KAT ROVER SD1 TURBO FOUND! - The MOST INSANE ROVER EVER MADE

[@jackparker365]

As I commented in your last video, I bought a twin turbo rover v8 engine that was built by Turbo Technics and the story was it had been removed from an SD1. It was definitely based on a 9.35-1 cr SD1 block, had composite head gaskets rather than the single layer steel standard head gaskets. The heads were studded rather than bolts, and it ran 2 Garret T3 turbos on nice cast iron manifolds that were tight on the heads. It ran Stromberg carbs modified for blow through and had a single front mount intercooler so the charge from both turbos became common through the intercooler. I put it in the back of a series 1 bodied landrover hybrid which I sold with the engine as an unfinished project to a farmer in Cornwall. I did contact Turbo Technics at the time with the engine number and specs. They replied that the block number was a preproduction one but didn't have much other record of it. Don't know if any of this relates to the KAT SD1 but there can't be many twin turbo turbo technic SD1s around. Great cars though, great to drive and always loved the styling

[@amvam3646]

As a kid growing up in the 70's most of the now day classics were every day cars parked in every roads, but just one stood out. So when I had the chance, and a driving licence and £££'s I purchased a Rover SDI 2600 VDP in Moonraker Blue (1st owner Chairman of Doves Jaguar). You only live once and I am Sooooooooooooo glad I had the pleasure... Best looking car and what a great ride (especially in the back seats!!!)

[@BernardSamson-hf6fc]

I worked at a Rover dealer, when the S engine came out it was supposed to replaced the V8. I PDI'd the last few SD1's - ALL V8's.

[@drelxgradio6287]

Great..I have a 400 1997, how can I parts for it? I’m in Jamaica

[@SabotsLibres]

Was always and still is my favourite car. My second SD1 was "gently" breathed on and gave an estimated 240bhp without forced induction...

[@FunLovingCriminal_JB]

Huge respect for what you're trying to do... Keeping a record of some of the rarest cars to have ever been built in the UK... Really looking forward to the update, and seeing the car fully restored 👍😉

[@johnspain1948]

Enjoyed that. As a Tickford Capri owner of 38 years (bought new from the factory) obviously knew a bit about Simon Saunders. Keep up the good work. Oh and loved the computers. Regarding Tickford and Simon court case I do not know of anything with the Rover, but definitely there were problems with the KAT Capri, but it got sorted with a few mods to the KAT as I understand.

[@toucan221]

Thank you Tom, I certainly enjoyed this film about the Kat SD1 Rover, I remember seeing it in the magazines, also remember the MPV car which I thought looked like it might be a Ford Escort! any that's good to hear that Simon went onto produce the Arial Atom, something we all appreciate. 😃😃👍💙💙

[@Zero8T1]

My dad owned a couple of v8 SD’s in the late 80’s / early 90’s. He stripped and rebuilt the engine of one over the course of a few weekends on the drive at the front of the house. The first time it turned over and fired up without the headers installed was something I (and many neighbours) will never forget. Absolutely awesome car. I still remember the registration number.

[@tomdrives]

Good story, it’s stuff like this that makes these cars so special. Does the car still exist?

[@Zero8T1]

@@tomdrives Having searched the registration on a few sites it seems to be off the road at the moment but apparently has been with the same owner for the last 25 years. I can’t verify the validity of the website unfortunately. I’d like to think it was still around.

[@drelxgradio6287]

I need help getting parts for a rover 400. I’m all the way in Jamaica and most parts I’m seeing is on eBay

[@korma9732]

SD1 was a stunning car, really was ahead of its time and competition

[@Hondaboijames28]

Glad to hear the original KAT is going to be restored, hopefully it’s going to be turbocharged once again 🤞🏻

[@tomdrives]

I do hope it gets put back to its original state

[@Lot76CARS]

Excellent Tom, and great to see the car survives… loving these discovery type videos.. and yes it’s a very enjoyable watch.

[@tomdrives]

Thanks! I love making them

[@TheMileswin]

Excellent history on the KAT SD1. Many of the KAT body kits ended up in Australia but I haven't heard of any being the twin turbo specification.

