Jeemy's Elan Rebuild

[Jeemy]

You are in luck! I am replacing them with Oz titanium wheels, already bought. I am putting goodyear eagles on them, assuming ive not messed up and they fit, you can have these. Can have as-is for £200, sprayed for £300, or powdercoated and with new tyres approx £700 for premium, £500 for budget tyres. I can do em same time i do mine.

[Jeemy]

There has to come a point at which you just move on. I've scrubbed that gearbox for about 10 hours now, maybe more. I've used tardis, g101, surfex, and today tried metal polish, aluminium wheel cleaner, and steel wool. I am aware there is a risk of cleaning fluid seeping through the seals and contaminating the transmission fluid so I've kept it quite dry.

I want the gearbox shiny, but not as much as I want the car on the road. And I can keep cleaning it here and there. But short of actually starting to grind the surface, I'm going to have to live with it being about this shiny:

You can see the masks placed up on the engine bay. I'm going to finish detailing the engine bay in the next 3 sessions, and change up the gear cables so I can rebuild.

I can't show progress pics; its too messy. I gave everything a last degrease with G101, wiped down with paper towels, masked off everything I could, gave a light rub with sandpaper, and wiped down with a tack cloth.

I then gave a first coat of POR15 to the following parts, using a paint brush for the main part. This was VERY ginger work, I changed gloves often as a few pairs of gloves aren't worth a paint splash in the wrong place, I changed brushes, worked very slowly and gave myself a sore back from being too tense. In about 4 hours I managed a first topcoat on the following parts. I used a cotton bud swab for the very fine work and to 'blacken' areas like the cam cover mount - i.e. the kind of pitted metal, just rubbing it down with the cotton bud and POR15 gives it a nice patina. For these parts I'll just leave it as is. Its not rusting, POR15 will seal it, and make it look better. For a few of the parts, they are just staying black. For others its an undercoat before I put gold or red on.

I just think its proven good at sticking to not perfectly clean surfaces, it sets rock hard and seals, it works good to blacken anodised metal thats looking tired, and of course it prevents rust spreading - so what could be better.

After the first coat I was very pleased with the results, but a second is definitely needed:

Lower engine block, prongeron, water pipe, fuel pump mount, dipstick tube:

The prongeron & dipstick tube will possibly be gold.

The back rigger:

Its going to be gold too

The clutch lever, mounts for the gearbox, trunnion, and airbox mount:

Clutch lever will be gold

The side area where the coolant tank mounts and the DIS:

All of the grey was going to be gold. I'm leaning towards less use of gold and more of these pieces staying black.

The other trunnion and the metal pipe behind it:

The metal brackets behind the headlamps:

And all the bolt heads and pipework under the oil filter:

Not pictured is the underside of the sump, any other visible and clean parts from the underside, the top of the radiator mount internally with the chargecooler & oil cooler sides & mounts. I used the rest of the can up on the radiator mounting kits:

Side brackets will be red

Thats me back up to posting in real time now. Tomorrows plan:

Second coat POR15
Decide what is to be gold
WD remove bonnet & work on stress cracks
Create engine shroud
CD refit fans & new radiator
After 2-4 hours, paint gold over appropriate bits
Loosen cam cover
Paint engine top block, plenum chamber, unpainted parts in silver
Remove gear cables, do another clean to the back.
Swop masks, paint brake lines & brackets red,and mask up back firewall, spray it red.
Call insurers and see whether I can't get a new windscreen.

Its hard to really appreciate how much difference this is making. Effectively each time you black something out, it 'disappears'. The overall effect once everything is clean, polished, dressed, etc should be stunning. A before and after pic will show so much more than this incremental picture business…..

Last night I finished checking off all the hose clips, pipes, conduits, sleeving etc needed and ordered the remainder of my engine dressing parts, together with 4m which I hope will be enough vaccum tubing which should arrive Monday and by this point I hope to have all the paintwork done, save for the red around the clamshell and the bonnet interior where there are some stress cracks to cover.

I measured everything with vernier calipers and while it may not be 100% neat as its done in oily scribbles on a clipboard, I don't mind typing it up if anybody is interested in this info.

[GoM100Go]

I wish I could buy yours, but I am in the US. It would be much cheaper to just buy the same set here. I was just wondering if you know the make and size. But I appreciate the offer and very good price.

