Hexus Rally Car has a new heart

[Zak33]

Well....the 1600 16v engine is in, and its at the rolling road The throttle bodies are on, and the engine is one STANDARD CAMS at the moment.

A standard X 16XE knocks out about 105 to 109 bhp.

OK..this has been EXPENSIVE (£2400) and no doubt you'll all still think I'm mad, but its done now

Wanna see a torque and power graph?

[TiG]

YES, but more importantly are you happy with how it feels?

TiG

[Zak33]

not driven yet..not even seen....

bt yeah...getting all warm and glowy about having her back

[Zak33]

[TiG]

So its pushing 130bhp now?, and we're talking changing up at around 7200rpm?

TiG

[jon bda]

Mmm, chortle bodies...

[jon bda]

Nice torque curve btw...

[Zak33]

swhat I asked for....nota curve...a plateau

Yes TiG...upchage at about 7200 ish.

Gonna get me 15" alloys....to raise the gearing a tad...she's a tad low geared for all that grunt now.

Once we've been out in her and felt the power in real stages I'll get some new cams

Ge that torque further up the range if needbe

But we're going from 103 ish to 130

In fact we've got 105 at the wheels now

[5lab]

am i being dumb - would it not be cheaper just to drop a turbo onto it or a bigger engine in?

[Tumble]

it's got to stay N/A and 1.6, or else the car goes up into the next class... where they'r spending major amounts of money per event to just make the cars go.. and when they do, an L reg astra, ven with a V8 in the front wqon't keep up..

[Shad]

Shame you can't drop a B16 or even a D16 Honda lump in there, you'd have 160/135 hp to start with

Torque curve does look v. nice though!

[Rave]

That torque curve is amazingly smooth, the engine should be spot on to drive!

[Butuz]

Very nice Zakky! Dude you'll ahve to come over to the Cork Rally in ireleand - went there last weekend great fun, stunning roads its all tarmac. Taking the Datsun over next year to tear up some tarmac, was in a fiesta 1.25 this year, oh joy

Oh and thats the kinda torque curve that us metal hairdryer users can only dream of

Oh and one question following on from shads post. Wouldnt it be more cost effective in the long run to move from spending thousands on an astra to gety 130bhp, to spending thousands on a civic? I mean you can get 170bhp out of those 1.6 vtec units, slap a short throw 6 speed box in to garuntee staying in vtec, and you'll be flying wont you?

Butuz

[Zak33]

all you Honda guys are right....except for one thing.

I love my Astra

[Butuz]

Thats cool zak. I understand

Be a loser in an astra, or scrunch up and throw out your vauxhall heritige/love and get a civic.



Butuz

[Rave]

TBH, if Zak wants to he could bung some hot cams in there and have an engine that's every bit as wild as a Honda engine. The XE series are the equal of pretty much any 90s 4 cylinder engine, the difference is that Honda supply theirs in a high state of tune whereas Vauxhall leave the state of tune to the end user. This is a Cosworth designed engine don't forget.