Scimitar GTE

[oakesy]

Hi, I've been on here a few times and thought it was time to post. I've got a 1975 Scimitar GTE 5a and a 1987 Scimitar SS1 Ti. I bought the 5a last march after saving all my money (I'm 15 years old) It had been in a garge for 10+ years, and I got in on the road just in time for the annual Scimitar Weekend in August. The MOT was the day before and its first drive for 10 years was 100 miles
Its had a fair amount of work, and has cost a lot of money, but its worth it, mainly for the skills I've learnt. Here's my project thread with all the work done if anyone's interested
www.scimitarweb.co.uk/sgwrs/viewtopic.php?nomobile=1&f=20&t=14258
I bought the SS1 about a month ago. It'd been in a leaking, falling apart garage for about a year after the owner blew the engine up at 120mph because the turbo had been running more boost and it had a useless intercooler. So far, I've pulled the engine out and got another one built up and painted. I'm hoping it can be put in in the next few weeks. Again, here's the work I've done so far
www.scimitarweb.co.uk/sgwrs/viewtopic.php?nomobile=1&f=20&t=17830
Thanks,
Josh

Here's a few pictures of each:






What it looks like now

The new engine, ready to go in

[greeny]

I know them cars

[Smiler]

That pic of your GTE always brings a smile to my face, I would be very happy indeed to see that parked on my drive every morning. I too am saving up like crazy, I'm older than 15 but I also have a wife and two young children!

[AtomicRooster]

Love the 75!

Ideal colour exterior and interior, keep at it.

[joeyman96]

makes my 99' plate corsa and my 87 plate polo effort at buying cars when young (16 yr old) seem feeble:( but nice cars can see these looking very good indeed soon!

[oakesy]

Thanks

As I'll try and update the thread, especially on the Ti's work, I thought I'd do a bit of background stuff

Ti:
Bought last month with my birthday money. Had a blown engine (compression 0psi)
Here's why is was running hot. It had an interwarmer
It came with a spare that the PO bought though. Since I got it, all the fuel lines have been replaced because they seem to be a big problem on the SS1. I pulled the engine out with guidance from the guy in the garage next door. It only took about 2 hours from fully in to fully out. Once the engine was out, all the chassis was cleaned up, the headlamp panel and nose cone came off and the front armature was rustproofed and painted.


We didn't actually know what was wrong with the old engine, so we took the head off, which turned out to be a curse word of a job. The head is in great condition, as we're the valve and pistons, but at least one bore is badly damaged. Probably due to broken piston rings.


I started to strip and re build the new engine. We didn't know if it was any good, so it would've been silly not to take the head off


Head off, the bores look great, they're like glass


Engine after re build


The plan will be to get the car on the road in standard form, then I might put a new intercooler on it. The set up that's on the car is rubbish, but the intercooler is an ARC one, so I'm hoping to sell it.

The 5a:
The whole braking system has been replaced, its now got stainless pipes, a Tilton M/C etc.


the engine didn't run, so we spent a while trying to work out why. In the end, it was just very bad timing.
While I was de rusting and painting the chassis, I found a little hole... Which turned into a big one.

So I ordered a replacement section and it was welded in


Great car to work on


Once the engine was running, I got it outside to run it up to temperature, when clouds of smoke erupted from the engine bay. I spent hours searching for the cause, thinking it was a HG, but it turned out to be the oil pressure gauge pipe that had burst over the exhaust manifold

It was quickly replaced with a goodridge item


MOT time

And it passed with no advisories
It was then driven to the annual Scimitar weekend at Curborough. The only problem was the broken fuel gauge


There's lots more work that's been done, I just can't remember it

[rockhouse]

hi what bore was the tilton m/c
and was it single or duel circuit
best colour for a scimitar yellow
regards gordon

[oakesy]

The bore is 0.875 and its a single circuit. It fits straight in, but requires a 1/8 NPT male to 3/8 male union adapter. The MC and adapter only cost me £54

[DWDarkWheels]

These look familiar

[rockhouse]

thanks fo the quick reply

[mgmal]

Nice work Josh.
Hopefully we can park both our Yellow Scims next to each other at Curb's this year.!
(your's will no doubt put mine to shame!)
Great to see some one much younger than the "norm" getting into classic's, and especially Reliants!.

Mal.

[79cord]

Love them both, each with such comfortably different characters.

[AtomicRooster]

Just occurred, you're 15!?

I had cars at 12 and had 4 by 15 but nothing even remotely roadworthy, they're all bare shell resto's at the moment.

I'd love a Scim too, cannot afford the insurance though.

[oakesy]

Thanks guys Mal, the beauty of my 5a is it makes everyone else's look stunning Anyway, your green one will be the star of Curborough

Well, One thing we've learnt from today is DON'T BUY A SCIMITAR WITH A DUFF ENGINE!
We went down the garage to fit the inlet manifold (some of those bolts are impossible to install) and do some wiring.

Once that was done, we decided to try fitting the engine. It took 3 hours and a lot of messing around to get it to sit on the mounts. Some of the problems we had were the engine crane was set too short and had to be adjusted half way through, the engine was going in at an angle, it was also rolled over so one side was lower than the other and getting the elbow and turbo together took nearly an hour of hammering and levering. I then realised we forgot to put the gasket in




Tomorrows job will be to connect everything up and maybe see if the unknown engine actually works

[enginewizard1969]

I found the same problem when fitting my engine in my GTC Scimitar seem to put the engine so far back. I like the ss1's would mind one to use as a track day fun car. keep up the good work fingers crossed for tomorrow and the engine fires up all ok

[oakesy]

Thanks, Reliant put the engine so far back in the Coupes/GTE/Cs due to the weight distribution. That's part of the reason they drive much better than similar age cars.
The SS1s are great to drive, there's nothing cheaper that has a chassis as well balanced or has the performance to put hot hatches to shame. With a bleed valve, this car should be producing 160ish BHP and it only weighs 750-800kg
Oh, and the SS1 might be for sale when its done

[oakesy]

^^click

[oakesy]

It may be noticeable in the video, but when the engine first ran, it was only running on 3 cylinders. We checked the ignition system and that was fine, so we checked the fuel system to find cylinder 1 wasn't getting any fuel. Because the other 3 injectors were running fine, it was doubtful that it was the actual injector that was gummed up. We used a voltage meter on the wiring plug to the injector and found it was dead, where as the other 3 were getting good readings. Now it could only be 2 things - The ECU or the wire from the ECU to the injector. A spare ECU was fitted and it made no differance, so there must be a break in the wire somewhere. We spliced into the wire as soon as it leaves the ECU and spliced it back in just before the injector. Guess what. It now runs on 4 cylinders
All we need to do now is solder the wire in to make it more permanent and wrap it into the loom

[oakesy]

The SS1 drove for the first time today



And I fitted a Towbar to the GTE

[oakesy]

I've fitted some new wheels to the Ti today. I wasn't sure if they'd look any good, but they look amazing 8)