-James

[Rob P]

James these look like Wheel off a BWM MINI, think they are called Conical Spoke. the link below is to a set for sale on Ebay which will have all of the details on size etc.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/GENUINE-MINI- ... 1087647399

I was speaking with a LEC member at Donington who had some MINI wheels on his Elan M100, apparently they do need the centres bored out slightly to fit the Elan Hub. I'm not a Fan of After Market wheels on the Elan (with a few exceptions) but there are a couple of Mini wheels that look fairly nice.
You might also consider the S Spoke which is again a Mini wheel, saw a couple of Elans running these and look OK on the car.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/17-8-Spoke-Al ... 136wt_1161

Hope this helps
Rob P

[Jeemy]

Whoops - stupid of me not to see you were in US. In fairness I was posting from the ipad in the car!

I'll see if I can find the brand out when I take them off which will be a few weeks left, maybe there is something printed on the backs or rims. I'll get a quote on shipping them tyre-less, it may be less than you think as I get very good courier rates and I don't mind shifting on the price a bit to make it work - I'd rather you had the wheels you want and I might end up having to sell them for less anyway, I just guessed at the price quickly with no research! It will obviously be about the same price in dollars to have the work done on them over there. I'd clean them for you before I shipped them as I'll have spare product left over.

All I know is they are 17" with 205/45 tyres, and they have 8 bolt holes; so they are multi-fitment. I did try to look into wheelbolt blanks to fill the spaces and I think I ended up deciding that getting a metal working shop to cut 4 bolts down for me and then weld them in or advise on how to otherwise fit them in would be the only option.

Fingers crossed for the weather today. I will put the tent up if the rain continues, I've got to take every opportunity I can to push this project forward now.

[Jeemy]

I should note I also have HD copies of all of these photos if anybody needs to refer to anything in more detail in the future.

[norman lovie]

I should note I also have HD copies of all of these photos if anybody needs to refer to anything in more detail in the future.

Jeemy, that would be fantastic - if I could post down a memory stick to you - as and when your finished - you've done a great job capturing a lot of detail that I know will come in handy

[Jeemy]

Progress, progress…….I am just about at the point I start working back through these photos!

Gear short-shift is the only thing left to do.

Today, I finished the dirty work on the engine. There is a few minutes of tittivation to go….it will be so quick.

When I got in this morning, the POR15 black coat looked so good, I just left it. Most everything is going to be hidden by fitments anyway, I would save four hours not doing a second coat, so I saved em!

I started off by working up to the next stage of the engine block. I used a palette knife to remove all the old gasket gunk:

Brushed down the engine with the first of 10 paintbrushes of the day, and onwards…..

This is the POR coating. Not perfect but given it sticks like f'n glue to rust, the gaps are already coated and its getting 2 coats of colour, so I decided to press on:

Theres a couple of non-glossed bits here, but again, they are not rusty. If I get a chance I'll refer back to this photo and cover this centre spot:

So I started with the gold paint….this will match the flip on the body paint and the calipers. Its by E-Tech, who I don't think are particularly reputable, or the converse, they are just the guys on eBay who give you free brake cleaner and a brush with the paint, and its always worked well.

Today (for now) was no exception. The gold took about 30 minutes of constant stirring to get to a consistency I was happy with, and during that time it started to cure a little (its enamel paint) but I had no enamel thinners to hand, so on I went, and in fact it did a brilliant job of the back rigger, the mass damper, and the throttle mount:

The clutch lever looked OK…..bit patchy:

I pulled the throttle cable as its getting overwrapped, and did the LH engine/PAS mount which came out amazing:

And as the gold was going on so good, I did the block to plenum join in gold too, avoidin the top part as I'm not onto detail yet, just blanket work:

So I moved onto the silver. Same e-tech brake caliper HT paint. This was disappointing. Its like spreading teflon jam around. I struggled like hell and ended up doing a key coat onto the plenum block and the engine block middle section:

During all of this I am using cheap disposable paintbrushes, and cotton buds to swab on the colours.

