Evening

[Schooleydoo]

Hi,just registered and very happy i have finally found a mk1 only forum,love all mr2's but theres only so much i can take of "get a mk2,there faster"!!

Anyway, got an 87 red t-bar,had it about 2 months and absolutly love it. But it does need dragging into this century, sorted the wheels for the moment,planing on some 16" mille miglia's my brother has,just need some spigot rings. worried about the weight of them when parking but wel see.

It has a s/s exhaust and pipercross filter, im way off an engine conversion like a few have done on here, but are there any cheapish power gains out there for my 4age?

Going to try and modify my light relay this weekend to keep the lights down with sidelights on,but i've seen some with the lights halfway down,how is this done?!

I like the dash lights you can get from ebay,but after reading some posts on here might hold onto my money for now! does anyone have details of the bulbs i would need? assume its a dash out job so thinking of new dials at the same time.

Any advice would be much appreciated,new to this and dont want to get things wrong!

[nik]

welcome to TB mate..
what, no mention of an engine swap..tchh..we'll soon sort you out mate..
you cant gain significant power without spending significant amounts of money from any engine..the cost of cams etc is not far off what you'd pay for a 3SGTE..we've all been there and done that but to gain 10 or 20bhp just didnt give me personally what i wanted..
DO NOT buy those ebay LEDs..search the threads and you'll find out why..!
as for spigot rings, we've got great machinists on here who will knock you a couple up for a few notes i am sure..

[Paul Woods]

welcome bud,you sound like me 10 years ago...i only want a little 4a-ge upgrade,nice exhaust,wheels......it doesnt stop there im afraid!! nik is right you will spend a small fortune getting any decent power from it but there are options....how about a bike carb upgrade? i mean just ditch your inlet manifold and t-vis rail,keep the injectors so fuelling is taken care of and make a simple 4 tube manifold up and stick 4 bike carbs as throttle bodies on there,that will be good for 30bhp or so i reckon....just a quick idea off the top of my head.

You can fit cams,unichip but the most you will ever expect to see is maybe 160-170 bhp for a few grand,reliability brought into question...if i were you id save my money until you fancy a bigger engine,its the only way to do it really.

The dash bulbs are easy to fit,but do a net search for LED's instead of the ebay ones.

As for a cheap power gain,there isnt really,the 4a-ge is a yamaha designed engine and its already in quite a high state of tune,essentially a big bike style engine in a car,(you need to rev to 2k to pull away just like a bike!) The flow on a 4a head is really good standard and its quite aggressively mapped in the ecu....an exhaust/filter is pretty much all you can do cheaply,next step maybe cams and unichip,but not that cheap for the gain to be honest.....welcome though,theres bound to be loads here you can get ideas from.

[mr_tim]

IMO you're probably best off sorting the chassis and having the most fun with that. When the need for more power comes swap the 4AGE out and you'll have a chassis that can cope with the upgrade rather than having spent a small fortune on a half tuned 4age :wink:

Of course the idea of a 4AGE on TBs does appeal - it's just not the most bang for your buck!

[Schooleydoo]

I would love a bigger engine in it and am always dreaming about it but untill i hit the magic 25 mark i would just never get insured,so have to stick with my 4age for now. One day though! i went down to r-tec and they wanted 25 for 4 spigot rings,have no experience of them so dont know if im getting my pants pulled down but i would welcome anyone that can make me up a set instead.

I read the led post. :D thanks for that,blokes made his money though so was a good idea,i would have got them if i hadnt read the post.

so my 4age is pretty much putting out all it can as near standard...

mr tim does make sense, maybe i should start looking into weight reduction.

Paul unless im mistaken you have a great set of rear lights,are they custom made?

suspension is next on my list,ive ordered some koni's with a 30mm drop, are they ok? my exhaust hangs quite low already and sometimes scrapes humps

Thanks for the welcome everyone :D

[Schooleydoo]

I've only been registered 12 hours and after seeing that e153 gearbox am already making plans! if i break my car im blaming you lot! :P

my mum lives in chichester,got to be a sign. So how much work is needed to get a mk2 tubby into a mk1? oh that would be nice...

:D :D :D

[Driftin_AW]

the swap is easy! well, it's pretty easy anyway. Read through the install write ups on the twobrutal homepage. I'm about 80% through mine (pretty much just intake and suspension to go) and I've never done an engine swap before, and I've found it quite basic

[nik]

I've only been registered 12 hours and after seeing that e153 gearbox am already making plans! if i break my car im blaming you lot! :P

hmmm sounds familiar.!

[Paul Woods]

oh dear....what have we done?! id also agree with what tim said,you could spend the next few years upgrading your chassis/brakes in preparation for the big engine.


Paul unless im mistaken you have a great set of rear lights,are they custom made? erm the ones on my old red 1.5? all custom made one off rear,impossible to duplicate...took 6 months that did,i wont be doing it again! :D

[Schooleydoo]

ah but their worth it! ok maybe not 6 months but they look good all the same!

read a few guides and i think with some help its do-able. now i just need to ring up my insurance company,terrified! still,if they say no it gives me some time to "prepare"! need a donor car and itl give me time to find a good one. not something i want to rush into,i do that all to often...

Tim im in st albans too,you the artic white t-bar? think i saw you down sandpit lane a couple of weeks back

driftin im sure il be bugging you for help when i start mine!

[mr_tim]

I often see 2 around St Albans. I'm not the white one - mine's a dark metallic blue T-bar. I'll keep an eye out, so if you see a mad mk1 driver waving at you...

[Schooleydoo]

Nice, i havent seen you i dont think but dark blues pretty rare so im sure i will when you drive past! yeah im an e reg red tbar

[Schooleydoo]

Thought i should update, insurance gave me a straight no on a transplant, so going to sort the chassis etc so when i can insure it,itl go straight in and there wont be any wait!

btw tim,saw your car outside a bunch of cherries tue. least i think it was you! not many blue mk1s in st albans...