[@kevincraven4038]

I loved the shots from the 70s/80s computer rooms, yes I was there running DOS/VS on IBM/360 & IBM370 & DOS/VSE on IBM4300 mainframes, with tape decks, removable multi-platter disk drives, punched cards and 8" floppy disks - the good old days! 😁🖥💽

[@tomdrives]

I’m a big fan of the vintage computer stuff, although I’m more of a Macintosh man myself

[@kevincraven4038]

@@tomdrives Who are you calling vintage computer stuff? Oh, I see what you mean 😂 - when I worked in a large telecommunications company in early 80s Manchester I had to evaluate a v1.0 Apple Macintosh, my first experience of "the mouse"... it didn't make the grade, so we opted for the also unproven IBM PC - which with the addition of a network card could communicate with the mainframe in Windows 1.0 - God, I feel old!! 🙂

[@tomdrives]

@@kevincraven4038 I’ll be saying that one day to someone referring to Windows 7 and on premise Active Directory as vintage computing. 😂

[@tomdrives]

@@kevincraven4038 I’ve had several 1984 Macintosh. I think I’ve had nearly every Mac ever made from 1984 - 2012 I used to be a collector.

[@barryphillips7327]

My memory of the SD1 Rover, my cousin had a red SD1 Vitesse Nice car, it was quick enough!

[@6643bear]

Hi Tom, another great interesting video, love the valve radio behind you. There were some sd1 with twin plenum fitted , saw one years ago , regards Mark

[@BITTYBOY121]

Great shame they had to remove the KAT tuned and turbo'ed engine, Still a great looking car and the best and most sportiest Rover SD1 I've ever seen ! - Love it ! BTW, This was an executive car, so sadly most of the buyers who were interested in the Rover SD1 were posh, older folk, hence they did not like the KAT conversion body kit that any SD1 3500 owner would be compelled to have to buy before they could get the high-performance KAT engine so not many buyers went for this, that's why there is only just the one prototype ever made. It was basically influenced by the Ford Escort Mk3 XR3i which was a true boy-racer's car back in the day !

[@bernardcharlesworth9860]

I brought my vittesse new from Denmark when working abroad the best car I have ever owned always thought its design had so much more to give.Very interesting to see that someone had that in mind.

[@The-Audi-driver]

I remember the police having these back in the day. One whistled passed as it flew up the road. I’ll never forget that. Top sound

[@scottprichard9933]

Many years ago I bought quite a few parts of an SD1 that was being broken in the Leeds/Wakefield area of Yorkshire, the dashboard was identical to the picture in your video around 5.15, by the time I got to it, it had no engine or box, the back axle had loads of play in it and the body was poor. It had some interesting suspension mods, among which was a rear anti roll bar kit (which I bought and some Koni suspension parts) I bought the seats which at the time were Vitesse items, but I never forget the dash which unfortunately was damaged and I always wondered it's origins until I watched this video

[@paulnolan1352]

I had a 3500s in the mid 80’s Green Metalic with the Green Velour trim and it was the only car I ever owned and ran that gave me a profit when I sold it.

[@Heartofaloin]

I remember my dad buying a late 3500 brand new. Said it was all piss and wind. Made a big noise and that was about all. Chopped it in for a senator 3.0 24v which he said was superior in everyway

[@tomsmith2209]

Good work finding info on this. Excellent presentation. Thanks.

[@paulhutson6187]

Pretty sure I helped fit this car with it's panels in around 1984. Kat panels had a small workshop in a village in Northants. The work being carried out in a small body shop in the next village over. We also fitted Escort and Capris with Kat panels. Quite a few of the Xr3i and Rs Escorts were for coppers who made a mint during the miners strike 🙂

[@Interceptor3500]

I used to have this Kit back in the day.. long gone now though. I do still have the rare spoiler and rear light infill panel though.

[@tomdrives]

Those bits might be worth a few quid

[@TheBaron481]

3xcellent work. I remember seeing this in a mag back in thr day. What a superlative creation it was. Reminiscent of Triumph motorcycles when an engineer added a cylinder to the Trident to make a 4 cylinder motorcycle " Rubbish - nobody would want that!" Said the management...

[@silvermane9370]

I used to sell Austin rover cars in the 80s. We sold several kat kit Metros. Iirc the big flaw with them was that you couldn’t fit bigger/wider wheels without them fouling badly on the kit around the front arches. We also sold a few , i think, TWR kits on the Rover 800 one was a Sterling plated F111 but I can’t remember the letters. We nicknamed it the love-missile after the song. At one point a sales rep for TWR turned up with a red Rover 216 Vitesse with a TWR kit. It looked fantastic. I have no idea whether any were sold as i left soon after.

[@garethbird4259]

KAT also made a body kit for the Capri which looked brilliant ❤

[@Penguinracer]

Great work Tom!

