Before I even start, I should say that my ambitions often greatly exceed my time & ability to fulfill them.
For a couple of months now, I've been mulling a new project idea. For a few months now I've been using by garage to built some new cabinets for my wife, which are pretty near done now. After that I have an old 1927 antique single-cylinder farm engine that I started restoring year ago that I need to finish. After I'm done with that, I figure I should get around $1000 for it or so. Here's what I'm thinking of doing with the money.
Buy an old Volkswagen with a 1.6L diesel in it. I figure, if I shop around I should be able to buy something with a decent engine and a rusted out body for $500 or so. I think the naturally aspirated 1.6L's are pretty easy to come by, but I'm not sure whether I'd try to find a turbo'd one or not--need to do some more research on that. Anyway, I'm thinking of puting that engine into a feet-forward motorcycle like this:
That way the frontal area is minimized. Maybe at some point I could even build aero-fairings to make it really slippery.
I figure that engine should have pletty of power to make it fun to ride, and yet be quite efficient. Should also be easily converted to run waste veggie oil. Especially with fairings, I think 100-150 mpg would be very reasonable.
As far as the tranmission goes, I'm not sure whether it'd be better to try to use the VW tranny (I'd likely get it with the car). The other option would be to try to use a motorcycle transmission--I would probably try to find a bike with a blown motor for sale cheap. I'm afraid the motorcycle tranny probably wouldn't be geared too well (since motocycle engine tend to spin so fast), and also might not be able to take the torque. Not sure how I'd shift the car transmission on a bike either.
Another challenge would be mounting of the radiator (if I mount it behind the rider, as shown above).
Anyway, don't hold you're breath waiting for me to start this project
, but feel free to chime in with your thoughts!
And if anyone else wants to "steal" my idea, please feel free--I'll enjoy watching you do the work.