LocostUSA.com

is anyone in nort America using the zetec in their locost?

the brits are making use of them nicely, but the engines avaliable here seem to have a little different bellhouse pattern.

Just wondering if anyone has done it on this side of the pond and if so what years/models did they pull the engine, and tranny from.

my intention is to build a 442 chassis, using a thunderbird as suspension/ rear end donor

Holler before you buy the rear, by then I will have more info about what and why. As I suggested to another look at the Tbird Supercoupe it has a iron block aluminum heads blower EFT 5 speed 4wdb alb (if you wnat to use them) quite a few nice stock wheels and with minor mods to the spindle I believe you can even use them. The advantage is they can be found cheep and don't have to be hoppped up which keeps the overall cost down.

i got a complete posi rear end thet i can have for free
I was planning on modding some T bird front spindles, but I do want the zetec for motivation.

The Zetec is an awesome motor - very light, and will produce anything from 140-275 hp depending on mods. Mine is expected to put out approx.170 hp with Weber 45DCOE's and a header. Remember, it's all about power to weight ratio! If you put in a 450 lb motor, you're going to have to put out an awful lot of power to outperform the lighter car. Plus bigger brakes to stop the extra mass, a heavier frame, etc. etc.

As to the bellhousing, John Ehrlich at quads4rods.com makes a beautiful bellhousing to bolt the Zetec to the Ford T-5. This trans is light, bulletproof, cheap and plentifil in North America. John also makes a simple (4 wires to connect) ignition system for the Zetec. No more ECU, sensors, etc. He even makes Weber DCOE maifolds for the Zetec, in various lengths. His stuff is fantastic quality & reasonably priced.

I'm thinking bike carbs rather than injection
megajolt would be my ignition choice other than no predone maps.

the guys in britian are able to bolt together engine and tranny without aftermarket bellhousings, in keeping with the Locost idea, I'd rather rather not spend the $400 if possible. But if it cmes down to it I may have to go that way to make it work.

True, but they have transmissions we can't get easily on this side of the pond such as the MT75, which is pretty much a bolt-on. We agonized over this issue for a while, but decided to bite the bullet. What we got from John was impressive (I never thought I'd want to show off a bellhousing!), and the precision fit is flawess.

I've noticed a few canucks in the forum here
I'm located in Lethbridge Alberta

Victoria, BC here. My buddy & I are building a pair of Locosts. Looks like our original budgets of under $10,000 CDN were a bit optimistic though...we've put so much work into the cars that we now have a hard time using donor parts, sooo...all that high-end stuff is pricey