transvers/FWD.

The only thing a car is useful for in London is getting out of London.

Problem with that is, the car's already IN London.

Problem with that is, the car's already IN London.

Well it wouldn't be much use to those wanting to use it to get out of London if it wasn't, you silly kangaroo.

The real problem is what you do when you've used the car to get out of London and then you're stuck outside of London with a car that's useless for getting back into London.

Oh, and ... you daft guacamoles.