The plenum after 10-15 cleaning sessions and a sand & tack, still did not want to accept paint, at least enamel paint….I managed to get a decent first coat on (you'll see behind, more POR15 black swabbing on the windscreen wiper pipes):

[Jeemy]

Don't really know what extra this pic shows, more detail on the PAS mount and the first silver coat on the engine manifold block I guess:

This pic shows the second coat of gold. Its going the same way as the silver, just curing too fast in the open air. Its like spreading cold butter…..again, I want it all perfect but there's only so far I am prepared to go:

I remembered I'd forgotten to do the lower prongeron…..you can see the gold is starting to go on very streaky now……the clutch lever is looking superb in the light……and I've swabbed some POR15 onto more of the local hose clips:

With the bad experience with the silver, the gold was going on so good I decided to put it on a few things I hadn't intended to touch up, but replace; the passenger side mirror mounts/arm for one (note a missed piece of POR directly below, catch this before re-assembly***):

The gold was going so good I extended the reach on the clutch mass damper. At the same time, I touched up in black all of the remaining pipes below the main block, if they were already connected:

A second coat of silver to the plenum chamber, attachments and all visible rusty bolts went much better, although its getting gloopier by the minute……I then decided to clear up the back wall, so I pulled these hoses from their spiral conduit:

Masked up everything I could, and threw an old towel over the engine:

After a decent spray with plastidip red, the back wall was a lot cleaner (you'll also note here I spent 2 hours thoroughly cleaning the sidewalls of the clamshell to check for any paint spots and get them off now before they bond with the lacquer. The paint looks very orange in some lights; a going over with compound will bring it back to spec but this task will be saved until after respray so I remove any overspray or tack dust at the same time):

Everything needed to dry, so I attempted inlaying the DOHC detail to the plenum block.. I drop-filled it, thinking to use surface tension to my advantage. Unfortunately as you can see here, gravity prevailed. Plus, I wish I'd used gold paint.

Everything else on the engine right side needed longer sessions, so I moved to the left. You'll not here I have started to take the detritus out of the bonnet gutters, to see if any POR paint splatters needed removed. The far side in this pic has been polished too….its all starting to look sexier……

[Jeemy]

I started working round with a final detail on the LHS rops & pipes….This is what I got after a single light wipe using Meguiar's Engine Clean:

I did, however, find a neat litle logo plate to refer back to:

For those of who who don't believe in top detailing products, here is a before on the brake fluid tank (*change to closeup):

You'll have to wait til tomorrow and daylight for the after. Suffice to say, its looking great.

[Jeemy]

Last thing to do before I rebuild the engine bay is fit the new gear cables & short shift.

I am a bit panicky about this as I cannot take the car off for a drive; but I figure I'll get it all fitted and be in no worse a position than anybody else when it comes to adjustment.

So I put the gear lever to the back, 4th gear I guess, which apparently makes the cross gate bracket easier to put back on.

Pulled the first cable clip:

And the second, then spent ages looking on the floor for it:

Removed the e-clip from the crossgate lever:

The lightest tap with the back of a wrench free'd the securing pin:

And the bracket slipped out pretty easy:

Inserting the new bracket was equally simple. The instructions say to do so, so I did so, however it means installing the next bit is harder:

Here you can see the bolt affixing the 'fore-aft' lever. The instructions talk about this being a pin, and to push it in to lock it. Mine may have been f*cked with in the past, because the spanner just spun and I couldn't push in or out:

A wee examine, and mine had a 6mm allen socket underneath, so I could brace & remove:

The instructions then went on about how you do not need this pin anymore, and the travel being notched so you could select one of more different positions for the shift length. I didn't have a pin, and I didn't have a new bolt, so I used the old bolt onto the new lever:

Hard to take a picture of, but here is the new lever bolted on. I've set it to the midpoint on the travel for now and left the cable ends attached (I had to remove this one to get the spanner to the bolt at the midpoint, but its back on in the pic) as there isn't anywhere safer for them to be.......

[Jeemy]

Over the weekend (photos are on my iPhone so I will upload in a bit) I also cleaned the airbox (I plan to fit a swanky-looking alteration like Sandra has with a vane fan, but for now things that can be done while she is on the road are being dumped to another list) together with:

- soaking the airbox, coolant tank & cap in surfex
- shaking sand through the coolant tank to take out the staining
- ordered all decals for the tanks, windows & fixings
- grinding the corrosion off the airbox fixing clips; before & after here:

I also have some questions at this point if anybody could help:

1) is that bolt OK fixing the new fore-aft lever as I have done?