[@a11csc]

what a true crusader you are tom

[@tomdrives]

Thanks Chris just happy people are interested in the same cool cars I am

[@A65Bill]

Good to hear of Peter Filby's part. I was a subscriber to his inspred and inspirational magazines

[@alanshepherd2417]

There was a guy owned a sd1 twin turbo in Fraserburgh in the North of Scotland in the early 90's. It was a weapon, used to put on the stockcar track.

[@georgepitchley3946]

The Met police has one with Janspeed twin turbos, i drove it on the M11, and it eventually toured most of the outer traffic units, only problem - about 4 mpg with your foot on the floor, but it was good for 155+ on the calibrated speedometer, eventually the turbo were removed and it went to royalty protection.

[@brucerawsthorne1338]

I’ve converted a couple of SD1s to pickups,in the early nineties. But the second one ,my dad ,bless him , rang me up to say his mates son had recently had a crash at the rear of the car and he wanted to sell it , and mentioned something about a turbo and he wanted £600 , Imagine my surprise when I went to pick it up ,it was a janspeed twin turbo V8 . Got it home drove , it really did go when the turbos kicked in but the lag was horrendous. Removed it and sold it to a guy building a cobra .wonder where it is now .

[@TheBlaert]

God I forgot about the 70's/80's bodykits. Car magazines used to be chock full of ads for bodykits from KAT, Zender, Kamei etc. Most of them absolutely awful, but sometimes they got it just right

[@matthewc.419]

Nice one Tom , 😊 well intresting Thank you

[@tomdrives]

Thanks Matthew!

[@MarkHarvey-c3t]

My Dad owned one of the Rover Prestige by Wood and Picket. Amazing spec and head turner. Wasn't very reliable due to the add on turbo fitted as part of the conversion.

[@jaws6869]

If you're into oddball twin turbo cars of this era, maybe you should have a look at the broadspeed road cars. A mate has a prefacelift mk 2 granada built in the late 70s. I've read that there were 7 cars built but can only find evidence of two, fly2t a silver car and my mates black one, which hes restoring in Ireland.

[@tomdrives]

If he’d let me look at it I’d be on the next flight over!

[@jaws6869]

It's a repainted rolling shell at the moment so not much to see, but you would be welcome to have a look and hear what we know about its history.

[@ianwallett7438]

A friend of mine in the late 80’s had a KAT Capri 2.8 twin turbo, insanely fast back in the day, it would do over 120 mph in third gear!!! 🤪

[@bertybone]

I have owned 4 SD1 A 2.3 2 / 2.6 AND 3.5 WITH TWIN ROTOR MASTER TURBOS, THE 3.5 WAS INSANE EVEN WITH 6.5 PSI BOOST AND NO INTER COOLER TOP SPEED WAS OVER 150 BUT IT STARTED TO LIFT AT THAT SPEED . 2.6 WAS A 30 MPG CAR WITH A TOP SPEED AROUND 120 WITH CARBS SORTED, CHANGE OIL REGULARLY TO STOP CAM SEIZING DUE TO NON RETURN VALVE IN THE HEAD AND YOU HAVE A GOOD CAR FOR ITS TIME.

[@paulriggers1558]

FBR 471Y, my bosses 2600 SE in silver, lovely car, had electronic ign + uprated carbs, fast car for an automatic, until the head blew...

[@davidpeters6536]

My 1st ride in an SD1 was a new Vitesse about a year after they came out. It had replaced a rather tired XJ6 but although I liked the design it looked cheap inside compared to the Jag. BL should have given the SD1 to Triumph to build in Coventry.

[@CKVidsHD]

Any idea what happened to the original twin turbo engine after it was removed?

[@stiffler107]

Very interesting well done

[@adamwort7160]

I've owned ten sd1's all V8 some manual some I converted to manual Ive got a rare set of sd1 minilite alloys as fitted to a lot of met police cars

[@laurensnieuwland4657]

Saw one for sale here in The Netherlands a while ago. LHD, but an absolute basketcase. Dunno what happened to it though...

[@tomdrives]

Was it blue?

[@laurensnieuwland4657]

@@tomdrives Nope, white, just like in the thumbnail. Although it looked almost green thanks to the amount of algae on it.

[@brenglover72]

I had various skirts/ airdams/ spoilers over the years but I sold mine - SD1's are so thin on the ground now originality is really important - nobody wants the bits these days.

