Building from Kit

[aja]

Hi - can anyone give me advice on building a 7 from kit? For years Iv'e dreamed of owning a 7, and now have some funds available, but arguably not enough for what I'd really like. Consequently I'm considering building one up. Ability wise, I regularly service my own car, but constructing a 7 might just bve more problematical I suspect. No doubt Caterham advise would be DIY ers that it's a piece of cake given the right tools etc, but just how idiot proof are the instructions, and just how long in terms of hours does it take - not that that matters - I'm sure it'd be a labour of love. In short, do I have to be a time served mechanic to do the job - might I end up with a garage full of bits wondering what goes where? Anyone else undertaken this exercise?? STEVE

[Miraz]

I'm waiting for my kit to arrive, ask me again in a couple of months.

 

FWIW It's probably worth pointing out that building is not the cheap route to seven ownership. There are some great prices on secondhand cars at the moment - Keith's 15k superlight is a steal.

 

I decided to build from new because I've always wanted to do it that way - and my svelte 120kg frame fits much better in the SV - but it is significantly more expensive than buying a good used car.

 

YMMV

 

Miraz

[Bob Corb]

I've just passed my SVA on monday, I received my kit on the 1st of June and have just gradually worked away at it. The only difficulty I had was setting up the Rover engine management. I bought a new engine independently and got the ECU over the counter at my local Rover dealers. If you buy a kit with an engine from Caterham you wont have this problem. Its just a matter of patience. I found that staying up late at night is a bad thing as you only get upset and tired when things dont fit. The factory are quite helpful and so are the other blatchatters.

 

Go on, give it a go, I've no regrets(although there were a couple of moments...).

 

Bob

[Paul McKenzie]

Aja,

Go for it - it's easy, providing you know one end of a spanner from the other.

Caterham say 70 hours, but if you don't want to rush and want to make an A1 job of it, then take all the time you need. Mine took me about 160 hours spread over 8 weeks just working on it evenings and weekends. The build book is very comprehensive, you even get a video, and Caterham are always available by phone - also this web site will get you instant good answers to any build problems.

I think the big advantage of self-build is you will know the car's been put together properly (or badly!) and you will know the car inside-out - this is extremely useful when you come to work on it for the various upgrades and mods. which we all do.

Paul

 

[aideen]

Steve, If a girl can build one.... smile.gif

 

It helps to have somewhere warm and spacious to work (I wouldn't fancy the job in Winter) and to have a few other local Sevens (for comparison) and their owners (for help and advice).

 

Aideen

 

 

[hugh]

my advice would be buy second hand unless you actually want the experience of building the car,there really was,nt any other option for me as i wanted a club sprint/hillclimb car and i wanted the following bits, limited slip diff, FIA roll bar and cut out switch, alloy radiator, uprated cooling system, protected honey combed fuel tank, adjustable anti roll bar, and a known uprated dry sumped cross-flow engine (cheap to run & simple) It is a very long winded way of saying by building the car yourself its less of a compromise you can build the car with exactly the bits you want.It is a slog i,m nearly there, i will try and start the motor today for the first time wish me luck.my advice is if you can afford the complete kit, buy it all from caterham, I did,nt if you only want it for the road keep the specification as near standard as possible. The manual is OKish too much in the words dept not enough exploded drawings. Its worth looking at fully built cars and photographing them also i found the whole thing reasonably challanging but good experience.Which ever way you good luck. regards hugh

[tony isherwood]

I agree with Hugh

 

Unless you are really keen to build, I would buy second hand. Give it a year or so then find out what you REALLY want spec wise, then go for a build. That way you have the best of all worlds. Just takes a little patience and a little longer. Also it gets your backside into a Seven faster. ;o))))

 

 

[Andy. N]

Aja

 

I was in exactly the same position as you earlier in the year. I posted a similar query on blatchat, and received a range of very helpful responses (reflecting the enormous diversity of Sevens and Seven owners).

 

I chose to go for a starter kit and self build for the following reasons:

 

1. Although I freely admit that my mechanical aptitude is minimal I knew I would get all the help I needed from my dad who's had years of experience tinkering with bikes and cars. I personally felt that if I was going to own a Seven it's somthing I wanted to know more about than how to drive it.

 

2. I wanted to be able to specify exactly what I wanted.

 

3. I didn't have the lump sum available (or the desire to take on a big loan) to walk into the showroom and drive away a new car or a complete new kit. By going the starter kit route I can buy the additional kits from Caterham as time and money allow. BUT - you should note this is more expensive than buying the whole kit at once (which I justified on the grounds of the saving on finance).

