I did get a reply from Jacob....! He has since moved his family to Portland Maine! Wow, from the west coast clear over to the east coast. I'll share a portion of his email to me here with you all...
"Funny you should mention putting a 1.2L in a motorcycle. Way back when I started the Insight project I ran across the Thunder Star. It's certainly doable from a technical standpoint. For most people money is what holds that type of project hostage. The total project cost for the Insight was somewhere around $25k--expensive but about a quarter of what one custom vehicle house said they'd do the job for.
The Insight has languished a bit in daily driver obscurity. I did take it out to the '09 Bonneville World of Speed. My Dad holds the official unofficial land speed record for diesel powered hybrid cars at a whopping 97.7mph. Click here for a short picture album that will give you a better feel for what was involved in swapping in the 1.2L.""
Totally fun. I went sleuthing and found the top speed was slightly faster than Jacob says (he so modest): 97.740 MPH top speed! Haha. This photo was also available (Hemmings magazine online). You can just barely make out "redlightracing.org" on the door. Site seems dead though: http://redlightracing.org/
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See my car's mod & maintenance thread and my electric bicycle's thread for ongoing projects. I will rebuild Black and Green over decades as parts die, until it becomes a different car of roughly the same shape and color. My minimum fuel economy goal is 55 mpg while averaging posted speed limits. I generally top 60 mpg. See also my Honda manual transmission specs thread.
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