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Go Back   Madabout Kitcars Forum > Mad Build Area > Vintage and Classic Roadster Kit Car Builds

Vintage and Classic Roadster Kit Car Builds For Vintage and Classic era kit cars. Post your build reports, problems and progress here

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  #1  
Old 30th October 2015, 20:10
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Default Up-dating my McCoy

In the beginning

I first heard from a friend about the car, he told me that a friend of his was selling a mini based kit car but couldn’t give me any details of it, I arranged to go and view the car thinking it may be a Mini Midas or similar but when I first saw it, it reminded me of a car I was familiar with from the 70’s, the Clan Crusader but it didn’t look quite right and I knew the Clan had an Imp engine, looking around it had stick on letters saying McCoy which then I was not familiar with, I asked the price, he told me £200 and I gave him the money. It wasn’t running very well so I organised a trailer to get it home.



I got the trailer and went to collect the car to bring it home…



The next day I had a good look over the car and didn’t look too bad but had mechanical issues which I decided it was time for an overhaul, engine, gearbox rear sub-frame, the usual mini problems and later purchased a donor mini.











The interior was shabby but nothing that couldn’t be improved.
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  #2  
Old 30th October 2015, 21:05
garyh garyh is offline
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carry on, I'm enjoying this....
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  #3  
Old 30th October 2015, 21:15
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Default Stripping out

I had the car a few years before serious work was started, women’s requirements got in the way, you know what I mean, get married fix up house, move, fix up house etc etc….

Well I got the car on the 20th January 2004 so work out how much time I havn’t been able to get on with it.

Anyway, I was helping my eldest son put a Vtec Honda engine into his mini but he wasn’t putting enough effort into it due to him working 50 miles from home and it looked like I was going to do it for him, there he was wrong, I had other thoughts, I gave him a deal which let me have all the parts he had for the Vtec conversion which I could then put into the McCoy but I never made the deal until we had the engine running because a lot of work would be needed to get it to fit the McCoy and I wasn’t prepare to cut the car to get it to fit with knowing it was a runner.

In the mean time in slow time I started stripping out the McCoy to fit the parts from the donor mini just in case.



This had to come out….



and this along with several other parts that had seen better days…



The engine bay was stripped and cleaned…



On doing this showed a problem with the firewall suffering from heat off the mini exhaust, that would need repairing…



The door cards were removed along with the rest of the interior and the part have been stored until I get back to them.



The fuel tank would also need some work….



None of this would be needed as I would be fitting a beam axle with new swinging arm assemblies that my son had got new for the mini, but I would refurbish the swinging arms as spares…



This lot had to go… and it would become apparent that the front valance would need cutting to allow the Vtec exhaust to fit.



I am not sure what my son was thinking here but I think it would probably be ‘This will be a monster with my Vtec in’

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  #4  
Old 30th October 2015, 21:41
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Default The engine inspection

I said to my son ‘It would be a good idea to inspect the engine before we bench tested it’ because it was bought off E-Bay and collected from the back of a van somewhere in London and we didn’t have any history of it. All he knew that the engine was from a Honda Del Sol and it was a 1.6 B16A2 Vtec unit with gearbox.

We emptied the sump and with horror about a litre of water came out with the oil and sludge, so the sump was to be removed for further investigation



On removal of the sump the bottom end looked surprisingly clean but the sump itself was full of sludge.





The small amount of emulsified oil was removed….



The main and big end bearing shells and crank were inspected and only a small score was found on one of the shells..











So all was cleaned and rebuilt..

While the engine was out a new clutch assembly was fitted along with a new timing belt and tension pulley.

Last edited by pompeyal; 30th October 2015 at 23:14.. Reason: .
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  #5  
Old 30th October 2015, 22:14
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Default Sub-frame build

The sub-frame was purchased from a company that manufactured them to suit minis with other engines, as the McCoy was mini based this sub-frame was also suitable, the following was progressed when it was being destined for my sons Mini, the majority of the parts were brand new and other donor part came from the mini and we refurbished…

These were some of the new parts..











And some of the refurbished or made parts..







It was a struggle to say the least to get the engine into the sub-frame and had to be support from a crane while the sub-frame was put onto it, just like putting on a coat. As this was the easiest way of fitting them together the hole assembly would have to be removed from the car if any major work had to be done



Finally the engine was in and then the suspension, drive shafts steering components etc was assembled.





Later in the build it was apparent that the heater hoses would clash with the sub-frame so it had to be redesigned to sort it out..









