Hi All,

There are a number of engine swap kits for the classic Mini, like for example this R1 one or this VTec one. My question is, since Rossas (or at least at least early ones) use a Mini front subframe on its rear, is it reasonable to assume that the amount of custom work required to adapt one of these kits to the Rossa should be either minimal or none at all or am I missing something here? I think this, this or similar Duratec 2.0 would be awesome, but I haven't found a Mini kit conversion for it.

Cheers,

Alex

Not sure about the R1 kit but most of the car engine conversions, like the Vauxhall Red Top or the V-Tec, involve extending the Mini subframe and bodywork forwards by a few inches.

Is there room in front of the engine in the Rossa. If not you'll need to do some bodywork mods at the very least.

I agree that the difficulty lies in the front of the subframe. I contacted Geoff Watson a couple of years ago about putting a Honda Vtec in my coupe, he said he had done it before so that may well be worth a phone call.

David

Even the conversions that don't actually extend the bodywork on the Mini usually take advantage of the room in front of the front crossmember of the front subframe (there's a good few inches in front of the subframe before you hit the back of the radiator grill). Even Rover did it with the late automatic Minis and the MPi's - their front subframes have a different front crossmember that bulges forwards between the teardrop mounts.

Certainly on the Coupe that room simply isn't there so the engine needs to sit further back in the frame. In a Mini that would usually result in it clashing with the steering rack which we don't need to worry about.

I'm not aware of any of the "off-the-shelf" conversion kits that fit a Mini that can also be used in a GTM without so much modification that you might as well have started from scratch anyway.

Iain

Many thanks for the responses. Clearly there's nothing straightforward about this sort of conversion. I thought power train room wouldn't be an issue because somewhere I had read that this car had plenty of room because apparently it had been conceived as 2+2 at first. I doubt a mid engine 2+2 is feasible at all (do you know of any?, all the ones I know from the Simca 1000 Rallye to the 911 are surely rear engined), but even the Wikipedia page for the Rossa says it's a 2+2 I'm happy to ammend that if you confirm it's wrong...

my Rossa 2 log book says 2 + 2 but it really isn't any good for anyone to get in the back but the insurance is cheaper than if the same car says 2 seater sports car.