 

The story so far (since taking delivery of my starter kit):

 

We've only just started the build, but so far so good. The front suspension was straightforward to put on, and i'm enjoying learning one end of a spanner from the other. Althouth I found the build manual easy to follow (so far), I don't think I personally would be comfortable undertaking the project alone (but that is purely down to my own self confessed mechanical ignorance, and not knowing what to do if something doesn't go exactly as the manual describes). I suspect that anyone with a reasonable level of experience in servicing/tinkering with cars would not go too far wrong. If you do get stuck, Caterham have a telephone help line. I called to check a couple of details and found them to be very helpful.

 

I'm really pleased I chose the self build route. I'm sure there will be times in the near future where I question my decision, but at the end of the process i'll have a car that I know I can be 100 per cent confident in. I'll also have learned a huge amount about how it all fits together, and will feel confident in undertaking any future work.

 

All that said, I don't disagree with anything others have said. Any route to Caterham ownership has swings and roundabouts. It's a personal thing and basically you pays your money, and takes your choice.

 

Good luck with whatever you decide.

 

Andy.

[Brad Tipp]

aja,

I built my car two years ago. To me part of buying a Seven was the prospect of actually building it. So I may be a little biased.

I'm not a fantastic spanner man though so this may help.

 

I built the car in 4 weeks of complete weekends (8 hours a day sat and sun) and a few (4 or 5) evenings. I didn't need to call Caterham once during the process, but I did need the help of a couple of mates during some of the build.

Putting the dif in, getting the engines in, fixing the seats all really needs two people to make like easier. It also helps to have someone to bounce an idea off.

 

You won't need a huge amount of tools, but you will need a fair few. The only thing I had to invest in was a good torque wrench, and an extra set of axle stands. As I had a fair range of spanners and good socket set.

 

The engine started first time!! It drove fine to start, right out of the box!!

Nothing fell off!!

 

Once I built the car I chickened out and had Arrowstar put it through SVA and do the post build check. They only found a couple of minor things wrong, and in addition did a couple of post SVA mods, like the FIA bar, flush fit fuel filler with no restrictor and they also swapped out my front wings during the SVA so I didn't need to have side repeaters in them. I did have to pay for all that though and using them isn't cheap, but the quality is good.

 

To offer a contrast, my mate built a Cobra kit and it took him two years and LOTS of custom fabrication. In the end he has a car that isn't half as good on the track or road as the Caterham, and isn't worth much second hand either.

 

Building a Caterham is really assembling a kit. Everything fits. You don't have to fabricate things, and then make them fit.

 

 

If you do fancy doing it you'll get lots of help from people on this site, and once done the glowing pleasure that you've built your own car.

 

Go on you know you want to!!

 

 

 

 

 

T 1 PPB - Superlight

 

"Well yes officer i'm not arguing, it's just that [insert excuse here]..."

[aja]

many thanks to everyone that has posted a reply - you have given much food for thought, covering many of the quetions I had in mind. Yes, cost,as I initially mentioned had made me consider the kit build, but also it was a belief that in building myself, I would get to know how the car worked, where everything fitted in etc, as well as the pride I would have in saying "I made that".

 

A nightmare experience with IKEA product some time ago made me have my doubts, plus the realisation that kit build aint necessarily cheap - as some of you pointed outyou pointed out.

 

I think that for the time being, I'll continue to visit this forum weeekly - nay daily, gradually building up my knowedge, posting the odd naive question, getting a more balanced feel to the whole Caterham experience. Then I'll decide. One things for sure, I'm now viewing the Mondeo on the drive as the company car, the family car. Me..I think I NEED a 7. Off to post a stupid question....hope no one ridicules me!! STEVE

[Dave H]

aja,

 

I bought my Seven 11 years ago second hand. I am just finishing a major rebuild and upgrade, which was well worth the time and trouble. I wish I had built mine from new to start with.

Before you start get hold of a copy of the Caterham Build manual and have a good look at it. Putting a Seven together is not difficult, just allow yourself plenty of time, and be prepared to have to wait for odd bits to be sourced.

If you are in the West Sussex area get down to Dial Post - second wednesday of any month and make yourself known, you'll get plenty of advice and information.

 

Dave H

[Dave H]

Ohh bum.gif!!!!...Double Posting

Dave H

 

Edited by - Dave H on 28 Aug 2001 11:31:04

[aideen]

T 1 PPB - Superlight, More details on the front wing change to avoid side repeaters would be interesting. Thanks,

 

Aideen

[Brad Tipp]

So here's how you "cheat" the great god of SVA.

