this might be a bit slow at first as i have other things going on but as ive made a start i might as well post it up
ive always liked the look of a beach/dune buggy
something along these lines
now there dozens of differing designs all loosely related to the original manx
just about everything out there sits on a vw beetle floorpan either standard wheelbase of 94" or most are shortened down by 16" or so giving 78" wheelbase, i think that might be a little bit to short for my liking if you have a big horsepower engine, now there nothing wrong with the beetle floorpan or the aircooled engine there probably 50 billion of them still put putting about quite happily, i havent looked up the horse power figures but would guess 40 bhp as engines of that period generally produced around 50bhp per litre maybe a bit less the classic range rover had 3.5lt and 125 bhp whats that ... about 36 bhp per litre i know the Sd1 has 155 bhp but still not great but i digress... so i wanted a dune buggy but not with an aircooled engine i mean thats witchcraft engines must have water right and i dident care if the engine was at the front or the back ....
then i started looking at a suzuki vitara without its clothes on ,
i thought this had merit as its all self contained fuel tank at the back nice all alloy engine and box up front , they can be had as 4wd or 2wd, when its 4wd the engine is stuck up in the air to clear the diff this might be an issue with the bonnet but as i want rwd only the engine can sit lower down and solve that, now the engine is only 1600cc and develops a spine tingling 105 bhp not enough to get to warp speed but twice a standard beetle and they are other vitara options the 2lt and the v6 which is around 180 bhp so its getting there but i wont keep up with star ship enterprise
the other plus with a vitara chassis is that it sidesteps the iva if i dont alter the chassis in any way, so after lots of fanning around i decided i would biuld 2
one standard vitara chassis that i send the details to dvla and they alter the v5 to suzuki dune buggy or other description the second one will be on a modified chassis and will have to go through an iva but its all doable, i wanted something a bit more extreme for vitara buggys big sister and whilst idling flicking through ebay i came across a jaguar S type R with body damage all down the passenger side but mechanically sound well after to many beers and a slip of the finger it was mine oh dear another ebay mistake ,,, still im sure it would break for more than i paid i keep telling myself ( and the wife) so we are north of 400bhp now way past what a suzuki chassis might want to accommodate and would you belive while getting my transit pickup moted i happened to spy a discovery 3 with no engine and box and no interior sat in their yard further more they couldent wait to get rid of it, even delivered it to me which is a good job because even engineless they are very heavy, the disco 3 chassis appealed to me as it well constructed, very strong, easy to shorten, and comes on air suspension which will be fun to play with, it also has abs/traction control from the same family as the jag and i imagine i will need the traction control working in a sub 1 ton buggy with 420 horses under the bonnet, so the disco was dropped off and i pushed in the workshop with a tractor, there it sat for a week getting in the way so i thought i better remove the body and send it off to the great gave yard in the sky
so i managed to get shot of the body just in time for the void to be filled by an S type R jag
almost seems a shame to start taking bits of this untill i think of this engine in a buggy lol
some of the interior might make it over into the buggy too
ive always liked the look of a beach/dune buggy
something along these lines
now there dozens of differing designs all loosely related to the original manx
just about everything out there sits on a vw beetle floorpan either standard wheelbase of 94" or most are shortened down by 16" or so giving 78" wheelbase, i think that might be a little bit to short for my liking if you have a big horsepower engine, now there nothing wrong with the beetle floorpan or the aircooled engine there probably 50 billion of them still put putting about quite happily, i havent looked up the horse power figures but would guess 40 bhp as engines of that period generally produced around 50bhp per litre maybe a bit less the classic range rover had 3.5lt and 125 bhp whats that ... about 36 bhp per litre i know the Sd1 has 155 bhp but still not great but i digress... so i wanted a dune buggy but not with an aircooled engine i mean thats witchcraft engines must have water right and i dident care if the engine was at the front or the back ....
then i started looking at a suzuki vitara without its clothes on ,
the other plus with a vitara chassis is that it sidesteps the iva if i dont alter the chassis in any way, so after lots of fanning around i decided i would biuld 2
one standard vitara chassis that i send the details to dvla and they alter the v5 to suzuki dune buggy or other description the second one will be on a modified chassis and will have to go through an iva but its all doable, i wanted something a bit more extreme for vitara buggys big sister and whilst idling flicking through ebay i came across a jaguar S type R with body damage all down the passenger side but mechanically sound well after to many beers and a slip of the finger it was mine oh dear another ebay mistake ,,, still im sure it would break for more than i paid i keep telling myself ( and the wife) so we are north of 400bhp now way past what a suzuki chassis might want to accommodate and would you belive while getting my transit pickup moted i happened to spy a discovery 3 with no engine and box and no interior sat in their yard further more they couldent wait to get rid of it, even delivered it to me which is a good job because even engineless they are very heavy, the disco 3 chassis appealed to me as it well constructed, very strong, easy to shorten, and comes on air suspension which will be fun to play with, it also has abs/traction control from the same family as the jag and i imagine i will need the traction control working in a sub 1 ton buggy with 420 horses under the bonnet, so the disco was dropped off and i pushed in the workshop with a tractor, there it sat for a week getting in the way so i thought i better remove the body and send it off to the great gave yard in the sky
so i managed to get shot of the body just in time for the void to be filled by an S type R jag
almost seems a shame to start taking bits of this untill i think of this engine in a buggy lol
some of the interior might make it over into the buggy too