Garden variety MG Midget, needing a paint job. That exhaust pipe looks a bit suspect, though.
I still had a 12-A Mazda rotary engine sitting on my shop floor. It had been an unused racing spare. It had gone into my red RX-7, but the result had been unsatisfactory for a daily driver (not the fault of the engine). I had been prepared to install it into the Lenham coupe I had bought, but I had changed my mind, not wanting to chop up the rare and complete car. The idea of putting the rotary into a “tiny” car had intrigued me for years. Time to do something about it for real.
Let’s finally get this thing installed in a car, shall we?
The Lenham had introduced me to local British car events and shows. While there, I met the “MG guy”. Otherwise known as “the guy from Lake Elsinore that has a hundred MGs, but wants full price for them”. Others said he was hard to deal with, or a bit “off”. I found that he was an entirely reasonable guy, who was unwilling to simply give away MGs because he had a hundred of them. If he had made the effort and commitment to store them for decades, why should he just give them away later on? My impression was that he was charging full market for weathered but complete old MGBs and Midgets (which wasn’t a whole lot in 2014, but it was something greater than zero). I think, keeping in mind that a guy who saves a hundred MGs for decades is not your average guy, or even your average car guy, the odd reactions people would make to him would, in turn, elicit odd or somewhat combative responses from him. Dealing with him as a person with MGs ready to sell, and me as a potential buyer, we both treated each other straight up, fairly, and honestly. What more can you ask for in a transaction? He even went above and beyond by methodically trying to coach me through getting an old and skip-owned pink slip through the DMV. As I had just gone through a missing-and-with-transfer-of-title pink slip process with the Lenham, I felt I had the DMV process nailed down well (which I did, as it turned out). But I appreciated his effort.
Lake Elsinore lies in the lee of the mountains just east of Orange County, California. At the time, it was one of those quirky California towns that had never gentrified or “grown up”, and was full of eccentric people living “alternative lifestyles”. Two claims to fame were that the lake itself was a prime area for the fire-fighting seaplanes to land and refill to fight area brush fires, and for the large and somewhat well-known nudist colony on the outskirts of town (apparently nudist colonies are often hidden and not on the map, but this one bucked the trend). In the meantime, my counterpart had a whole bunch of MGs, and the city had decided that his site was both a public nuisance and potentially an unregistered toxic waste site, so the city was after him to move out most of the cars. The threats to crush them all, if he didn’t disburse the cars, was unnerving to him. From the circumstances under which he had arranged his life, understandably so.
As I arrived at the site, I found him both a font of knowledge on British cars generally, and MGs specifically, and also a very meticulous person. While there were rows of MGBs covering most of his property, he knew the history, features, and condition of each one of them. He had removed the engines from each of his cars, had noted which engine number went with each VIN in a vast pen-on-paper book of spreadsheets, and had put all the engines into a closed metal warehouse, mounted in racks and in rows. Among other cars there, I glimpsed two Jensen-Healey Estates (shooting brakes, two-door wagons, whatever you want to call them). Jensen-Healey didn’t make very many of those. While he didn’t give me any free rein to just look around, he did give me a tour. He apologized for being distracted, as he was busy mating Midgets with their extracted engines, and crating them up, six at a time, to be shipped to Australia. I guess Australia had an appetite for left-hand drive Midgets, some years back. He was glad to get the cars moving out, as neighborhood kids had taken to trying to shoot the Midget windshields with B-B guns, at his rented Midget lot across town. When you own over a hundred old cars and everyone is treating you poorly over it, it does tend to stress a person out.
