Mini Quiz

[Marlow Sud]

At the Goodwood 74 members meeting and I was on a mission to take pictures of saloon car engines. I wanted to see what the engine looks like in the fast cars and in the slow cars.
This is a picture of the Swiftune Mini engine. Very fast.
I walked straight up to the car, took the shot and the bonnet was shut almost immediately. What can you spot?

[junior]

They are only using half of each weber carb ? Got me otherwise.

[KevJTD]

what's the large bore U shaped hose on the left of head/block? that's something I've never seen before, extra coolant transfer?
otherwise, no idea.

[Sud 145]

That was my thought Kev because we all know how good mini rads are. ???

[Marlow Sud]

Hi Guys,

I thought the carbs were interesting. I read a Motorsport article as follows:

By 1980, Dooley, who the year before had taken over Greenslade's old 'Sud, was looking for a car to replace it — after all, it was the veteran of the '75 Tour of Britain — and he soon found the ideal vehicle: an eight year old 'Sud with only 85,000 miles on it. Unpromising though it sounds, once it had been stripped and turned into a racer, this car won the 1300 cc class in the '81 Saloon Car championship against the works Metros in the Tricentrol series. What helped to keep the 'Sud competitive was the 1980 rule change for Group 1 cars: a slackening of the regulations allowed ARDT to throw away the long intake manifolds which normally connect the central twin-choke carburetter to the opposing banks of the flat-four. Instead, a Weber 48 IDA carburetter with one of its two chokes blanked off was mounted directly on each cylinder head — the same number of chokes as the standard car, but a significant increase in power, which jumped by about 20 bhp to a maximum of 144 bhp.

Brgds,
Simon

[justsuds]

I remember reading a piece by Bob Dove, talking about the Dealer Team suds, in which he said pretty much the same thing, they had to use the original number of chokes, but used two 48mm Webers, each with one choke blanked off, and they got an astonishing amount of power out of the engines, 140 bhp I think out of the 1186 or 1286cc engines, - but it is a long time ago, I may be wrong.
John.

[Spacenut]

I remember reading a similar article in ARD, before the management presented Bob with an ultimatum (stay on-topic or stop writing for the magazine ). It is staggering how much power the dealer team guys were able to extract from a 1300 boxer

I've seen this use of a single choke on other machines as well, such as Clubman cars, which might well be working to the same restriction...

Lauren

[Marlow Sud]

Hi John & Lauren,
My 1.3ti Trofeo has two twin choke 48 webers on it. Tom at BLS has recommended we get it on a rolling road to see that it is set up properly and of course......to see what power output it has.
I will report back on what we find.
Brgds,
Simon

Fancy a trip to Northampton Motorsports Shrew?

[BS25]

The Dealer Team cars were quick for the time but power claims were optimistic - they weren't at all special internally. They were significantly quicker once the 1.5 twin carb was homologated. In that form they entered rounds of the Alfa Championship in the early/mid-80's - back when the championship also got support from Alfa GB! At Cadwell I remember Andrew Thorpe and Rob Kirby competing with in Napolina colours - they were running steel panels and slicks, they were doing 1.48's. They weren't the quickest cars there but Rob Kirby did win due to two retirements ahead of him. The 1500 engine wasn't especially competitive in the British Saloon Car Championship as they were up against 1600's - something Alfa have always got wrong - but of course the Sud handled brilliantly! 1700 16v 33's up against 2.0 Astra's and Golf's in the ITCC - overcoming 300cc was too much to ask!

Ten years later I was racing my Sud at Cadwell - 1700 engine, steel panels and control tyres - and doing 1.45's. My Sud was also black and given the class I was running in called for steel panels I always had the time of the Dealer Team cars as a target to beat. I did enjoy racing the Sud!

[Marlow Sud]

Hi Bryan,
Thanks for the historical view. Fascinating.
It's interesting to hear how quick or not the original group 1 cars were. I like the black Sud.
Has anyone got pictures of the Napolina cars?
Was it a Sud, Sud Sprint, Alfetta and GTV6?
Brgds
Simon

[Veesix75]

All of the above....

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=alfa+ ... 6Nh7z2M%3A

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=alfa+ ... zp5cTGM%3A


https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=alfa+ ... vFG2HPM%3A

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=napol ... dNQlMGM%3A

Can't find a sprint but I'm sure I've seen one in the napolina colours.

[Veesix75]

http://touringcarracing.net/Pictures/19 ... -52etc.jpg

http://touringcarracing.net/Pictures/19 ... 981-51.jpg

[Spacenut]

The Dealer Team cars were quick for the time but power claims were optimistic - they weren't at all special internally.

Good point - historical horsepower claims were always prone to exaggeration! For some reason I thought that mature gents such as Jon Dooley and Bob Dove were above such base tactics, but 35 years ago I guess it was a different story!

Lauren

PS - actually there was one exception to the historical horsepower exaggeration rule - over the pond in 1971. Insurance premiums on high performance cars was going through the roof, so the Big Three manufacturers deliberately measured engine power at two-thirds peak power rpm and advertised accordingly. So your Dodge Challenger 440 Magnum was advertised with "only" 390 bhp, when in fact it was putting out something closer to 450!

[Marlow Sud]

Thanks for the pics Tim. You found the Sprint then!

Brgds,
Simon