Cheesehead from across the pond.

[Andy_R]

Welcome James 

I myself am a San Diego Chargers fan having seen my first game in SD when I was in my teens on holiday.

And yes I'm very much aware of the "San Diego" typo 

Sorry to hear you are a Cheesehead () although your fans always come out in force at Wembley ... no matter who is playing!! 

[jm1211]

LOL... Didn't realize there were so many NFL fans in the UK. I was waiting for somebody to say the NFL isn't football! Does anyone know if Talon has a contact phone #? I tried sending him an email through his website to see if he ships to the US but I have not heard back. I am still debating if this is the direction I would like to go. I like the FW look and it has what has me looking at the Westfields instead of doing a Locost, plus I am a horrible welder! Thanks in advance.

[Kevin Pullen]

I’m a Raiders fan played for 12 years as strong safety

[Steve (sdh2903)]

18 hours ago, jm1211 said:

I was waiting for somebody to say the NFL isn't football!

Well it's not really is it. It's More like rugby with shoulder pads 

Regards to talon. The guys been having a few personal problems of late and is well behind on orders by all accounts so sadly I wouldn't be banking on getting hold of one of his diff carriers.

[Andy_R]

On 06/10/2017 at 20:27, jm1211 said:

LOL... Didn't realize there were so many NFL fans in the UK.

It's getting a lot more popular over here. The "International" games are drawing big crowds and nearly everyone stays till the end of the game (you don't get a mass exodus of people leaving at the end of the 3rd quarter for example).

They keep talking that a UK based franchise will happen in the next few years but I'm not so sure there is as much enthusiasm for that in the US as there is in the UK. Also if you had a home team based out of London then that team would need to be play off contenders (at the very least) within the first couple of years or the fans may loose interest. The Jags, who have had home advantage over a few games in recent years, are currently not at that kind of level ... although they seem to be having a good start to the season this year so you never know.

I have attached some pictures of my seat that I'm very lucky to get when I go to the games in London.

[Captain Colonial]

Mmmmm...cheerleaders......

[jm1211]

So the Vikings beat the Packers... I figured I was going to hear it on the forum. But instead I get to see a pic of some cheerleaders! I need to get on the forum more often. 

Quick question... As I continue to look into building my first kit car I am wondering why most of you went with a Westfield? I love the look of the FW and the quality of the kit looks great. So I am wondering why you chose a Westfield. Since we do not have many of them here in the USA I thought I would ask. It might be a dumb question... Here is Wisconsin the home of Harley Davidson most of us ride Harleys. Is it the same for Westfields? 

[Davemk1]

22 hours ago, jm1211 said:

So the Vikings beat the Packers... I figured I was going to hear it on the forum. But instead I get to see a pic of some cheerleaders! I need to get on the forum more often. 

Quick question... As I continue to look into building my first kit car I am wondering why most of you went with a Westfield? I love the look of the FW and the quality of the kit looks great. So I am wondering why you chose a Westfield. Since we do not have many of them here in the USA I thought I would ask. It might be a dumb question... Here is Wisconsin the home of Harley Davidson most of us ride Harleys. Is it the same for Westfields? 

I'd owned a Birkin years ago and after a move toward a more 'normal' car I wanted to come back to a true lightweight. I shopped for a Birkin, a Caterham and of course the Westfield. The Caterham was pretty quickly ruled out based on cost and that left the Birkin and the Westie.

When I compared the two in detail a number of things stood out to me and pushed me toward the Westfield  -

 - The Birkin comes with aluminum bodywork that needs to be painted and the owner needs to deal with that. The cost to paint the car is not insignificant and when it's done you really need to install clear-bra material over much of it to protect your paint investment. The Westfield on the other hand has fiberglass bodywork and the color is through-and-through so there is no paint to chip. Having owned a car like this in the past I knew that this was important to me.

 - The Birkin is based on Ford power and getting a lot of power from one means spending a lot of money to build the motor. The Westie I chose uses the wonderful Honda S2000 engine/trans and it makes lots of power in stock form, its easy to get parts for, it revs to almost 9000 rpms and it cost about 1/3 what the equivalent power Ford lump would cost. This was a no brainer for me.

 - The chassis design of the Birkin is very tradition "Seven" and works well enough but my time owning one in the past showed me that the Birkin design is pretty flexible. The Birkin, like some Caterham and Lotus Sevens, has a driveshaft tunnel that is a simple cover to hide the driveshaft but it is not structural at all.....just an inverted U shaped fiberglass cover. The Westfield has a tubular structure  that is part of the chassis design and I feel this not only makes the car safer (keeps a broken driveshaft from beating you to death) but also I feel makes the car stiffer in bending and torsion. It's a very stiff box section and when the alloy panels are riveted in place it makes a nice torsion box. This too was a big deal to me.