He seemed to enjoy someone interacting with him on his terms, and not questioning what he was doing, or trying to bargain unreasonably with him. I helped him carry an engine over to his Midget lot across town, as a particular car (needing its engine) was going to be picked up from there later in the week, and we were heading over there anyway. We went over to pick out a Midget for me, and I explained to him what I was up to. We agreed to pick the least-likely-to-be-restored car that was complete and serviceable, because neither of us wanted me to build out a car that could otherwise be nicely restored to stock condition. We picked out a car from the dozens on the lot, one that had been hit gently in the left front and had a slight tweak to the radiator mount area. He assured me the frame and suspension mounting points were solid and square. As I was cutting up the radiator mount area anyway, to adapt a larger rotary-compatible cooling system, the car seemed like an appropriate choice for me, and I trusted him on the rest of it (and I was right to do so, as it turned out). We towed it on my trailer, back to his main lot.
He sorted the paperwork out, and he added some parts from his used parts inventory that were missing from the car, such as the convertible top frame assembly, an untweaked left front fender, and a front bumper and mounts. My kind of seller, who seemed genuinely honest, and who was trying to make sure I would not be disappointed in my purchase. $700, and I could have probably found something much cheaper on my own, but would I have gotten a complete car? Would I have gotten one that, while dinged a bit, was “certified” (strictly by a man’s word of honor) to be suitable for my needs? He also gave me photocopies of a long list of MGBs and Midgets, detailing the characteristics and condition of each one, complete with VIN, and with his asking price. He asked me to share it, as appropriate. The city was going to crush his stash, and he needed to find homes for his cars, much as people try to find homes for puppies or kittens, before they are euthanized.
I learned two things that day. One was that people may seem eccentric or troubled, and perhaps there are good circumstantial reasons for it, as in his case and the need to find homes for all of his cars. Two was to take people as they are, rather than judging them against cultural norms. If their differences are not dangerous or potentially harmful, everyone can come away from the encounter and interaction feeling pretty good about things, about each other, and about people in general. I know I did, that day. Old cars can create human connections, even superficial and fleeting ones. I hope he found homes for all those cars which meant a lot to him. Looking at Google satellite photos today, I see his lot cleared of cars, but the warehouses are still standing, and the entire fenced site exists as an island in a sea of recently built tract houses on tiny lots, as they build them in the California suburbs these days.
So, back to my newly acquired Midget. I knew from the Lenham that I could fit in it, and unlimited head room would be welcome in a tightly constrained cockpit. The matter of the engine and driveline was a puzzle to be solved. I knew it could be done. It was a matter of how to most elegantly and appropriately do so, with as little cutting and chopping as possible. As it turned out, only cutting the heater mount area, aft and above the rear of the stock engine, was necessary. A bit of cutting away for the radiator, and for the gear shift lever from the Mazda transmission, which emerges a few inches aft of the factory MG piece, was all it took. The Mazda RX-7 transmission is actually very light (with an aluminum case) and compact. The structure of the Spridget transmission tunnel is mostly enclosed, and outside of fabricating and fitting a custom transmission crossmember (along with the front engine mount crossmember), everything just drops in. Not only that, but using the older and shorter Mazda points-and-condenser distributor, meant that the hood could close over the engine without modification or cutouts, and the bottom of the oil pan was flush with the bottom of the car frame. It all fit! Like so many cars of today, it is a bit tight in the engine room. Get out those floppy joints for your socket extensions, you are going to need them. There is no extra space in any direction.
A preliminary fit. Only the MG’s heater mount needed to be cut away, to make it work.
It’s in there, and it works! Once you get all the ancillaries done, in a small place, it’s hard to see the engine underneath it all.
Transmission fits well, and there are the brake line, the fuel line, and the fuel return line (a rotary engine thing). It’s like building a puzzle by making your own pieces along the way. And then you drive around the solved puzzle.
I found the mating of the engine and the car a very satisfying exercise. It was like the dimensions of each were made for each other. The (big) battery went into a box in the trunk, and the factory MG heater was moved closer to the firewall and adapted as an auxiliary cooling system. A completely new wiring loom was created, incorporating many more fuses and a series of relays. The original MG loom ran all of the power through the switches and buttons, and that is not the way to do things these days. We don’t want any dashboard fires.
