i'd say the dat dats are more fun,

now heres a slight thread hi-jack if we are on the escort vs datsun topic has anyone ever used a mini for track or rallying i have an offer to buy one for $500 with a leather sunroof immac interior 2k on the engine since rebuild and about 3 rust spots the size of ten cent pieces. i want to keep the dat for a daily but i also want a track or rally car, i know minis kill on the track but cost wise would it be cheaper to do the dat

sorry for the long hijack

at least there's one person that knows something about racing(tsillay). escorts suck, but they have some parts that work great on datsuns. fords have a wider range of diff ratios and larger rear brakes. ford rack and pinion steering work good on datsuns. i dont even whant to talk about cast iron heads v/s alu. etc. kents make more torque, but they can't rev and fords are heavier than datsuns. so if you are smart you will stick with a datsun and use some escort parts on it!

go for the mini, sounds like a great buy, I currently have a mini which is (currently) pretty stock. Minis are the #### for handling they are awesome, already low with hard suspension. If you want a fun club racer for not much money minis are the way. To start developing power for not much cost this is what you need to do: get a 1300 (big valve) engine from an MG1300 of bore the origional engine to that size, get a hot cam, port the head, add extractors, put a twin carb manifold with twin choke side draft webbers. all relatively cheap mods and you develop about 90-110 HP. with wide-wheels and 4 wheel discs it should be a force to reckon with. However if you were to do the same modifications to you datsun you would definently davelop more power. The choice is really yours.

cheers buddy

there is graet escort suff out there but due to the popularity of escorts as race cars

its all rare and also therefore bloody expensive

my bro is doing a mk.1 escort rallycar and he always talks about awesome stuff he can get, only prob is he can never get it

oh and the electrics in the escorts are absolutely SHOCKING, though this can be fixed obviously

im biased towards the 1200 for obvious reasons but the escort isnt that bad a thing

Building any racecar is expensive...but if you can use parts from various vehicles you can keep the costs down. E.G, Tim's old coupe had Ford struts, because the trick
strut inserts were readily available and bigger discs and calipers bolted on. 10 yrs ago Stanzas and the like were still relatively new. It had a Escort rack fitted because it was lighter than a steering box and drag links etc. The diff was a MK 2 Cortina housing with an Escort LSD because they were far cheaper than Datsun ones and had a good range of ratios. With the wheel bolt pattern matching front and rear it was also far easier to find cheap Ford rims as there were far more of them around...Ford competition parts are still available new from England and they appear expensive but it's all relative , they are new parts not thrashed old bits of #### you see in the Trading Post. Nismo parts are not cheap either...As for what car I'd use for Classic racing well ummm I have a 1200 and my other half has an Escort, both are good cars and there is a wealth of info about on how to make either one a flier. Saw a nice MK 1 Escort a few weeks back nice and low, minilites and standard guards , no flares and it sounded really nice. The interior was really tidy and trad and it ran really hard on the track too. I surprised to talk to it's driver at the end of the day and find it was running a 20 valve Toyota motor with a pair of sidies.!! It would have slipped onto a classic grid easily with no one knowing what was going on. If you go for a Datto look out for a project that is already started as there are plenty still out there..don;t go chopping up original ones as they are becoming rarer by the day!!

minis are a great little car but here in australia performance hot up bits are quiet outragiously priced. The real problem is not getting power from them its getting it two the ground without breaking diffs and boxes. You can get lsds and dog boxes etc but at a price.

Escorts are "BRITISH" Is that why they NEED so much specialised stuff to make them competitive?
.
Why did the british motorcycle & car industry all but collapse? Because the Japanese made much BETTER stuff.
Now who makes Datsuns? [answer,... the Japanese]
Datsun took the old Austin A40 engine in the early 60's & they stoped it leaking oil, fixed ALL the engineering failts to make it reliable, then made it go very well for it's time.
Isuzu did the same with the Hilman engine at the same time [Who remembers the Bellet G.T.] This was something that the Brits could never do.

Go the Datsun & maximise your fun at a more affordable price.
Chris
P.S.
Lucas electrics joke [The Prince of Darkness]
Why do the Brits drink warm beer? 'Cos they all got Lucas fridges.

like stirlingmac my other half also has a escort. its a mk 1 rs2000 rep. with the cozy block, bilstiens adj. everything. its had about $22k spent on it and its beautiful. Ive spent $7k on my datto (still running a a12) but if i got this a14 im looking at for $1500 (155hp)and put it in i recon the datto would be as quick if not quicker. If i had unlimited (with in reason) $$ i think the escort would be a beautiful car to build and race, so much history etc. But on a budget the datto cant be bet, hence my love of them. so in short, unless youve got deep pockets and a love of british historical racing the dattos the way to go.

My first car was a mini, by the time I got rid of it it was developing about 85hp at the flywheel.

You cant bore a 1000 or 1100 out to 1275 cc, they have different bore centres or sumthing like that

You also will struggle to fit two twin choke webbers on a mini, ive personally never seen it done, even to fit a single sidedraught webber you have to muck around with the bulkhead as its too close.

Ive never seen a mini with 4 wheel discks, there are some in England and I think there is a guy building a mini dejoux somewhere up north thats doing it. Generally they go hand in hand with beam axles.

LSD or straight cut gear boxes are very expensive and 5 speed are even worse (like 8 grand last time I checked) plus the std 5 speed is only good for about 90hp so above that you need straight cut gears. 4 speed gearboxes are cheap and plentiful so theyre pretty easy to store if ya can swap them yourself.

My old mini was a 1275GT with twin SU's, extractors, 1 7/8 exhaust, head work, hot cam, higher compression, 20 thou over. Every single person that went in it was impressed. Only trouble was stopping it from spinning the wheels as it was well undertyred.

Sorry for hijacking the thread

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