Mike's Sylva Fury

When I first built my Sylva Fury in 1993, the internet was still in its infancy, for me anyway! I bought my kit from the respected Jeremy Philips, owner and designer of Sylva Sportscars. The Fury ticked all the right boxes for me, it had a race proven chassis (based on the Stryker) and had a good looking 60s style body.  Having test driven Jeremy’s British racing green demonstrator I had no doubt this was the kit for me. I picked up the kit in the summer of 1993. The donor vehicle for the engine and gearbox was a Fiat Mirafiori sport. Both the engine and gearbox needed rebuilding, which I did myself. The mk2 escort axle and hubs were sourced from the scrap yard, in the days when they let you climb around the wrecks and remove the parts yourself! The build was all done in a small steel framed, asbestos paneled garage that barely kept the rain out! Getting a rolling chassis was relatively easy but the bodywork took a lot of measuring (twice) and careful cutting to make all t...

In early 2001 our family moved to Texas from Lowestoft Suffolk. Initially we were not sure if it was a long term move so I put the Fury in to storage for a couple of years. Once we realized the move was for the long term I shipped the car over to Texas involving a lot of red tape. For many reasons I won’t go in to, the Fury sat in the corner of the various garages we had for over 17 years. I had an attempt to get it running in 2009, but it would not idle at all and disappointed, I let it go to rest again.   Earlier this year (2019) I cleared the way to get it on the lift and was determined to get it back on the road. I had purchased an all-round disc brake conversion and 5-point harnesses in 2007 that had sat in the boxes they came in. As the pictures illustrate it all started with a good wash.  So on March 27th this year the restoration began.  After getting it up on the lift the first task was to get the carburetors cleaned up...