Firstly, can I just say in advance apologies for the grammar and spelling mistakes you will see throughout this blog, it will be done on cold winter nights in bed after pissed off nights down the shed, most of the posts will no doubt be done intoxicated! And I just realised it doesn't have spell check!
I'm doing this as I wish I did last year for fellow builders, friends, kit car entusiasts, readers, drivers, people who havnt started, people who have finished, key board warriors and my self. I'm not saying what's in the blog will be right, I think the mear nature of a seven won't allow for anything to be "correct" for everyone's point of view. However, personally using and following blogs has helped me build my knowledge on a vast amount of areas kit car related and not so if this one does the same, and because of this more people are willing to give turbo'in bike engines a try from there shed, then happy days! This is going to be a big learning curve for me also never turbo'sing anything previously!
Who knows I might add pointless hours to the project typing away on here and nobody might read it!
Lets start with some background!
One cold, misty November night about 6 years ago I was helping out teacher, now very good friend, Geoff Wallman build his CBR1000 blow through carb turbo locost. We had reached the stage in the "night" (a common theme I will learn) where it was ready for a blast round the school yard. Never being in one of these before, I had no idea what to expect. I knew dad was passing from work so asked him to call by, this might be my chance to get him into the idea of a 7. This style of car was beginning to and admiddingly still is the only thing that impresses me, something someone has physically built with there knowledge and hands impresses me greatly and I now love taking ideas from other people and adopting them in our builds. Soo.. Dad arrives at school and he watches me scream and shout f#cking hell this is the fastest thing I've ever been in. Geoff was probably doing about 0-20mph just coming on boost at about 3k Rpm! (Like I said never been in a seven befor) the noise was like being in a tornado as the garret T25 spooled and dumped on, off throttle to feed the little Honda power plant. Dad was up next and much the same! We both went home thinking we have to have one. It's probably all I spoke about for a good few weeks. The adrenaline these cars produce is crazy! This is were the addiction began.....
A year passed of trying to convice dad to buy a road registered rolling chassis and put a turbo bike engine in. Two points here. 1. Why at 17 just passed my test did I think any insurer would cover me on a 200bhp bike engine turbo!? 2.why at 17 did I think I had any money to carry out such a project!?
Anyways, a rolling chassis that had blown up a crossflow on a track day I had spotted months before hand on eBay, rightly turned down by dad, turned up again, this time with a working engine. me and dad had bought a nakered trailer with 4 (more like 1) wheel and set out to have a look. The first time we seen it, it had to be ours, people who know me and Tony Gray, this car is the famous Goofy! It adapted it's name purely due to it's Registation plate ending GFY, something that stuck from day one.
We arrived home in style, the trailer AND kit car where on the back of a AA truck as the one working wheel shot off into a field leaving the other 3 to fall apart mid journey. Let's get it right, when we got goofy it was a shed, about the same as the shed we build the cars in! Engine number 1 filled a coke bottle with oil on every journey, we built a race spec crossflow, and moved over to bike engine last year, with huge help for Geoff and also John Richardson, both very knowledgable chaps in thier fields.
Last years bike engine install was when I wish I done a blog as I learnt a lot about engineering and would have been good to pass this on, something I'm always willing todo.
Over the last 4 years me and my old man have been tinkering on in the shed and have built up a "good" understanding for engineering and also how to take shouting at each other when something doesn't fit!
Anyways, we have just bought the turbos, inter cooler pipe work plenum and more yesterday so keep posted for updates! Enjoy....