That done the trick, it shouldn’t have had to be done if the sub-frame manufacturer accommodated it and there were a few other clash issues I had to deal with, with regard to the sub-frame.

Last edited by pompeyal; 30th October 2015 at 23:16.. Reason: .
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  #6  
Old 30th October 2015, 22:41
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Default Engine bench test

Heath Robinson would have liked this, I pulled a bench out into the garden and clamped the sub-frame, complete with engine and mini fuel tank a radiator and wiring harness, stuffed an old silencer into the manifold with fire gum attached a battery and tried to fire it up…



















Go here for first trial video https://www.flickr.com/photos/383774...7658176284393/

The problem was the immobiliser within the ecu, the steering column was from a different car than the ecu, so the internet was called for, I went searching for possible solutions and it came up trumps, a guy on a Honda forum described in depth on how to by-pass the immobiliser circuits in the ecu, this meant opening it up cutting a couple of resistors out and putting in a few links, after doing this, this is what happened next

Go here https://www.flickr.com/photos/383774...7658176284393/

Last edited by pompeyal; 30th October 2015 at 23:18.. Reason: .
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  #7  
Old 30th October 2015, 22:45
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Well that's the first 5 episodes of 27 to date, more to come, watch this space....

Last edited by pompeyal; 31st October 2015 at 09:46.. Reason: .
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  #8  
Old 31st October 2015, 12:36
a big scary monster a big scary monster is offline
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Excellent, thanks for putting all this effort into the thread a most pleasant surprise when I logged on. That swage tool is a work of art you should hire it out, I followed a McCoy last week they look better as they get older Ed
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  #9  
Old 31st October 2015, 13:50
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Hi Ed, I thought I should as I have been teasing for a while, I don't think you will reckonise mine when its finished, if you see that McCoy again would you mind taking its reg no as I am trying to make a database on them, cheers..
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  #10  
Old 31st October 2015, 14:10
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Default Rear end

Now for the back, the old sub-frame was in serviceable condition believe it or not but not for me, I wanted to use the beam axle my son had for his mini, the problem with these after market items they do no cater for everything and the beam was no different, it did not have provision for the handbrake cables so as its what I do I made that right…





Having that sorted the beam was drilled for fit and powder coated..



The beam was offered up and centralised, the car drilled and then bolted into place, I will be strengthening the heal plate it fits to later…



Nice new coil overs..



Refurbished swinging arms with new brake parts and bearings were then fitted to the beam, all the geometry will be set up at a later date..



I was going to have it sit on revolution 12” wheels…


But decided on these 13” Starmags..



The problem with all McCoy’s they sit high in the arch at the rear, even using hi-lo coil overs, I have thoughts on righting that later.
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  #11  
Old 31st October 2015, 14:35
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Default Rear Lights

Now the car was back on wheels I could put it back in the garage, even though the garage was small it would do for a while as I had planned a much bigger garage when I had my extension built.

The rear lights were tired so I searched E-bay for some suitable replacements, as my ideas were not for going modern on the looks at this stage I got some from a Triumph Dolomite, because the rear panel on the car is flat it lent itself to 70’s lights.





First the old lights were removed and a template for the hole positions for the new lights was made.







Holes were cut…





New lights and number plate trial fitted, looking better..





A few coats of paint..





A few stripes…



And that looks good, the paint colour was decided to celebrate the routes of the car where the designer ‘Arthur Birchall ‘ was originally an engineer for the Lotus Racing Team..

Last edited by pompeyal; 31st October 2015 at 18:47.. Reason: .
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  #12  
Old 31st October 2015, 14:46
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Default The boot lid

 Next was the boot lid, first thing was to flat back and fill the hole that some previous owner drilled for a hideous ill fitting spoiler, maybe he liked it but not my cup of tea, I have other plans on that front and I am considering integrating an air brake…hehe





A few coats of primer..



And a couple of top and that will do for the time being..