 - when I owned my Birkin years back the distributor in the USA was a very nice southern guy who was first and foremost a salesman and he could sell ice to an Eskimo. He didn't know the product that well but acted like he did. When I had questions he would listen and then smile and tell a story and my question was seldom answered. He lost the dealership and it moved to a new guy and the new guy had only been at it a short time and I could find no track record with him. I hear that now that he's doing a good job but back then I heard nothing. Westfield on the other hand is sold by a very cool guy in Texas named Tom  and he could often answer my questions and if he couldn't he did the rare thing and told me "I don't know but I'll find out"....and he always did. Factory support is a big deal when you are building the car and want to make sure it's done right.

So......I ordered the Westfield Mega S2000 and I love it. I had a few frustrations when building the car mostly down to having been given a wrong part here and there but once that was sorted the car has been great. It's very quick, handles extremely well, fits my 6'4" tall body perfectly and has been very reliable. I use it on the street and race autocross about 20 days a year in it and it's never left me stranded and I've never had a mechanical issue that's kept me from competing.........and winning a lot of races.

I hope that helps - sorry for making such a long post......as Mark Twain once said "I'd have written something shorter but I didn't have the time."

dave

 

 

[Captain Colonial]

On 17/10/2017 at 02:23, jm1211 said:

So the Vikings beat the Packers... I figured I was going to hear it on the forum. But instead I get to see a pic of some cheerleaders! I need to get on the forum more often. 

Don’t think I wasn’t tempted!  But as one of the exalted and revered elders in here, I have to set a good example for others.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Who am I kidding?

 

[jm1211]

Captain- LOL that was pretty good! Even with the Minnesotan accent! There is always next year...  

Dave-thanks for the information and spending the time on the post. It was exactly what I was looking for. I have been in contact with Tom and he has been working on finding a Westfield I can see in person. I told him maybe I make it to MT in November. Hopefully it works out. I should know more soon. 

James

[Andy_R]

I went for my first Westfield after watching a TV series about one being built. I did look at the other manufacturers but thought that the affordability of the Westfield beat the others hands down.

Obviously I'm slightly biased, and it's not something that you will notice that much being based in the US, but when you visit the Westfield club stands at major events everyone always seems more open and willing to include you in the group ... whether you own one or not. 

Finally the wealth of knowledge on this forum and the willingness to answer all my stupid questions is worth a huge amount and I doubt the other kit car types have a group this good.

[BugMan]

2 hours ago, Andy_R said:

I went for my first Westfield after watching a TV series about one being built. I did look at the other manufacturers but thought that the affordability of the Westfield beat the others hands down.

Obviously I'm slightly biased, and it's not something that you will notice that much being based in the US, but when you visit the Westfield club stands at major events everyone always seems more open and willing to include you in the group ... whether you own one or not. 

Finally the wealth of knowledge on this forum and the willingness to answer all my stupid questions is worth a huge amount and I doubt the other kit car types have a group this good.

I'd back that 100%

[Davemk1]

6 hours ago, Andy_R said:

I went for my first Westfield after watching a TV series about one being built. I did look at the other manufacturers but thought that the affordability of the Westfield beat the others hands down.

Obviously I'm slightly biased, and it's not something that you will notice that much being based in the US, but when you visit the Westfield club stands at major events everyone always seems more open and willing to include you in the group ... whether you own one or not. 

Finally the wealth of knowledge on this forum and the willingness to answer all my stupid questions is worth a huge amount and I doubt the other kit car types have a group this good.

You're right....being in the USA we miss out on the personal interaction with the other club members but I must say that this forum is a very valuable resource. When I owned a Birkin I participated on a Birkin owners email list and it was anything but open or helpful. All too many members made fun of you for asking a question instead of helping to answer it. In the end the email list was worthless to me............whereas this forum has given me answers and ideas and community.

The value of this can not be overlooked.

Thank you all for making this a cool place to spend time.

 

dave

[Dommo]

With regards to the FW rear on a Mazda SDV - you may be able to utilise a Mk3 diff. The splines on the drive shafts looked the same but I've not physically put them together. You'll need the right parts welding on the chassis, and to extract the brackets from Westfield

Mk3 LSDs are much cheaper second hand. I've been tempted to try a swap myself but have found that I'm just too lazy.

[jm1211]

Again, thanks for the information! Tom, the US distributor for Westfield said I will just need to move the fill spout for the gas tank over and it will fit. He sent me some pics of another Westfield FW with a Mazda kit. 

It does look like that is the direction I will go. Now I just need to see one in person. Still working on that but I have plenty of time. I also was doing some research on why kit cars are so popular in UK versus US. Looks like I wont complain about US taxes anymore! LOL The only kits I see around me are the Factory Five Cobras.