Lots of fuses and relays, mounted on the passenger side kick panel. Not much physical room anyplace else for them!
Metal-boxed battery, main electrical switch, and the main fuse. Add the spare tire and jack, and the trunk is mostly full.
A custom exhaust system had to be fabricated. It looks a bit on steroids, relative to the rest of the car, but it is what it has to be. The straight-through glass-pack mufflers are a bit loud, but there are three of them of various lengths, matched to the spaces available, and the car is still a bit noisy at speed. On the other hand, I can use the excuse made by the Harley riders, when their machines make the loud unmuffled “potato-potato-potato” engine sound, the idea being that at least they will hear you coming, because they will never see you. It’s a safety feature. Yeah, right, okay then.
Fabricating a tiny header for a tiny space.
Measure, cut, fit, weld. Repeat, repeat, repeat.
The exhaust system all fits, but it doesn’t look factory stock in the back.
I kept the rest of the car stock, particularly the brakes and the suspension, the wheels, and the skinny tires. I actually found that the engine was very mismatched to the car, as it sits. The factory engine of 65 horsepower or so is actually well matched to the rest of the car, as I have experienced it in the Lenham. The capabilities of each are appropriate to each other, in their limitations. Putting 110 horsepower into the little car overpowers it, at least with the factory underpinnings. I may need to rethink things on this one. Perhaps a smaller, less powerful motorcycle engine. I could go back to stock, but the point of the project is to find things that work well together, that didn’t come together. If a car has a mechanical soul, then this engine swap kind of ripped the soul out of the car. Despite the elegance of fitting a litre (1.148 litre, specifically—smaller than the stock 1.275 liters) into the pint pot, I didn’t accomplish what I had hoped to do, which was to build a completely satisfying package to drive around as a toy. Close, but not quite there. Get heavy on the throttle, and things get kind of squirrelly. Perhaps a buildup of the suspension and brakes, but that will wait for another day and for some thinking through.
All done! Too much engine for a little car on skinny tires. A nice start that will need to be thought through some more…
In the meantime, I think I have a starting point of something interesting. Short of the bulging musculature of the exhaust system, it goes together like everything was designed for each other. I will come back to it later, once I try some experiments and figure some things out. All will be made clear next week…
Spridget, with its 18th century semi-elliptic sprung cart axle, woossy windup windows & (Cec Kimber and Heb Austin forfend!) DOOR HANDLES, had stepped back from the Bugeyed Sprite’s spartan sportiness, losing the handling and axle-tramp proofing of Quarter Elliptic springs and radius arms: one of the best located live axles in production. Spridget gained weight, lost taut road-hugging, and gained nothing that good special tuners hadn’t long squeezed out of the A-series engine. Bolt-on vane and Roots type blowers had been around since the first Sprite’s dear little froggie face graced the automotive pond. A guy in Tasmania shoehorned a Jag XK into one, and it handled well. Big brakes were fitted to many. The Fierce little Frogeye’d be my choice for a hot rotary! A few of my G.Fs drove Spridgets. The delightful Air Stewardess Secretary of our branch of the MG Car Club drove a red Midget when I drove a Stage 10 Red B Type.
Spridgets really are blank canvases, more than most other cars. I actually prefer the later generation cars from a feature and appearance standpoint, but the original Bugeye is a much more pure, uncompromising, and unique iteration of the whole Spridget thing. It would be hard for me to rotary a Bugeye, as it would seem somehow blasphemous.
There’s one going begging in Niedermeyer’s stomping grounds: https://kansascity.craigslist.org/cto/d/holt-1978-mg-midget-13b-rotary-spd/7486288717.html
How does one advertise a car with an engine swap as the biggest point of interest and not even show a picture of the engine bay in the ad? Jeez. Dutch’s story explains the likely reason for the sale…A 12A rotary is great, a 13B is better – in an RX.
