Rear mount engines

[Noof]

Hi People,
After some advice on an engine to put in a buggy which my brother in law is building. Almost got hold of an MR2 3sgte which would have just been dangerous!

My question is what other engines would suit this application.
Engine and gearbox mounted behind driver with shifter next to driver etc etc.

I am guessing that MR2, VW and porsche are the only candidates available in Adelaide?

Cheers
Nathan

[jonathan yee]

most common buggy engines are VW's but i've heard some people put the wrx motor's in them as well using the vw gearbox i think

[wa5]

VW engines, or Nissan L series or Mitsubishi 1600 (galant/ lancer or colt) are popular, all depends on how fast you want to go.
Older Beetle transaxles have swing axles (IE the axle only pivots from the diff end, and swings in an arc) these are not that strong, they are prone to breaking diffs.
The IRS (IE these have exposed axles with a CV on the diif and the suspension end) are a little stronger.
But most people go for a 70s Kombi Box. these also have CV type axles, they are a lot stronger than the "car boxes".

any non vw engine will need an adaptor plate/ flywheel.
If you do use a fwd type engine/ gearbox set up, you will probably find it is too high geared once you fit a decent set of big tyres.

[AL510]

You could probably use any front wheel drive engine and box as well. just slide the lot straight back to the rear and put a fixed tie rod where the stearing tie rod is..

cheers, Al.

[wa5]

Problem with almost any FWD setup you might use, is ground clearance. if you put bigger wheels (IE 900 16s) on it, the gearing will suffer. and it probably wont be able to pull anything better than 2nd gear.

only possible exception to this would be a Subaru dual range drive train. in low range with big wheels it may work well enough.

Old Volksys were gutless, and therefore, low geared, so can pull bigger wheels fairly easily.

Is this a bush or Beach buggy?

[M.J.H]

900 16s ????????

Surely some 31/10.5/15s would be more than enough for a buggy.

[thechuckster]

i think Alfa also had a transaxle motor/box setup?

Also audi (NS motor with transaxle) might have suitable hardware.

[Noof]

Ok thanks to those who have contributed so far.

I think that the wheels will not be much different in size from a car initially. We are just messing about with the first buggy and will move onto more advanced designed perhaps later.

Without thinking about it too much...... if I put a front wheel drive gearbox into the back of a buggy will I have to spin the engine gbox around so I can get the shifter in the right place? ? ? Therefore 5 backwards gears and one forward?

Or am I wrong?

[thechuckster]

no .... otherwise you'd have 1 fwd gear and a choice of 5 reverse gearsets.

shifter is connected by cables anyway.

[Noof]

Ah nice! So I can pick any front wheel drive engine/GB combo....... Nice...
Sounds too easy!

Alternately has anyone bought a rear cut MR2 and wants to part with whatever was left when they took out the 3sgte engine?

Cheers
Nathan

[Noof]

Or another silly question,
Is there a front wheel drive GB which mounts relatively easily to an 18 RG? cos I have one of those in my shed?

Cheers
Nathan

[wa5]

Again, is this Buggy intended for Bush or Beach?

900/16s off the front of tractors, are a good sand tyre once Buffed (IE all the tread removed... any tyre retreader can do this... I have also seen it done with a grinder, though dont recomend it) as they are not a steel belted tyre, and bag out really well, with less than 10 psi in em...
Hoosiers also work very well on the sand, but are very wide, so are not so good on narrow bush tracks. and can be a little fragile around sharp objects.

[Bananaman]

You say with all the tread removed.. the tractor we had back in the day had tyres like this:



would this negate the need for doing that?

[Noof]

Sorry WA...... This is intended for use up the river so more likely bush.
Like I said above this is just the first go at it so if there are problems we can address them in Mark II

I think that the tyres we will run will not be too hard core initially. Probably similar to car tyres? maybe bear claws?

Cheers
Nathan

[wa5]

Bananaman, that is the Tyre, fitted to a buggy weighing around 600kg, they probably wouldnt belly out, even with the valves removed.

The tread/rubber is removed so the tyre bags out to make a bigger contact patch on the sand. so yes they still need buffing.