Evening guys,
I am with a friend building a off road go kart kinda thing for out major work for the HSC and it came to the engine question and my thoughts were to use a mini engine, but i know that the best place to have the engine would be middle to backish. do you think that this would cause problems with a mini engine in relation to gear changing? would the h pattern be in reverse?

thanks in advance
Ed

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Eddy

Get a Matic!

not a chance! this thing is gunna be a machine! do you get what im saying though? basically is is possible to move a mini engine to the rear of a vehicle and still use a manual gearbox?

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Eddy

Yes, and not too hard if you use a rod change gearbox.
You will have to make up your own linkage for the gear change,
or at least adapt a cable change from a Jap car to suit

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Too many cars, and too little time.

try doing a google search for the twinnimini. In the 60's the english works team built a couple(?) of twin engined rallycross/race cars. The rear engine was reversed and they had to re-jig the gear linkage and yes, the pattern was reversed from memory.

It's mentioned in a few of the brian moylan/stuart turner works books but not too many details from memory. It was fairly lethal and abandoned when someone almost killed themselves in it.

I would think a motorcycle engine with sequential box and chain drive would be a better proposition. Have a look at the edge website for inspiration

www.edge.au.com - note the reversal of com and au is deliberate.
KB

Ed, if you search through the various little jap cars
you will find a FWD with a very compact engine & a cable gear change that can be mounted in various locations without modification.

Toyota Starlet, Hyundai Excel & Daihatsu Mira all use cable change

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Too many cars, and too little time.

thanks heaps ill have a look into that! i dont want a reall big engine either so that is helpful
cheers
Ed

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Eddy

I dunno what your budget is but if you can stretvh look elsewhere.
A mini engine is just that bit heavy for what you want, I'd go looking for a 4cy small capacity bike engine, much more power and the sequential shift as mentioned, it's light and would have good power.

that is a good idea BUT my friend wants the body to make a mini trailor! so this way it works out cause we could buy a shell with the good bits for the same price i think n e ways but thanks heaps!

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Eddy

It's been done many times before and is very simple to do . The Nota Fang uses a rod change box and a simple linkage to take the rod under the box towards the front and then goes into the normal shifter though it's facing backwards . I'll try and find a pic of one setup and working , mines in pieces at present and will only look like a few bits of flat or bent rod .....

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Thanks heaps! thatd really help. at least i dont have to start till september

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Eddy

Typical isn't it , I can't find the picture I was looking for , anyway , there are 2 ways you can do it , one's better than the other . You can just make a simple J shaped bar that goes from the gear shifter mounted in front of the motor to the end of the rod where it goes into the gearbox (basically a solid rod that goes under the sump , bends up 90 degrees behind the gearbox and then bends 90 degrees to connect to the rod change stub coming out of the gearbox ) , this isn't as precise as the other method but has less moving bits to break under abuse . The second one I've seen used on several race cars is a similar , straight rod coming under the gearbox to directly under the rod change stub , then bend 90 degrees to the side (drivers side to miss the diff etc) . put a short piece of rod on the rod change stub coming from the gearbox also with a 90 degree bend towards the drivers side . Connect these two rod ends to each other with another rod (make them so they hinge)so that when the rod coming from under the gearbox is twisted by the gear shifter , it pivots the vertical joining rod up or down which then moves the rod change stub up or down the same . basically you'll be setting it up as somethingof a parralelogram , twist the bottom corner and the top twists the same . Providing you make it all stiff enough the forward and backwards movement of the under gearbox rod will also be transferred to the rod change stub .



Ok , now that I've really confused you I'll do a diagram in the next few days and attach it here , when you see it you'll see it's a lot easier than it sounds .

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Is is possible to make an engine run backwards, by changing the cam timing and starter direction?

Not without a fair bit of engineering I would have thought , apparently Austin did it in the 20's with the Austin seven when it was built under licence in Russia (I think from memory) , the reversed everything in the motor so the Russian parts wouldn't work in the English Austin sevens so they couldn't sell cheap parts to the English owners . So I've read anyway .

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So you want basically this, with big wheels and the seat facing the other way

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'78 LS 1275