Hello All, I have been wanting to back into racing after leaving the 750 formula to start my own engineering business for some time. I have come across and done the deal for a marrow of some kind. It has a front engine layout and independent rear end. (I'm told it had a 2L 16v Vauxhall engine in) My question is. I had intended to rebuild it to original condition with a view of sprints and hill climbs when work allows, but after reading this forum its got me thinking of maybe getting back into circuit racing with what seems to be a friendly bunch and enjoying a few weekends a year(to start) on track. Would anyone remember the car(I will get photos) and is their a classis clubmans sport 2000 type of championship. (I haven't really done a lot of research) Cheers for now Stuart

Oh how do I post a picture?

Sounds like it would be eligible for the BARC King Henry's Taverns Championship.

Depends which engine you fit - a 2,0 Vauxhall engine would put you in the Proto class or a 1,6 K in the Sports 1600 class.

Send more details......:-)

Hello Stuart. I know about the Marrow and should be able to put you in touch with its designer/builder. Email me for contact details. Cheers. Chris Hart

Stuart
I replied to your e mail but it bounced back.
Says your e mail account limit is exceeded or something. ????

Sounds like the ex ANDY JONES car which Peter Green bought and stored for quite a few years and was then sold to race car dealer Dermot Healy about 4/5 yrs ago as a bare rolling chassis.Ihave the fuel tank that was fitted to it sat in my garage if youre ever in need of one

Would be great to see you on track, sounds like you're Proto class with the Marrow. Clubmans is great competition with wonderfull people.
The races always make me smile for a long time.

I didn't think the Marrow ran a 2ltr Vauxhall engine.

There was a guy that worked for PI selling dash's to Club racers that also had a Marrow? Can't remember his name tho!

I have just arrived back with the marrow. Lots of parts to unpack and sort..!! Any info on the car would be very helpful if you can all rack your brains. The body has seen much better days but is fine to get me going, I must say it are looks very well engineered and thought out. I am on the hunt for any Lola uprights/hubs that maybe gathering dust somewhere if anyone knows where some may be?(Really any Formula type of uprights/hubs). Also a suitable seat, Wheels and tyres, Engine and gearbox, Rad ,Brakes, exhaust etc haha!! I will keep the updates coming.

I was flicking through an old Autosport today, and spotted a pic of this car when it was new. Autosport 30 March 1995, photo with the quote:

"Double 750 Formula champion Andy Jones has virtually completed his John Morris designed, front engined, Marrow Supersport Vauxhall car, which utilises the same aerodynamic principles as its Reliant engined predecessor. Built on a narrow steel spaceframe, it has pushrod operated suspension all round. The alloy bodied machine features an Arrows F1 venturi under its tail. The "Super Marrow" is set to face the rear engined opposition for the first time at Snetterton on April 9."

The caption by the photo reads "Andy Jones reckons his sleek Super Marrow will enjoy a straight line speed advantage over rear engined rivals."

It looks like it is fitted with Reynard "Dustbin Lid" wheels in the pic.

Autosport 1995

Tom, you are a true Anorak!

Ha ha, yep, proper anorak. I've got Autosports dating back to 1968! Sad but true.

Funny how the names have not changed much in the Clubmans write ups......

yes Tom and we look forward to you getting back with us...

Right so I think I'm getting somewhere on the uprights and hubs front but still plenty to do to get it up and rolling. I have some questions on the engine front.. Best option? I need some real life views on Engine/cost/power/reliability with these car. I'm trying to work out the cost of it all. Does everyone in proto have 240bhp and trick boxes costing £££££ are the k series engines expensive to get set up and running? Do they need dry sumping or is a shallower sump ok?

Any thoughts would be well received

K series is quite easy to tune to about 200-220 bhp. And will run quite reliable at that. Going over that is big money and not so reliable. All dry sumped. U can still buy them for caterham which are the same. Or vauxhall red top is another option. But I dont know much about these.

The Vauxhall is easy to tune to 200+ bhp but like all engines the more power, the more costs. Not all cars in PROTO have 240 bhp but i think if you want to be front runner you need at least 220 bhp. I was able to win a race last year at Rockingham with my spare engine a zetec 1800 with 178 bhp but only because i had brand new tyres. So if you want to be a front runner in PROTO you need at least 220 bhp or you wil be blown away on every strait line. In the Sports1600 class the engines are mostly standard with around 135 bhp and if you are lucky you find one complete with dry sump, ignition, bellhousing etc. The big advantadge there is that all engines are the same so real competition. In your case i would go for some bigger carbs and a set of camshafts that could do with the standard pistons and you would have around 210 bhp without big expences.
The Quaiffe dogbox can handle that power very well, the synchro is on/over the limit.

echo what Steve and Onno have said. if you are looking to have a fun to drive competitive race car without being desperate to have a histerical car, then the MG K engine is really the route to go based on weight. the K engine is 72kgs without fluids, 78 with. a Vx red top is about 145kgs, and so are the Dura or Zetec engines and the Honda K series. that is a hell of a difference - a light passenger!!!

