Jeemy's Elan Rebuild

[Jeemy]

Off ramps and to spray shop next Friday! Whatever it takes......(he mutters darkly)

[Jeemy]

So yeah, I had some problems. No photos to document these until the fix.

Basically, while rebuilding the vaccum lines I wanted to get into the vacuum reservoir - I suspected a line was disconnected. I thought I might be able to get in via the air blower ducting. When I started to remove the airblower, I discovered the casing was cracked and needed a fibreglass repair. And where the Service Manual innocently says 'remove the 3 bolts holding the air blower on' it totally neglects to mention that one of these can only be accessed through the wheel arch.

While all of this was going on, there was some good weather and I painted the brake lines red. The light shows up some areas that require touchup, I have a hand aerosol of Dinitrol 4147 for this and some artists paintbrushes for the very end bits, which I will do once the back is on the lifts:

Another view showing more spots missed when painting in the depths of winter!

So basically to get the arch liner off, I had to lower the car onto an axle stand placed at the rear bolt mounting for the front wishbones, as per the manual:

Then I put a jack just under the jacking point for torsional support to the frame.

At this point, I found the locking nut I'd dropped off the gear cables. Happy days!

The bolts were much easier to remove with the wheel off. A drill with a 10mm socket managed to remove 2 of them impact style, an impact screwdriver did the remaining 2 philips head at the base, and then I had to drill out the rest.

Out came the liner. Not surprised but not particularly pleased by what I saw:

[Jeemy]

In particular, the oval area is almost bulging out with rust - or so it looked to my horrified eye. A bit of a tentative poke with a screwdriver and its like all the rest of the car - I am just catching it in time, another year or two and it wouldn't be surface rust to stop spreading/penetrating, but endemic rust needing sections cut out.

Plenty Dinitrol access points here, so I will get it sorted and cleaned. I also took the opportunity to test fit my new wheels - spigot rings will be needed, so I sourced those.

The rust will need dealt with quickly, so it looks like I am going to be doing the wheel arches before I go to respray. I will keep the suspension for after.

Looks pretty bad. Its not, but I'll deal with it right away.

But YES! As I suspected (well, as I was told it probably was 6 months ago, and as I hoped so this exercise wouldn't have been in vain) the vacuum reservoir was completely disconnected just where the evidence suggested. So problem solved:

The bolt I wanted to get to from the airblower is tucked right under this foam duct; the manual suggests its as easy as removing a screw, haha.

Its completely perished anyway, so I am glad I get the chance to replace it:

After removing it appears the bolts holding the air blower on are technically fixed at the air blower side - after 20 years this is not the case and a wee pal holding them down with a fingertip at the other side was essential to get the blower off - you can see the bust fitment here:

So NOW its reassembly only, wheel arch work excluded (which I always had marked up to do, I'm just doing it before respray now!

[Jeemy]

I'd washed the coolant tank out last weekend:

Its time to start refinishing the bolts & pipes before replacement. I am testing out a supposed wonder product called Ferro-Solve. I'm going to use it to hopefully clean the insie and out of the turbo oil and coolant feed pipes:

Last night, in went the first pipe and the first set of bolts:

[Jeemy]

So I took this and the airbox. Plasti-dip appears to be impossible to get so I used an eBay equivalent, to spray them black:

Unfortunately it takes 10 or so coats to get the proper effect and as its meant to be peelable, this wasn't the best choice to get a neat edge on the strip I made for level checking. However its only a temporary solution till I can afford an aluminium tank:

While the bolts soak, I started mounting the fans to the radiator in preparation for refitting the new rad:

[HJ2]

Very inspiring, this thread!

As a plastidip expert...
If you take a scalpel and cut the edges of the level checking strip, you can peel them off to make a nice and perfect clean edge

Just like my silver and black wheels!
viewtopic.php?f=45&t=20744&hilit=plastidip

[epipete]

What did you clean the coolant tank with to bring it to that level of restoration - it looks almost new!!!

[Jeemy]

I cut with a Stanley lightly; wish I'd thought of that HJ! Maybe I can trim back a little more or I will handpaint red edges over it.

Epi, I used Surfex HD 1:5 with boiling water on an overnight soak, then shook sand through it, then scrubbed using a toothbrush, then overnight soaked in washing up liquid then scrubbed again. There are still stains simply because I couldn't reach some areas with the toothbrush but its pretty clean and covered now anyway.

[HJ2]

I cut with a Stanley lightly; wish I'd thought of that HJ! Maybe I can trim back a little more or I will handpaint red edges over it.

Epi, I used Surfex HD 1:5 with boiling water on an overnight soak, then shook sand through it, then scrubbed using a toothbrush, then overnight soaked in washing up liquid then scrubbed again. There are still stains simply because I couldn't reach some areas with the toothbrush but its pretty clean and covered now anyway.

