So after a very long time of not posting anything about my traveller I thought an update was in order, the lack of posts has mainly been due to the amount of work we’ve had on. Hence lack of time to progress with the traveller.
But also because of a slight change of plan, oh no I hear you all cry, and I agree…. I always say to my customers once you have a plan for a build “stick to it” don’t start changing it half way through….. so what have I done,,,, yup changed pretty much everything.
Now my original plan was a budget build using mainly what I had around already. Fiat TC, ford rear axle etc, a perfectly good plan, but as the plan has always been to use the traveller every day and cover around 20,000 miles a year I decided I really wanted ABS brakes, I also wanted fuel injection instead of a carb, mainly to help with the fuel consumption and smooth running, both of which are good thoughts but I needed an abs setup and a fuel injection setup both of which could be adapted to work on the traveller and fiat twin cam respectively, obvious choice Mazda MX5, Why? Because I had a scrap one sitting here, so now I’m thinking while I’m there could I use the complete front and rear suspension setups? You see no matter what you think of MX5s they do ride well with their coil over double A arm front and rear independent suspension, so if I’m pulling all of that out why not just do as others have done before me and use an entire MX5. Problem was the MX5 I had in front of me was just as rotten as the traveller itself so not ideal.
Now I know the traveller is rather rotten and it’s not that I couldn’t rebuild it as a traveller with mods, but it made sense to use everything modern, or relatively modern, this way I’ll get crumple zones, airbag steering wheel, ABS brakes, fuel injection, good heater etc etc, I also get easy parts availability as everything will be MX5, and tuning parts… well the world really is your oyster, you name it and its available, suspension, brakes, performance engine components, just about everything you could wish for,
So I’ve been keeping my eye out for a suitable donor, my criteria was simple,
1, Cheap, very cheap,
2, 1.8 not 1.6, (there goes the fuel economy)
3, had enough good parts on it that I wouldn’t need for myself to sell on so that the donor car will cost me nothing or almost nothing, and I was lucky enough to trip over this, it’s a 2003 1.8 VVT mx5 UK spec, so 148bhp (when new) with just 49,000miles on, so that should push the old girl along ok..
it has heated leather seats, a set of alloys with good tyres on, and a full stainless exhaust system with a brand new cat, the leather seats, the wheels, and the exhaust system should return what I paid for the whole car, it even came with a pair of brand new rear caliper’s that the previous owner had fitted ready for its MOT but never MOT’d it, winner winner….. And it was only a few miles from work.
So my “I’ll just drop a fiat TC into a traveller” has jumped clean out the window as you can imagine. Still I do have a very good Sll shell here that’s begging to go faster……
So first job is to strip the MX down, and then just weld the two together…. Sounds so simple when you say it like that.. I know it’s not that simple as the MX is longer in the wheel base and wider, but I have a large hammer and a grinder so I’m sure it will be ok…..
Now I can carry on with the build and this will be my interpretation of an MX5 under a traveller,
The things that do stand from my original plan are Has to be built on a sensible budget, and still has to look like a Morris Traveller to the uninitiated.
So there you go, oh and if anyone wants some leather seats, alloy wheels or a stainless exhaust let me know.
Steve
- Well loved and cared for....
- mx front edit.jpg (2.01 MiB) Viewed 6006 times
- Grey wing and quarter damage
- mx side 1.jpg (127.13 KiB) Viewed 6006 times
- A clean leather interior
- mx int 1.jpg (104.48 KiB) Viewed 6006 times
- Opps more rust..
- mx sill 1.jpg (72.3 KiB) Viewed 6006 times
- 1.8vvt 148bhp
- mx eng 2.jpg (111.39 KiB) Viewed 6006 times