[@alantaylor353]

Excellent... THANK YOU.!! 👍 👍 👍

[@WelshDave76]

Nearly bought an ex police one of these in my teens.. Always regretted not getting it! 🤦🏻

[@dmitrylavrentev6642]

Tom, hello , I am from Russia so have no such information - what is mandatory (!) cost of ownership for Rover SD1 3500 produced in early 1980s? Mandatory tax, assurance , state technical inspection etc?

[@TheGreatest1974]

Great video 👍🇬🇧

[@tomdrives]

Thanks 👍

[@jamesc6075]

A28 HAD was once part of the collection of cars at Coventry Motor Museum

[@tomdrives]

That was the link i missed in this one, i saw a few pictures of it afterwards

[@tazmeadows2925]

He was taken to court and had to sender the molds for the capri because it was to close to the tickford one

[@yorkshire6458]

Hello there have you got any pruf that those Rover cars are in a Museum and which Museum is it because its one thing saying and its a total different of what really has happened.

[@RicardoAlejandroTV]

The world's car which was a they unique by it's dashboard that could be swapped to left to right with a massive tea shelf and was on of the world's comfortable and warm in the winter my dad had a sd1 vistest as a company car it was a head turner at the school gates a very rare car to see now days

[@SvenTviking]

Time to find a TVR motor

[@marciocarvalho8975]

Only saw one in Portugal and had nothing of monster! The owner kept complainting the bad/heavy performance of the bath tub

[@raychambers3646]

Off subject like your radio . Always fancied an sd1

[@tomdrives]

Thank you! I’ve got a PYE G61 Stereogram as well! Love them and use them every day.

[@KKTR3]

My memory is Nick Coppers dad

[@davidbarnsley8486]

I hope the owner can find the original motor with turbos and put it all back together

[@tomdrives]

I hope so too

[@Jay-ru3mu]

yessss

[@tomdrives]

I guess you’re from Sheffield?

[@Jay-ru3mu]

yeah mate 🙂@@tomdrives

[@Jay-ru3mu]

Brilliant Video By The Way@@tomdrives

[@stelianghile822]

I remember this vehicles most of the Rover SD was equipped with VM engines 2.4 TD that was great the for the era. However to me is very interesting vehicle I could say exotic now.

[@leviddesign4537]

The only time I was ever pulled over was a by an SD1. Copper was fair and let me go.

[@wayland7150]

If we're to keep motoring then these are not the last days of the internal combustion engine. The EV battery problem is a long way from being solved.

[@dspencer8827]

A beautiful car but .i seen the rally car slid out .would be nice if it was 4wd

[@tomdrives]

Tony Pond?

[@leeneal6969]

Are you midlands based? Sounds like you are.

[@tomdrives]

Nope I’m from Scunthorpe but now in South Yorkshire

[@kevinparker461]

Kat was just the name of the cheap, not to buy, fibreglass body kit. Didn't know there was engine modification offered. Saw an unfitted kit years ago, not impressed for the money!

[@KevinJohnson-vo5yn]

Enjoying your video check The Old Growlers garage we are currently rebuilding a 2.4 SD1 diesel for a customer

[@edgarbeat2851]

I was subscribed but tonight noticed unsubscribed..... strange.

[@cliveadams7629]

It's all very well saying the full package was £2900 but how much is that compared to the cost of the base car? Three grand these days is nothing, back then it would have been considerably more but compared to what? You don't give much useful information.

[@marciocarvalho8975]

There are things we have to distinguish! And brit cars are something aparte (as GB always want) no one like rover.

[@schlomoubermann]

So pleasant to watch. Thank You, Sir!

[@tomdrives]

Glad you enjoyed it!

[@keithnewton8981]

Some of the sketches look like 5 door opel monza from late 1980. BL need a rocket up bs Would have loved to see sd1 developed properly it was a great car.

[@Jay-ru3mu]

Why Wouldn't BL make them? makes you wonder If those in charge was working for zee germans, They surely can't be that Dumb. BL took loads of car brands under it's name then basically Ruined them. Gets me mad when i think of all our car brands we had now we really not got any, Just Euro cars.😡

[@liverush24]

It doesn't look as nice as a Vitesse, in my opinion.

[@johnnyjrotten59]

The Interior clearly is why nobody wanted one --- YUKKKKKKKKK!

[@tonysilliker5977]

I know where 1 of 1 SD1 is... It's a 3500 Estate prototype... Never ever released for sale..

[@sefikempowermentcoachvilla7843]

Great work Tom 👏