Alloy 5 bearing block
Turbo Mini Forums

Guessing most people will have seen the post on faceache about SC designing/ready to cast alloy blocks. I thought i would open the discussion on here to talk about it.

5 bearing alloy block, i've read through the comments and Paul W mentioned there is no hole for a dizzy. Also John K mentioned the casting of standard blocks as well. But someone pointed out about their direct injection project that seems to have gone quiet.

Can only hazard a guess at how much this will all cost.

So whats everyones thoughts?

Interesting, I heard KAD had an alloy block project. I don’t know if it is parked or how many main bearings it had.

Trouble is whoever makes one how expensive would it be?

You wouldn’t be able to use it in most competitions would you?

Not sure why ?If anyone wants to go 5 bearing alloy block, 8 port head, fuel injection and ECU control why stick with an A series ?
As the 168 valve mini club have shown it is more effective and probably cheaper to use a modern engine .
I still think the heroes who have extracted huge horsepower from iron head A series are the ones to follow.

Finger trouble - 16 valve !!!

Totally agree, putting in five main bearings, re-spacing the bores ...

All of which doesn’t fix the weakest part of the mini A-series, which is the long tail for primary gear and flywheel.

You would be better off with an engine and gearbox swap.

So is it engineering for engineering sake? I quite like that, but there is there a commercial market?

Nice engineering exercise but if going to that much trouble i’d go with the vetech buds conversion.

An aluminium 1380 3 bearing block looking similar to std would be good. Not sure the bore centres would allow for that though.

what about the gearbox? Say for example you buy the alloy 5 bearing block, the crank, rods, pistons and their alloy 7 port head to go on top what gearbox would you use?

Well if money is no object I guess the “Swiftune” Quaife gearbox.

Maybe they can recreate the JKD six speed.

In my post about the bore spacing, I didn’t write in very well. I meant if you were engineering a five main bearing block would you move the bore spacing too.

Its gotta be over £5k surely by the time you got teh custom crank and rods? I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand its a fun engineering exercise and given how far the community has managed to push the old iron block it'll be interesting to see how much more it can take with 5 bearings. But at the same time, what is actually the point? when does it stop being an a-series. If your making what is essentially an entirely custom engine block why constrain yourself with the architecture of a nearly 70 year old design. Its not like its gonna be able to race against the standard motor, and its completely unnecessary on the road.

Mixed Feelings. I hope if they go ahead they'd at least have the foresight with the new bore spacing to facilitate a bigger piston. And the 16v heads. It'll be a cool thing to see, but i certainly wont be able to ever afford one.

on the subject of gearboxes, there is a 5 speed sequential gearbox coming from Swiftune & quaife which I'll be testing very soon

Team www.sheepspeed.com Racing

Is it still not available to buy? Its been shown for ages.

It would be great to hear what it's like. And please post a video too.

The ratio's are quite interesting between the Quaife and KAD gearboxes, changing final drive they end up basically the same. Except one is an overdrive and sequential, and the other is a 1:1 top gear but conventional gear change.

We will have something interesting on our stand at IMM

I think it’s great. Good on them.

Also, pretty sure it is not cast alloy. Look like CNC from a billet.
The other blocks definitely cast standard steel block, that’s not going to happen until the market needs it though. Blocks are still reasonably easy to source.

Surely more sensible would be an alloy 3 bearing block ?

Are the 3 bearings actually a limitation ? No

Is the gearbox a limitation ? Yes

Is the iron block heavy as feck...Yes.

So an alloy upgrade of a 3 bearing that is externally identifiable as an A....should comply with a lot of motorsport rules so it doesnt fall into an engine swap category, and reduce weight, maybe add strength if designed right etc ?

And could re-use all current rotating parts etc.

And maybe start with a dry deck option for those doing head swaps ?

Edited by stevieturbo on 2nd Aug, 2019.

9.85 @ 145mph
202mph standing mile
speed didn't kill me, but taxation probably will

I think It's a pointless exercise really. As above, It's won't be a a series, so much more cost effective to buy a k series. Once you factor in block, crank, rods, pistons it will cost a damn fortune.