there is some tosh peddled about what output some cars have. the fastest Proto K engines have in a range 220 - 232 max. Marcus' Honda has 240/250. if you do some genuine power to weight calcs you can see easily where the competitive edge lies. the fastest K engine cars are also - perversely- some of the heaviest on grid and that goes forSports 1600 as well as Proto!! so if you work at an all up target weight of say 460 kgs for a K car with 220bhp vs a VX or Honda car with 240/250bhp and a weight of 535kg because the engine is such a pudding, you can see the point ... apart from the incremental gains of a car weighing less than 460kgs of course!!

you must run a dry sump and if running a MG K then use the Gold Titan pump and not the cheaper purple / silver one as the Gold has proper capacity (regardless of Proto or not). you want to get about 7-8litres of oil in the system and sure as hell dont want that lot bashung the crank 6500 times a minute.

if going Proto then get the single rail gearbox if 4 speed. if you want to be bomb proof with either 4 speed or 5 speed in Proto then the Sadev type 9 match replacement is de rigeur as it will last you forever, just like the single rails we use now. but they are €1250 more than the weaker alternative.

so, see younext weekend with the Marrow Stuart - simples!

Thanks Guys that good info. I had already thought the k series would be a good engine to use or a bike engine. I'm stuck really because a bike engine isn't really my thing if I'm honest. BUT its hard to dismiss, I know of a Honda Blackbird engine from a Van Diemen formula x with a dry sump system on it and they had some work done to produce around 170bhp with a strong gearbox. Now the weight is around 80k inc gearbox so it would be ok(power/weight) but I would imagine on some of the longer straights would suffer.? The install would be simple and quicker to boot. I'm not really a bike engine man but I could get on track quicker/ALOT cheaper and have some fun I'm all for it. Are their any bike engine cars on the grid and how do they compare in proto. The minimum weight is 420kg is anyone close? Again thanks in advance.

Stu

Be aware of the diff you need for a bike engened car, not all suppliers have a long diff that is needed for the bike engines. You probably need something like 3.1-1 You should look at that or your topspeed wil be limited to about 110 mph.

About the weight Jamie is right, the Vauxhall engine is heavy, zetec a little better but the K-sport beats them by far. But it's not only the engine that makes a car heavy as my Mallock mk20 zetec was 475 kg wich is 60 kg lighter than the Mk 35 Honda from Marcus. The biggest difference there is the body of the car and all the things around it. Imagen a powerfull car with torque can't have a light gearbox etc. etc.
If you look at the A-sport cars, they are light (430 kg) and have a Kent engine wich has no torque so needs less heavy parts to make it reliable. Big contrast there is the engine, it makes 9000 rpm so more choice of diffs per circuit to compensate the low torgue. Big disadvantage is the expensive engine.

The K-sport is light, true but also needs a lot more to tune to 230 bhp than the heavyer engines. So in my uppinion if you choose K-sport stay with the 1600 CUP class. I have seen an advert resently on this site for a complete engine + gearbox for 2000 GBP that should make you interested.

Not sure about the weight of the others but think i'm not far off with following:

PROTO 480-530 kg
Sports 1600 430-460 kg
Classic A/B 420-450 kg

Stuart,

Tim Covill has bike-engine in his car (altho he's not raced it in Proto for a while).

I'm running a K and when I had the engine built over the winter, my aim was to end up with a car that had a similar power to weight ratio to Marcus' honda-engined car. I think we've pretty much achieved that, now to get it to the end of a race.

Stuart try and engage Pete Burnham as he did (most of if not all) the bike engine install on te Covill car. it had its problems, diff etc and also 'prop' shaft. i seem to recall it has toothed cog whirring very close to flesh but that may well have changed!! may be cost effective but I think the development may be a bigger proprtion than the competing. ery happy to be wrong of course. if you go bike, make sure it does comply with our regs (not difficult!!).

My Centaur is fitted with a Kawasaki ZX12 engine which runs a short propshaft to the quaife reversing g/box then another propshaft connected to the rear diff

that sounds fun John, so why aren't you out racing in our Proto class?? Proto, the future of Clubmans!!

The last time I saw this car it had a Vauxhall engine in it so the quickest and cheapest route ought to be to reinstall such a unit. If you want to go the bike engine way then I am happy to help. I did indeed install and develop Tim’s Hayabusa powered Mallock Mk31. Suitable diff ratios, compliant prop shafts, paddle shifts etc., reversing mechanisms are all available but quick and cheap, I don’t think so.
Anyway if you still want to go bike engine then drop me an emial and I can give you some pointers.

Right I have decided to go for a car engine and aim to race in the proto class next year.(maybe a little optimistic)
I am now on the hunt for parts and used tyres(Anything old and had it) so I can plan my build. I haven't got the biggest budget but I will be bolting it all together myself and even doing the engine build in stages. I haven't decided on the engine yet, but I will make a decision in the next couple of days.

If you dig around and find a old seat or part you think you may never use let me know, I could possible use it and put some money in your petrol fund!!.

Is it possible to post pictures on this site?

Cheers Stu

But 1st you need to save the picture on say Photobucket (or another image storage site).

Then you use the command [ img]http://www.bravenet.com/images/house.gif[/img] got from clicking on the bb code text after the "enter message"

Replace from http to gif with an address got from Photobucket and hey presto:-



PS I had to add a space that you should not use to stop this BB displaying a picture so the command should start [img and not [ img.

There endeth my lesson!

Whilst searching for the Marrow I came across this page:-

Rolling Road

Something must have been wrong with Mark Cousin's K series (oops should that be sports 1600?)