automatic gearbox

[Gazm]

Hello everyone  my names Gaz i live in Lancashire .Ive owned bikes for many years but i fancy a change next year the only problem is due to a bike accident ive lost the use of my right foot and need a automatic , ive got a vw scirocco with dsg and i thought there would be plenty of kit cars using this as the paddleshift is superb but ive been looking for a month or so and i cannot find anything automatic at all .  I suppose my questions are  , Do automatic westfields exist ? 

[Andrew]

I've heard of an automatic MK Indy, which used a Ford Sierra presumably, auto box.. I cant imagine it was the most refined of automatics. Also saw an MK at Anglesey recently  with a disabled driver. Hand controls.. I think the throttle and clutch were on the "bar", and you pushed it forward for brakes? I'm not sure I'd fancy driving with one hand on the wheel, but he was going very well.

Part of the problem with modern autos, is a lot of them will be FWD .. Westy's need an in line type box to make it work.. BMW perhaps? 

 

 

[Rusty Nuts]

Welcome to the forum, I don't have any personal experience of an auto in a westy, but have had a few DSG auto boxes now, fitting one into westy would pose a few issues size, electronic controls as mentioned above fwd, that's not to say it can't be done.

People with more experience and better ideas than me will be along - if you decide to build or convert an existing car it would be very interesting to see.

[BenD]

the mk1 mx5 came with an auto gearbox im not sure what the sizes are like compared to the standard mx5 but maybe that could be an opition maybe @Mark (smokey mow) knows

[Kingster]

I think a car engined auto box will be fairly big. But take a look a @AdamR post here for an innovative way to add hand controls to a bike engined car. 

 

[Gary Taylor]

Welcome to the madhouse, lol

when i read your post I was intrigued, having had a close call to losing my right leg in a bad bike accident many moons ago.

so had a quick look around and please remember I’m thinking out loud here, if you went with a bike engined westy, you could use a flat shifter kit to handle the up and down shifts and possibly a “ bike” style clutch on the gear lever to handle pulling away / selecting neutral 

leaving your left foot on throttle/ brake duty 

as there isn’t a lot of room in a Westfield footwell the pedals would need reconfigured to suit, but that would be fairly straight forward to do

I doubt that there would be anything “off the peg” but it certainly is doable if your prepared to adapt a car

As I said earlier welcome and good luck on your journey and feel free to bandy ideas about were a helpful bunch

[AdamR]

^^ Exactly what I've done!

Welcome Gaz, if you wanna have a nosey at my car sometime (I'm near Preston) just give me a shout 

[Kevin Wood]

I remember chatting to a guy at Stoneleigh years ago who had a Westfield with a pinto engine and Sierra auto box so it has been done.

He had also mounted a winch to the roll bar just behind the driver's seat so he could lift himself out of the car and into a wheelchair.

Finding the donor parts for that conversion might be getting tricky these days, of course. MX5 auto as a donor is a good call worth investigating. Vauxhall Omega, BMW, Merc or Jaguar bits, perhaps? I have an Omega and whilst the box would probably require some fettling to fit the tunnel, I don't think it's hugely larger than my MT75.

Many more recent auto boxes are digitally controlled, of course, which might make a transplant less easy. The interfaces to control an auto box aren't that complex and the Megasquirt guys were working on a DIY mappable auto box controller some time ago, though.

http://www.msgpio.com/manuals/mshift/4L60e.html

[BigSkyBrad]

Does anyone remember the Honda Odyssey FL350 quad/kart? They had a steering wheel shaped like an older F1 car, with bike clutch/brake style levers that did the throttle and brakes (CV gearbox).

If you had a BEC with a quick rack steering (so that your arms don’t pretzel), you could have the brakes at the foot, the throttle in the right hand and the clutch in the left hand with gear-change buttons on the yoke near the thumbs and solenoid gear-change at the ‘box (like dragbikes).

[AdamR]

Thinking about this topic when I was driving to work earlier, turns out the only time you need to use two feet is pulling away. This could be done by slowly slipping the clutch, but isn't great for hill starts and drivers behind get a bit frustrated! Still, managed the 7 miles of back roads with one foot tucked away.

A little paddle on the gear stick tugging on the throttle cable to add a few revs would overcome the pulling away issue 

[Gazm]

Wow thanks for all the replies , i never thought about the fwd issue it does make sense now though . 

Id love to use a bike engine with quickshifter and auto blipper but my licence states automatics only and for me to be legal it would need to be registered as automatic 

im not sure about hand controls i think id rather stick to what i know if i could 

 

[Mark (smokey mow)]

6 hours ago, Ben (bunje) said:

the mk1 mx5 came with an auto gearbox im not sure what the sizes are like compared to the standard mx5 but maybe that could be an opition maybe @Mark (smokey mow) knows

The autobox is a bit more chunky than the manual in tbe mid section between the bellhouse and the PPF frame mount but I'd be suprised if it wouldn't fit as the SDV transmission tunnel is quite wide at that point.

given how easy it is to swap from an auto box to manual in an MX5 it should be equally as easy to swap back again in a Westfield.

[Kevin Wood]

Just a thought: It might be worth popping in to a local automatic gearbox specialist. They probably see the whole spectrum of boxes available and will have a feel for which RWD applications are nice and compact and have reasonably simple control requirements. 

I have a feeling the MX 5 setup will probably the best suited to a Westfield, though.

This is all assuming you are willing to do a bit of tinkering, however. I'd say the chances of finding what you need already built and ready to go are quite slim. That's not to say you couldn't start with an MX5 based SDV car and convert to auto, or even commission someone to do the job.

[jeff oakley]

I have done some conversions in the past for people with mobility issues and there are many solutions to problems but as always there is cost and technology is not cheap for some things..

I assume you had your licence adjusted by the DVLA for some reason. I ask because you could get a manual box which has an electronic clutch on the gear stick so you still have one leg for brake and throttle and can use a manual box that way. I switched the pedal so the brake was in the middle throttle where clutch would be which is easier for people to use.

As others have said, you will struggle to find an auto off the shelf but anything is possible with an angle grinder and a welder, it just depends on how much you want one, but on the face of it MX5 auto would be straight forward enough to adapt. 

I assume you left leg is fully fit as Westfields do not have a brake servo and take a good push to stop. Once again there are solutions if needed, a servo could be adapted to run along the scuttle with a bell crank to turn the operation 90 degrees but it gets very complicated in a tight space.

It is some time since I did one, over 30 years to be honest, but if you are keen go to a mobility expert, not one who just sells mobility cars and they will have all the up to date solutions.

If you really want a bike engined one there are some auto box bikes but I think the biggest is a VRF1200 honda which has a dsg type clutch so would possibley work.

Anyway some bits to think about