While I had access I wanted to change the transmission fluid for MT-90 (note the Wiki says use GL-5 spec which apparently will rot our innards, it should read GL-4)

2) but I should change it while warm? so wait until the vehicle is drivable?

3) if so, should I try to loosen the speedo entry cable/filler point (I do not have a filler plug); so its easier to get to when access is more restricted - what tool is best? I don't have any open-handed spanners above 14mm but keep needing them so was going to buy a set.

[DeeAitch]

Jamie, it looks like you just swopped one of my shortshift kits for one of Bob's !
And you do have a filler plug, it just doesn't look like one - it's that 'D' shaped thing on the end of the box, search a bit on here for some pics.
Most folk just remove the speedo cable. A small bolt, 10mm A/F IIRC, holds a keep plate to the trans, just swivel it out of the way and the cable pulls complete with the gear. Not easy to get to and leaves a rather big hole on top of the trans so be careful not to drop anything down there I wont say clean it first as you have no doubt done that already
Again lots of pics on here somewhere including some inventive socket extensions !

[Jeemy]

Don't say that mate, the shift was like a welsh girls.....no wait, there must be a better analogy.

It can't be, it just can't be. Everything else on this car has been bodge job, despite a seemingly good service history.

I'm keeping all the parts so if it is really a short shift, I didn't just chuck it in the bin!

I've searched a lot, but am working in gale force winds at the moment.

So what do you reckon, can I just change the trans oil cold? I'd rather do it now with space than fight to get to it later on......

[Jeemy]

A cracking day yesterday, got almost 10 hours in on the car and a bit of a tan!

I started with the stainless steel gear cables. The cross-gate is longer and has a little mark on it; its obvious which one it is (the closer one):

The next thing was to identify which end to put on them. One has a long bolt with spacers and one is just a bolt. The instructions didn't say.

So I decided to look at the existing to see if I could identify it. I removed the 4 6mm or so Allen bolts holding the gear inner gaiter & surround on:

However it wasn't going to pull out without first removing the cables inside the engine bay. So I had a guess and put the little bolt on the fore/aft and the spaced bolt on the cross-gate. This turned out to be wrong…..

Taking photos every step of the way (I was very nervous) I removed the bolts leaving the ends:

Removing the old cables wasn't easy. I can heartily recommend anybody doing this in future (I always feel like I'm the last one to do these things, so whats the point in posting photos, but hey) has a 24mm crows' foot spanner - I did not. I managed to loosen the bolts using an adjustable wrench and pulling them all the way up and the rubber gaiter back, allows you to push the cable down and slide it through the bracket at the thin part:

I couldn't get any access to the second cable's bolt, so I removed the bracket with a 13mm ratchet spanner:

…….and then I could hold the rear bolt with molegrips and turn the front bolt to free the cable.

As the engine end has two bolts these must be the other ends. Making sure to use the correct cable, I used 2 cable ties for security to tie the new cables to the old:

Down they went and the gear lever assembly came out. The instructions say to hold it in fifth gear to facilitate removal of the cables but you have to wiggle the stick a lot to get it out the wee hole:

A lot of running back and forth and finally the gear cable came out. It became obvious that in fact the spacer type arrangement was the fore/aft cable:

[Jeemy]

I undid the bolt and replaced it with the new one to remind me. Now I see the thing in action its obvious which bit does what. Anyway:

Removed the clip holding the crossgate cable on:

And with great trepidation followed the instructions to hammer the pin out:

This caused me a lot of stress. According to one part of the instructions the pin can't be removed as it is welded in. According to another part, it must be removed as the new cable is held on by a bolt. Welp, it wouldn't come off. I hammered and hammered until the pin started to distort. Thinking the former part must be true, I tried to put the cable on but the head was too distorted. So I ground the edges back off the head, and ground the pin a trifle thinner until the fitment would go over. Then I discovered the fitment is too big to use the clip. So it MUST come out! I used a needle grinder, to grind around the base of the pin at both sides. Hey presto! 3 taps and it was out:

It was very short work to get the cables back on, the only real pain was getting the large circlips back in to hold the surround ends in place. I followed the instructions to make sure there was at least 10mm of gap between the cable and the nut. There was lots more, maybe 15mm. So I called it good and shoved it in after tightening the locking nuts:

Back on went the gear cable, back on went the new bracket:

There's not much further to report really. I tried to get to grips with the Lotus instructions to set the transmissions to 3rd, then push the lever forward 5 degrees and 10 degrees to the right, and then tighten up the cable bracket bolts.