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Old 1st November 2015, 15:35
Althecate1 Althecate1 is offline
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I'm liking this resto/conversion.
Alec
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  #14  
Old 1st November 2015, 16:09
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Thanks Alec more coming....
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  #15  
Old 1st November 2015, 16:10
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Default Throttle

The throttle peddle was the next to be sorted as I was using a Honda cable and due to where the engine sub-frame covered the original cable hole for the mini I had to re-position the hole to miss the sub-frame



As the Fibre glass was thicker than the steel firewall from the Honda I manufactured a carbon-fibre interface plate





The the peddle needed to be altered to suit the new cable position



The peddle then was warmed and bent upwards to achieve enough travel but not so the it sat above the brake peddle



The engine was refitted into the car and the cable run in



The throttle body was the fitted and the throttle was tested for full travel



All good there
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  #16  
Old 1st November 2015, 17:40
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Your exhaust routing idea and cut section weld techniques for the bends are as inspired as your steering spline mod.
The McCoy I saw was in Brighouse west Yorkshire travelling with a hard top quantum and a mustard coloured allegro towards hebden bridge so they probably came off the M62 so could of been from anywhere. It was odd because when the quantum came out I recall drooling over it particularly the use of Sierra sapphire back lights but yet now it looked very dated and the rear lights looked massive whereas the McCoy looked more like a traditional yet very small sports car lotus élan esque.Ed.

Last edited by a big scary monster; 1st November 2015 at 17:43..
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  #17  
Old 1st November 2015, 18:01
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Default The Throttle body

I now discovered a major problem, the throttle body inlet was looking straight at the clutch master cylinder, now that’s not good, I had a few options here, I could either buy a set of individual throttle bodies or go the hard way and modify the one I had..





Well a challenge it was then, there seems to be a theme going on here, if I can go the hard way then that’s the way to go, my thoughts on these things are, anyone with enough money can go and buy all the nice new goodies and bolt them on but I wanted to make this mine so the modification was the way to go.

So here goes (Caution: this part of the build took some time and I want to thank both my welder colleagues for all the work they put in for me here)





First things first, I need to cut and shut the ports to allow the throttle body and chamber to lift up and forward away from the clutch master cylinder, I decided where to cut and then machined both the cut faces flat and square.







After I checked the measurements and angles of the machined part, incase I needed to make further changes after a trial fit.







After checking there became a mismatch of the ports, this was expected and I was going to put in spacers later to compensate for the errors



A trial fit was done and the spacer thickness was determined





Once knowing the thickness the angle for each spacer was measured



Then I manufactured them







Once made all was cleaned and this is where my welders made it all come together, after lots of cursing of course








One side done….now for the other half
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Old 1st November 2015, 18:17
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Default The Throttle body (cont’d)

This is where the cursing came in





As you can imagine it was very difficult for him to get to some of the weld areas but he kept at it and produced this..





Now to machine the distortion from the flange face





With that done the bores were ground flush to remove any welding and rough edges then it was back to the car to see how it looked





That done the trick, well that was the first saga over with..

On assembling the air temp sensor fouled the injector rail so that had to be dealt with, I ground away the rail but that wasn’t enough, if I went much deeper then I would have broken through into the fuel gallery so other thoughts had to be made.



What I needed to do was machine the boss at an angle to allow clearance, make a new boss so back to the milling machine and then speak nicely to my welder again..

















All done now to fit it all together..







Just right….

Last edited by pompeyal; 1st November 2015 at 18:35.. Reason: .
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Old 1st November 2015, 18:33
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Default The Throttle body (cont’d)

After fettling a bit more from the fuel rail to allow for the throttle movement the was on last thing to do..


The brake vacuum take of pipe was facing in the wrong direction



So after gently heating the casting around the pipe I managed to rotate it to the required direction





Now it was completely assembled and ready to fir to the engine..





Happy with that…
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  #20  
Old 1st November 2015, 18:57
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Default The wiring harness

I acquired a complete Honda harness that I was going to modify to suit the McCoy, It was a harness from a civic so I would have quite a few bits to cut out, first I took the rear harness and rebuilt that, removing the electric window wiring and anything else I didn’t require



Then I started to fit the engine harness and the engine bay harness for the lights etc, this I would cut about removing unwanted bits later.





The parts of the harness I didn’t need were the ABS, Air con etc

I made drawings of the wiring and what was for what, labelled all the ends and then it was ready for stripping, I didn’t want to do that yet because I didn’t know what was required for the ecu, so I started the cabin wiring (Warning: If you have a nervous disposition look away now)

















Well if you can make any sense of that lot without getting a head ache please come and sort it out because it has done my head in, I won’t let it beat me but I will be doing it in stages, it had taken an age to get here, looking through wiring diagrams, sorting out what is needed, what may be needed, what isn’t needed or of it was effected by what had been or was going to be cut out…..Hmmmm, needless to say I have left this alone for a while now to get my sanity back
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