Alloy it is then
Right its taken me an eternity to think about what it is I should do under the bonnet of the GT, well today I spent some hard earned money on the first part of the new engine for the GT. I have bought an old block, head, sump and manifold to use as dummy engine for fitting on the GT. I am going for a Lotus 912 engine 2.2 litre slant four. Some of you may think that wrong but this is my car not yours, but the old engine and gearbox will still be rebuilt and put away in the back of my garage. Its also going to be fitted correctly, so it doesn’t involve cutting my car to fit.
This is not going to be cheap in the short term, but looking at the rarity of slant four parts for tuning and how most of the parts are hoarded by people who think the parts trophies not to be used, I think this will work out cheaper in the long run. It does mean the car will take a little longer than planned but should be worth it to me in the end.
I have dropped the unit off with Retropower so some basic fitting of the engine to the subframe and car can be carried out when they are ready to play. Always a better idea than doing this after the paint is on the car.
The actual engine I have my eye on is from a local Lotus specialists, (www.lotusbits.com) I had a wee trip down to see them this morning, and can confirm they have parts to make up 100’s of engines new and old. I somehow think they will not run out of spare parts should I need them. The engine specifically is a 912, which is the 2.2 litre version, this is out of an old Eclat, a front engined rear wheel drive lotus sports car. This is the LC version of the engine which runs 160bhp in stock form, and should be plenty of power for me to use for now. The good thing is that the route to ever more power should I want it (not right now) is open, and parts are available off the shelf, none of this fabrication and hope routine I have done with Marvin.
I can therefore use the GT as is and upgrade as I want with ease (albeit cash) and the cleaver hard work can still go into developing Marvin, so my brain doesn’t get to confused.
Mule engine