But for my install, although I am fairly sure the cables weren't twisted, they do make a half-twist as they come out of the bulkhead, and they are pressed pretty tight against the bottom, in my opinion. They were pretty much as tight as they could go at the gear lever end, and the fore-aft cable was really as tight as it could be at the other end too. I hope to god I haven't mixed them up but I was SOOOO careful, I don't think I have. So I tightened them as much as I could to relieve any pressure on the bottom of the bulkhead, and luckily as my dash was out you could flick the cable ends and see the stick moving. Movement from either end seemed unimpeded and scratchy, 2nd and 4th located OK, and 1,3,5 seemed to be locating but very short. So I pulled the end of the fore/aft cable and let it out a bit, and that seemed to fix it. I did similar with the crossgate until I felt I had good forward/aft movement, good sideways movement, a strong centre, locating all gears, and finger-tightened the adjuster nuts until I get a crows foot. What more can you ask for, really?

Now I've done it, I'd be pretty comfortable getting the cables through on their own, taking it to pieces again, and its a long time before the consoles go back on so I will have a chance to test it on the road shortly…….

My main question for this was really: when they say pull the lever to set it to 3rd, and then adjust the stick 5 degrees forward and 10 to the right, do they mean, that if you pull the lever inside the bay, the stick actually flicks into 3rd - then you force it a further 5+10 degrees?

[Jeemy]

THATS IT!

I am now working backwards through my picture putting car & engine back together. Well, I'm over-excited and thats not strictly true. The final thing is to replace the vacuum hoses and dress the engine as I go. But anyway.

I started with the vacuum hoses. Number 6 inside the car to be precise.

This one just flies through to the engine bay connecting to nothing. I tested my new vacuum hose (3mm inner diameter silicon) out on the splitter, and then pulled cable 6, cutting the tape attaching it to the other long cable, and used it to measure the new length:

I pulled the new purple silicon cable through to the engine pay. The two cables I'd removed the spiral from got red conduit:

I replaced the black clip to the vacuum hose:

Pulled the dirty conduit from the first set of electrical connections:

I'd intended to replace this with stainless steel braid. I still possibly will but I need to (a) be able to cut it (I think I have a method) and (b) be able to remove each electrical plug, check, clean, and rebuild. Especially given some of the pins need pushed back properly:

It appears although I didn't write it on my list, I had checked the internal diameter of this 4mm hose:

Which connects to the back of the plenum chamber:

I had an exact replacement of high-temperature silicon, so it got replaced:

For now, I used red conduit on the electrical cable looms:

[Jeemy]

Also removing the other side of the big 8-ways:

The two grommets that I removed got carbon fibre covers:

In they went:

I removed my masks and wet sanded the crud off the water pipes - they are still a bit cruddy inside but I sanded inside as far as I could reach:

This gave me another excuse to scrub the gearbox, even sandpaper isn't going to clean it any further, so I officially give up for now…..

Once the ends were clean I flushed through with water:

And fitted the Samco hoses. I am trying to face all the hose clips in the same direction for neatness:

I put the clutch back in loosely for now:

And fitted the new spark plug cables:

Chatting to a passing tyre-kicker, I noticed the mirror trim is not flush, and marked it down to fix:

I had to use a UK on a ratchet to get to the last Samco hose that is still on the car:

[Jeemy]

In it went:

Night was falling. I took this pic to show what an utter mess I had made. Rewarding can of Fosters just visible on the clamshell:

Tidying up, I found a magnecor sticker in the box. So I thought I'd stick it on:

I immediately regretted it as it will likely be caught by overspray. They'll send me another, I am sure.

So this is the engine bay as it stands now:

Bit dark for an impressive picture, and its nowhere close to ready. I'd say its halfway there, though!

I have tried to link hi-res pictures of the bay so you can see everything in detail.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/phmptzf4iqg0uj9/P1010600.jpg
https://www.dropbox.com/s/v2ketoqotahxzo7/P1010602.jpg

[Piperman]

Looks like labour of love fantastic rebuild on road this year ? Piperman aka derek looking forward to day I drive mine !