People these days scoff at anything with merely 110hp, here’s proof that it’s weight and size that are the enemy instead, many of which conversely come as a byproduct of said bigger engine – more power, now you need bigger brakes to stop, wider tires and wheels to handle the power, beefier components to handle the additional stresses etc…and all of a sudden it’s lost a lot of the driving charm that was the point of it to begin with. You’re the very rare person to acknowledge that somewhere between stock and what you’ve created is a better answer.
I’m impressed with your skills and apparent abilities and have certainly enjoyed these stories, the little MG must be quite the interesting thing to hear going by with the rotary exhaust note and it’s great that the body is how it was, i.e. not the first thing to be “restored” as with so many other projects, many of which seem to end up remaining so, i.e. a nicely painted body on a dolly gathering dust.
here’s proof that it’s weight and size that are the enemy instead,
I get your point, but it’s not exactly definitive proof. There are a number of very/ultra light sports cars, like all those Lotus 7 based ones, that don’t jive with that. The real problem here is simply that this chassis and body, many aspects of which go way back and started out on spindly little economy cars, is simply not suited for such a bump in power.
It’s the design of the chassis and body structure, not just weight and size.
I think we can find a number of examples of very light cars, especially in Japan, that have/had a similar power-to-weight ratio, or better. But again, they have the modern chassis and body structure to handle it.
It’s noteworthy that the Spridget was frankly pretty marginal in its time; a recent comparison review of SCCA Showroom Stock Sports Cars I posted recently had the Midget dead last. It was primitive and very unambitious from the get-go. It could be fun, but it was crude. So it does not surprise me in the slightest that this one with 110 hp was totally overwhelmed.
A Spitfire might have been a better choice; a later one with the improved IRS.
“proof” was the wrong word…”example” might be better but yet still an oversimplification. My thoughts were that just because someone wants or thinks a given car needs more power, and then adding what seems a small amount numerically but is a large amount proportionally can sometimes not result in the desired result, i.e. a car that can hang with everything else on the road dynamically. An engine swap has far more things to consider than just simply the belief that adding more power of any amount will make the car “better”.
Agreed.
I don’t want to come off as a “I told you so” smart-ass, but the outcome of this swap was pretty predictable in my mind. Engine swaps can be effective, but the marriage has to involve two appropriate partners.
“Engine swaps can be effective, but the marriage has to involve two appropriate partners.”
Truer words were never written.
I’ve noticed as a Suzuki Samurai owner that there’s no shortage of people who want more than the 63 to 66 hp that the stock 1.3L puts out. The 1.6L engine out of the Sidekick/Tracker is a popular swap; it adds approximately 25% to 50% more horsepower, weighs about the same as the 1.3, and fits and mates up almost perfectly with frame and transmission/transfer case.
But then there are those who want to go so far as a SBC. Then you’re looking at a different transmission, transfer case, and relocation of a bunch of components. And then you have a tiny off-reader that’s front heavy and requires power steering. I’m not saying this is wrong, but my opinion is that this changes the entire character of the vehicle, and creates a mismatch that the other components weren’t designed to handle.
Loved reading this piece. Great reflections on the buying experience. It sounds like you really clicked with the seller, and much of this essay was a powerful reflection on interacting with others and batting away preconceived notions.
Probably all the readers here can admire the vision and execution of building one’s own custom car with a custom powertrain. But I suspect that only a small minority of us have gotten that experience.
I love, too, that the car’s exterior has remained untouched. I think that gives it a really rough and tumble look that suits the spirit of this project.
A fan of the Spitfire here, as I love it’s mini XKE vibe, especially the way the front end tilts up for engine access. Don’t know if I’m ready for anything else British, at the moment at least.
I really feel for the guy that collected all those cars, not without effort and expense. As residential areas develop and spread, those little awkward and quirky areas are put under a lot of pressure to “clean up their act” so that other property owners can get better prices for their land. “The powers that be” can exert a lot of pressure on an individual property owner.
