J15 Hayabusa standard wb - finished!

[padj15]

Hi everyone

i've been building this J15 for nearly 4 years and finally was able to drive it on the road for the first time yesterday, very pleased!









i think i's the only bike engined J15 on a standard wheelbase, there's at least one other Hayabusa car (in the states) and a Fireblade engined car but they're both on longer wheelbases and stretched bodies. This is (i think) a one off chassis built by Jeremy in 2010 with a longer rear behind the rear suspension pick ups to allow the diff to be pushed back to give room for the engine. hopefully the pictures make it clearer:







sorry i haven't posted much before but all my focus has been on finishing the car. happy to try to fill in any more info and pictures if anyone's interested.

thanks for looking

Paul D

[pigeondave]

Love the colour, looks really good.

[adithorp]

Very nice looking motor.

I'm surprised there aren't more BEC J15s as there are a fairly high proportion of bike engines in Riots. Don't see many BECs that have twin exhausts either.

[Edd]

THat looks a nice car
Edd

[jeffw]

Nice, there was a lengthened J15 which raced in RGB. The Riot was a little too short wheelbase I think.

[padj15]

now with headlamp covers fitted:

[davspeed]

Very nice indeed, I look forward to seeing it some time.

[adithorp]

Looks great. How are you finding driving it? Have you had a BEC before?

[padj15]

thank you all for the interest and nice comments! this is my first kit car and is a culmination of a life-long dream, i suppose. i was collecting caterham brochures as a teenager, 40 years ago, and planning to get one but life got in the way, as it does!

i've been keeping in touch and realised a few years ago that Sylva was really the way to go! i was planning a striker many years ago, either 4AGE or BEC, but again life got in the way.

4 years ago, everything came together, kids leaving home and moving to a new house (30 mins from the brecon beacons!) with a bigger garage followed by an insurance payout from our caravan being stolen meant it was finally possible. this car came up locally, unstarted kit and 'Busa engine from 2010 and it was for me pretty much a perfect combination. i wanted a sylva, had always fancied a BEC, loved the styling of the J15 and in some ways it's Jeremy's final and ultimate design.

Jeremy had built the chassis with the rear chassis members behind the suspension pick-ups to allow the diff to be pushed back with angled driveshafts to allow room for the 'Busa engine in a standard wheelbase. what i didn't realise until i got it all home was that the engine bay was just an empty box, jeremy had left all of the engine and diff mounting to the original purchaser. time to buy a welder and learn to weld again! Jeremy was really helpful, even though he is supposed to be retired, and sent me a CD full of photos of 2 cars he built, one of which was the hayabusa engined car on a longer wheelbase for Chet in the states.

as far as i know the engine only had a few hundred miles on it and everything else is brand new apart from the steering column, exhaust silencers (standard hayabusa) and front calipers (from a caterham) so i'm quite pleased that i've done it all for £10K.

first drive was 1 september and it did take a bit of adjusting to, sharp clutch, sequential change, etc but getting the hang of it now. acceleration from 6000rpm upwards is certainly something!

its done about 200 miles now with no problems yet, nothings come loose and no overheating so a promising start!

i may be mad but i'm probably going to take it off to france for a week the week after next!

sorry for the long read and yes, would love to meet up with some of you at some point.

[adithorp]

It'll take a while before you get completely at ease with the BEC.

If the clutch is too binary you can play with a smaller diameter master cylinder to give a more forgiving bite point. Until recently the common masters used only went down to 0.625" which combined with the Busa slave, is quite heavy and sharp. There's now a 1/2" master available or people have converted to a bike footbrake master but that takes more modification to mount.