 

All you need is to borrow a pair of front wings "with side repeaters" and affix them with double sided tape for the test, wired in to the plug at the front. Then remove pin in plug and wings and bolt on the nice new ones without the nasty/naff/tacky repeaters.

 

For maximum effect do this immediately outside the SVA centre in clear view of the tester :-)

 

 

T 1 PPB - Superlight

 

"Well yes officer i'm not arguing, it's just that [insert excuse here]..."

[aja]

The answers staring me in the face I just realised.......I want the best of both worlds...ie the experience of building from scratch and the benefits of a pre owned value for ££ well specked car. I'll contact somone in this forum who's selling, ask them to break the car down, go collect the bits & rebuild. Now why didn't I think of that one before? STEVE

[fool on the hill]

i think self-build owners may be over-represented in this area so I will speak up for all of us who bought our sevens second hand "off the shelf"

 

The big plus for buying second hand is you are up and going immediately and someone else has taken the biggest depreciation hit for you.

 

On the other hand i don't even know whar grade of brake pads i am running on (hangs head in shame) or know whether a job is really simple or much more tricky than it appears.

 

Maybe the best solution is to help someone else build his (or her) seven and then go out a buy a second hand one!

 

Views from other second-handers welcome!!

[aja]

For what it's worth, I did build a Dodge Viper this afternoon in the space of a couple of hours - but then I was helping my 9 year old put his latest model (scale1/24) together, and the instructions were idiot proof.

 

Fool On the Hill.......nice to know that not everyone out there knows there 7 inside out - rather comforting in fact.

 

 

Still musing on this one, any more thoughts gladly received.

 

STEVE

 

[Bob Corb]

Why dont you pootle along to your local members group meeting, have a look at a few cars get to meet self builders. You will probably find somebody who is building a car in your area (you dont live in the Outer Hebrides(?) do you?) so you may be able to get to see one in progress?? I'm sure they wont mind you coming along even if your not a member of the club - as long as you're interested.

 

Bob

[ChrisJ]

Go on build it !

I've been wanting to for years and as I am unemployed at present and had the dosh I did it.

Kit arrived on 29th June and it was running in 8weeks with probably 4 days a week actually working on it.

One tip is if you aren't really in the mood to work on it any day, take a day off and come back. It stops you making mistakes you regret later.

Also be careful with the build manual, some things are missing or taken for granted. Caterham are updating the spec of the cards quicker than the manual

Good luck

Chris.

 

[Jam Mad]

oops. doubled up there....

 

Edited by - jam mad on 3 Sep 2001 10:14:31

[Jam Mad]

aja,

 

i recently bought second hand... and love it. i would never have considered building previously, but would love to now... not knowing all the bits and bobs of the car gets to me, and i would LOVE to build one to fully understand it.

 

however, i'm glad that i didn't build straight away, simply because it is only after running one that i feel in a position to know exactly what i would want out of a new model.

 

like a few things in life... houses, skis, walking boots etc, you only really understand the product once you've made a couple of mis-judgements the first time 'round.

 

but i was lucky.

 

happy hunting,

 

j

 

j

[Tim Sture]

Well I built my car but I'm not int he self-builders' camp. There were parts I really enjoyed but I am not very mechanically minded (that's what garages are for in my opinion!) and did not find it very enjoyable, in overall terms. My initial view on completing the car was to tell my wife to shoot me if I ever suggested building another...

 

However, as I now go along to the local area meetings and know quite a lot of people locally who have built their cars (and a few who did not!), and am more familiar with the layout of the car, I would not be so awed by the prospect of building another and could do it more quickly and better (and with more enjoyment).

 

If you are going to build, get someone local to bring their car round every now and again so you can see what things look like when finished. Of course, their car will not be identical to yours so it won't always help!

 

If you have been regularly servicing your own car, you are already a long way ahead of me in experience and ability, and you are more likely to be the sort of person who will enjoy building the car and then tinkering with it. In the end though, you won't know whether or not it was a good idea until you have actually done it!

 

IMHO you do need to bear in mind that the only people who will normally reply honestly to a thread like this are those who enjoyed the build and found it easy - they can also (unintentionally I am sure) make the rest of us feel a bit inadequate too. The rest of us therefore normally keep quiet for fear of making ourselves look silly. Well, I was silly to build my car myself, although I do know it a lot better than many other people know their cars, which is sometimes helpful.