In the recent past, scrap metal values were up and roving car crushing machines were dispatched across the countryside. The gentleman in the post was very methodical with careful record keeping, which is not how most accumulations are organized.
I’ve read lots of posts on various forums where the local government goes after a vehicle hoarder, one recent account on the AACA forum described a Sacramento area owner who was hit with over 500,000 dollars in accumulated fines. (It’s a complicated story with a lot of parts.)
I’ve personally known of collectors that had a great amount of their collections crushed in a settlement with county compliance.
As a city dweller in a now high priced neighborhood, I’m surround by recent home buyers that don’t have any interest in old cars or the DIY/ hobbyist ethos. I try to be very careful not to offend the neighbors, (who have been pretty cool so far, I’ve lived here for 35+ years) as my city has very restrictive laws on working on cars at your residence. It would only take a call to code enforcement to find “something” wrong with my methods.
I believe in being a good neighbor/citizen, but I like playing with my cars, in a responsible manner.
A Spitfire is a more likely transplant choice, but the car is less in need of a transplant, and it is not the “ugly duckling” that a Midget is. Part of the challenge is to take a baby oxcart and to see what I can do with it.
As you will see next week, I am giving it a shot in the other direction with another old Midge. Wheels, tires, suspension, brakes, along with a mostly factory drivetrain. Then there is safety and bodyshell stiffness, which is a different issue with space limitations, and also the challenge in minimizing the extra weight the work would add (the factory bodywork is very flimsy on these). One of my Midge buys was put on the trailer with a fork lift, and oh, man, did that bodywork visibly droop a bit at either end. If the ugly duckling can turn into a swan in the handling/brakes/driving dynamics areas, then perhaps the more powerful drivetrain has a place in one of these.
There are two basic “prep” theories. One is that every car is four wheels and a steering wheel, and anything can be turned into anything else, mostly successfully. Old-school “ship-in-a-bottle” race car builders subscribe to that theory. So do the old ‘30s Ford hot rod guys, and the early Shelby Mustang, Sunbeam Tiger, and Z-28 Camaro crowds. Then there are the ground up, “purpose built” people. Lotus was the champion of that crowd, that there is no substitute for good engineering in the midst of lightness and smallness. “Purpose built” is the better way to go, but “four wheels and a steering wheel” is the creative challenge, and it is the version where the garage builder can show off his engineering and fabricating skills and capabilities.
The challenge is not to create a world-beater (those old Shelby Cobras and Tigers were actually mostly fairly limited in mechanical capabilities, outside of a whole bunch of horsepower and torque, no matter how reverent people are about them). The challenge is to find a balance of capabilities, across the board, that complement and enhance each other. The idea that there should not be too much compromise in any basic area, in driving the thing spiritedly on a slow-speed, sharply curved country road. And, in this case, to do so in the absolute minimum of a vehicle, and also in one that must be built, not bought, through applying all sorts of car know-how, coupled with junkyard mix-and-matching, and turning something with very low capabilities into something with high capabilities. Horsepower can give you some jollies, in the same way that spinning donuts in an empty wet parking lot can do. But carving up a road in relative safety, and with aplomb, is a whole ‘nother game.
Old Porsches and old Spitfires already have driving dynamics that can put a smile on your face. The idea here is to bake some of those driving dynamics into a Midget that doesn’t have them. I know from this project that the engine will fit, and elegantly so. Up close, which I didn’t go with my camera, the way the drivetrain and the bodyshell physically and dimensionally mated up well, as if they were made for each other, was astounding. Now the challenge is to figure out how to surround that engine room with a better set of mechanical outrigging. I am working on that challenge from the other end, and it is still very much a work in progress. While that kind of thing is not really in the spirit of CC, perhaps I will follow up in six months or so, with a progress report on this thing.