On 18th Nov, 2014 D4VE said:
went down to my local hydraulics place and he gave me a suitable replacement larger nipple

Evening all, I’ll explain a little of what I can explain. For the past couple of years we have reverse engineered the A and A+ blocks, adjusted tolerances to make them “correct” created full cad models and full cad “casting” models, they are at the point where we could commission the tooling but we won’t until the market is ready for them and all the cores are to hard/expensive to find. In the meantime creating a billet block is very easy compared to the cast versions, so why not put time into an iron sleeved solid deck 5 big A series, for us it’s time rather than many ££££’s to tool up and shows what we can do with the A series, Will we retail them-yes if someone wants one, but in the meantime my car Goldie is in need of an engine after 12 yrs sitting dormant......we haven’t forgotten about the gearbox either but these things take time, all the best folks JK

If Carling made Mini engines
it would probably be like this one!

It is great that people are still pushing and developing John...but is there really a need for a 5 bearing A series ? When as such...it could hardly ever be designated or recognised as an A-series...if it effectively isnt one ? Which could be important for some areas of competition where rules can easily get in the way....and competition could be a potential big market.

Unless you can do this and externally have it "identifiable" as an A....or whatever the blue book's wording is.
IMO much the same as the Millington seems to get away with appearing like a Pinto or such...even though it really isnt ?

But I'd say there would easily be a market for a 3 bearing alloy block, where people could use existing proven or already purchased rotating parts etc.

For gearboxes...some sort of billet or strong casing that uses the motorbike internals would seem a cost effective route, as most competition rules dont seem to limit boxes in the same way ? although that would also make most sequential, which can change things a little.

9.85 @ 145mph
202mph standing mile
speed didn't kill me, but taxation probably will

Yeah, I think designing a stronger gearbox, and drop gears, is what the market wants. I really don't see the point in reinventing the wheel, 16v 5 bearing crank is basically fancy k series. I love the idea in principle, but in reality it will cost around 15k for the block, special crank, gearbox ect.

vieturbo,14th Aug, 2019]It is great that people are still pushing and developing John...but is there really a need for a 5 bearing A series ? When as such...it could hardly ever be designated or recognised as an A-series...if it effectively isnt one ? Which could be important for some areas of competition where rules can easily get in the way....and competition could be a potential big market.

Unless you can do this and externally have it "identifiable" as an A....or whatever the blue book's wording is.
IMO much the same as the Millington seems to get away with appearing like a Pinto or such...even though it really isnt ?

But I'd say there would easily be a market for a 3 bearing alloy block, where people could use existing proven or already purchased rotating parts etc.

For gearboxes...some sort of billet or strong casing that uses the motorbike internals would seem a cost effective route, as most competition rules dont seem to limit boxes in the same way ? although that would also make most sequential, which can change things a little.[/quote]

On 18th Nov, 2014 D4VE said:
went down to my local hydraulics place and he gave me a suitable replacement larger nipple

It's just an engineering exercise by the sound of it. Its what this forum is supposed to be about really! Theres no real reason to do anything we do, may aswell just go buy a new car once you start analysing the economics of it all!

The way I've always seen it it's only a proper mini if it keeps the minis one big 'innovation', the gearbox! So anything that can be mated to the transverse gearbox to make the cars better is a good thing imo. An alloy 5 bearing engine is clearly much better design over a boat anchor 3 bearing job even if it will be too expensive for anyone to buy and illegal for most motorsport. I think people should understand alot of it is just a showcase for your buisness rather than some practical product that's going to pay the wages directly.

a showcase that's also a paperweight though.....hard to see the value in it, when there are people who would want the alternatives, and products out in the marketplace, winning races etc is a much better showcase.

For extreme non A-series stuff...that Vetech crowd are already doing that with some impressive looking stuff.
At a huge price !

9.85 @ 145mph
202mph standing mile
speed didn't kill me, but taxation probably will

I believe jimster would agree that a gearbox (casing?) with a little more strength would be a bonus...

And a better gearbox casing could probably be cast quite easily too ? Even if billet is all nice.

But surely a thicker stronger billet centre web would be easy in a billet casing ? And overall design/manufacture would be fairly easy ?

9.85 @ 145mph
202mph standing mile
speed didn't kill me, but taxation probably will

Swiftune are already doing tho no? They are certainly most of the way there.

Evenin, We’re working the way through the power train parts-a billet box will be comparatively straight forward, we just have a few projects in front of it on the list to keep us busy first. After the years of reverse engineering the A Series range of blocks for casting the billet is a bit of an engineering challenge out of the norm, like I’ve said my car needs something to power it, might as well be another worlds first for it with a billet 5 bearing....

If Carling made Mini engines
it would probably be like this one!