Do you love bad ideas? Of course you do. That's why you clicked on this post. What we have here is a Bremen Sebring GT kit car with a gaping hole in which you will put your engine of choice. These cars were typically built around Volkswagen Beetle drivelines, but we are confident one of our readers can turn up …
Could be a nice place for a corvair engine and transmission.
It would be difficult to put anything other than a rear-engined drivetrain in there, which means either VW or Porsche, and only one of those will fit in the budget. Although it wouldn't be impossible to squeeze a mid-rear lateral powertrain in there, or, EV powertrain packaging is pretty flexible...worst-case scenario, you just stuff a VW engine in there as intended.
Corvair is rear engined and air cooled.
Almost any engine can bolt to that transmission with adapters from Kennedy but water cooled would be tough - where on earth would you fit a radiator in that nose?
subaru kits exist to mate to vw tranny .big power ,boxer shape, cheap in wreckers, small radiators can be fitted in back and along side and run in series . the tranny becomes the shear pin unless beefed up though . corvair turbo is limited to about 250hp maybe 300 if really built right and running water meth injection .The pistons break at the rings over 15lbs boost even forged. some were experimenting with smaller bore thicker full fin cylinder barrels and a head cradle to stop movement and distortion ... see levair peformance they are the top experts 40 yrs race experience with vairs . really odd choice alfa boxer 1.5 from an alfa sud or 33 .
Having just almost completed a Subaru EJ22 into a Kelmark GT (Kit car of the same era), and a couple test drives under my belt, its quite fun. Even with only 52% throttle opening.
These things weigh in around 2000 lbs so there is not a lot of heft to move around.
My radiator went up front, it came from the legacy wagon I got the engine from, its at a pretty steep angle. With all the increased cooling capacity to get the coolant from the rear all the way to the front I hope I have no issues.
dculberson said:Corvair is rear engined and air cooled.
Almost any engine can bolt to that transmission with adapters from Kennedy but water cooled would be tough - where on earth would you fit a radiator in that nose?
Stick it in the nose at an angle and vent it out the hood like nearly every other "super car" or racing prototype since the Ford GT40 :) Its just fiberglass, I mean how hard can it be?
The Subaru engine is a great idea. It does have what looks like extractor vents in the hood already, if they're faux vents you can cut some holes to make them real, then make a big hole underneath the nose (since the flat area up front is both small and highly visible) and make a scoop from black ABS to get air into the radiator. The scoop would barely be visible from above. Just take it slow through deep puddles!
Another option could be an air cooled motorcycle engine.
Not much budget left at $1500 buy in.
I've always wanted one, maybe not as a challenge car but a decent engine in a car that light would be fun.
I saw a Sterling on the local Craigslist years ago with the person claiming 1400lbs with a built vw engine in it.
MotorsportsGordon said:Another option could be an air cooled motorcycle engine.
That was my thought as well.
Maybe a big American V-twin??
lrrs said:...almost completed ...
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