I look forward to the progress report! Before reading this, I too would have thought 12A-rotary-into-Midget was a great idea, and you’ve shown us an outcome I wasn’t expecting: too much power for the chassis. Hmm… how do the guys who race Midgets manage? Following with interest!
The guys racing Midgets (SCCA and vintage) are using tuned factory 1275cc and 1500cc engines, which struggle to clear 100 hp at high revs. They also use wider wheels and tires, along with careful spring and shock choices. Midgets weren’t generally raced in stock form, but rather as modified and upgraded SCCA “Production” cars, which mostly raced against each other rather than against other makes and models. Watching a Midget race is like watching a kennel full of crazed Chihuahuas.
Crazed Chihuahuas indeed (see below, in case you missed that race). I have to say though most of the cars in that race have more than 110 hp, a race 1340 A-Series is good for 130 hp these days. There are many suspension up-rates for the Spridget and I don’t think you need to go mad with those in order to feel safe with that hp. But yes, modifying a car (a US-made one in my case) can be a right pain – ask me how I know:)
Lenham for the win! And 3rd and 4th.
They are really getting a lot of horsepower out of those engines. 130 hp, naturally aspirated, out of roughly 80 cubic inches (1340cc). From something that began as a ‘50s economy car engine. That’s really insane. I had heard those numbers being thrown around, but didn’t want to write them down myself, as they are simply so outrageous, given the humble base engine and what is actually possible, in the world I am familiar with. That’s right up there with what dedicated horsepower engineering from places like Honda are capable of today.
I also believe, though I am not positive about it, that the British Midget racers are generally given more leeway in engine modifications than the SCCA and vintage racing clubs give the racers over on this side of the Atlantic. There has been a bit of resurgence in the rubber bumper Midget racing in SCCA, at the top levels, as recent working of the rule book to its limits has yielded good horsepower results out of the Triumph-based 1500cc engine, and some national championships have resulted.
I find that as race cars get highly evolved over time (as these have), set-ups and ideal settings tend to diverge from what one might want for road driving. But they do provide a lot of proven technology and engineering to steal from, for one’s own road car build.
I think you can easily get the chassis to handle the engine as a next step in the project. I’ve seen video of a rotary powered Sprite autocrosser and it both screams and grips. If you want a different direction, I don’t think anyone has built a rotary powered Lotus 7 (or clone) yet. Alternatively a BMW K series motorcycle engine has potential and a minor conneciton since a Mini tuner in the UK fits BMW K1100 cylinder head to A series short blocks to make a DOHC 16V Mini
Anything is possible, but what is real-world do-able? The Sprite (I assume you mean the black and green Solo 2 multiple champion car) is really a highly modified and evolved car that happens to still look a bit like a Sprite, its one-time starting point.
There are rotaries in Sevens (and especially various Seven clones), TVRs, Spitfires, all the little British cars. They typically sell for a discount to a factory set-up, in most cases.
The Ninja-class motorcycle engine powerplant installation is intriguing for very small cars. They offer simplicity and light weight, with power generally exceeding factory by a long way. Where they do fall down a bit is that they tend to offer not much torque at all, and find their maximum horsepower extremely high in the RPM curve, which is great for a screaming motorcycle but less optimal in a car. Also, the additional powertrain losses in a four-wheeler dent the real-world power output a bit as well.
Another possibility is the Ford Focus midget car “spec” engine. A lot of four-banger power in a simple and durable screamer of an engine (160+ horsepower out of 2,000cc)
Everything is trade-offs. The fun is working the power/drivability/cost/difficulty/practicality matrix in a positive direction, overall, without leaving one or two of them out. It truly is creating your own puzzle pieces, assembling and solving the puzzle, and then driving around the result. On top of everything else, the “right” answer is different for different people. To me, much more fun than simple restoration. Make it what you think you want, and then find out if you were right or wrong about your choices.