You can trim back as far as you'd like, no need for hand painting

I Used Caustic Soda to clean my tank, and filled it up with small marbles to get it clean

[Jeemy]

I would say FerroSolve is a great success.

If this isn't the exact bolt before and after, its blimming close:

[Jeemy]

I cut with a Stanley lightly; wish I'd thought of that HJ! Maybe I can trim back a little more or I will handpaint red edges over it.

Epi, I used Surfex HD 1:5 with boiling water on an overnight soak, then shook sand through it, then scrubbed using a toothbrush, then overnight soaked in washing up liquid then scrubbed again. There are still stains simply because I couldn't reach some areas with the toothbrush but its pretty clean and covered now anyway.

You can trim back as far as you'd like, no need for hand painting

I Used Caustic Soda to clean my tank, and filled it up with small marbles to get it clean

What if I like hand painting ?

[HJ2]

Paint an Elan for me please!

[Jeemy]

Grille time. I'd like to report this was easy and executed flawlessly but it was a bit of a bodge job. Hammering a putty knife down the side of the Betaseal eventually allowed me to tear out the main grille:

To get to the nearside one, I removed the intercooler. I half wish I hadn't done this and left well alone. 3 of the 4 bolts snapped off as you can see here. The front of the cooler is fairly ratty, with insects embedded, crumbling fins, and detritus:

And in fact, this gave me no better access to the grille really. Short of removing the bumper, I don't know what would be best or how you could do this neatly.

So I developed a new technique; cut it out with wire clippers, leaving a cm or so of wire protruding from the old grille:

Then place the new grille in and hold it from behind, then use a podger to bend the old wires around to hold it in place; then rub Sikaflex in with your begloved finger.

Stuck a treat:

Given the problem with the chargecooler, and reading the instructions, I was absolutely not prepared to remove the oil cooler. After a bit of reading, I decided that painting the oil cooler silver would be fine, but the chargecooler needed to be black to properly radiate. So I buzzed some masking tape on and a bit of VHT aluminium paint onto the oil cooler, then shoved the grille on. It looks brilliant in the light, not so good in the photos:

I've got to remember this whole area is hardly the most apparent to the eye; but I am glad I replaced this mesh. I wouldn't have been happy otherwise.

[Jeemy]

Time to work on the vacuum system. I ordered too little 3mm silicon hose - you need about 6-7m and I only had 4 - but I dealt with the other pipe going to the engine bay:

And wound the new cable through to the engine bay:

And onwards to the vacuum reservoir! I have not tried to blow this out or anything, maybe I should:

Neatened them up in the bay, new Samco hose fitted coming from the plenum chamber:

A brief spell of rain, so I sanded the crud off the heater pipes ready for reinsertion and flushed it again:

And reattached the spark plug hose clip to the base of the oil cooler:

[Jeemy]

Charge cooler nightmare.

I cleaned out all the fins, removing broken edges, wasps and stones; then brushed it down with a paintbrush, sanded the corrosion from the edges and acid etched it:

Trying to drill out the broken screws, initially seemed a great success:

Then, I broke a drill bit off, couldn't loosen the insert right up to 5.5mm, tried to tap the other side, broke a cheapo tap kit, broke a medium priced one, and decided instead of spending £80 on a brilliant tapping kit, just to get somebody to helicoil it. I still need to test it for leaks, I guess I will fill it with water and a little antifreee and see........

So I gave it a scoosh with Eastwood's Radiator Paint- more to hold the remaining fins on than anything else!

[Jeemy]

While the charge cooler is away, onto some more constructive work.

After some time examining the wiring diagrams I now understand them - green/black is +ve and I cut down the wires and soldered on the Kenlowe connections - I figure they know what they are doing:

I'd been soaking all the bolts in Ferrosolve for weeks, and now I'd acid etched the tops of them:

In the end, when I test mounted the rad, it transpired that to fit round the previous fan mounts they need to be more like this, than my symmetrical efforts. I'd rather have the extra support and not cut away parts of the frame, than have it symmetrical - I just wish I hadn't already poked 2 holes for the fans:

Unfortunately I had to wait for the silver POR15 to dry on the bolt heads:

So remounted the newly red coolant tank mount:

Nipped a tricky Samco hose under the oil filter:

Then - I got the gold paint out again!

I painted the oil filter, the plinth behind it, and the DOHC logo - much happier with it in gold, but there is still some tidying up to do there.....

[Jeemy]

After dropping the charge cooler at the engineers for helicoiling and fixing my mishaps, I dropped the lid on the oil filter:

And prepared the back of all the bolts for use with Copaslip:

Then I fitted up the tow bar. This turned out to be a mistake, but I needed to measure the hole for it to poke through:

Fitted up the neoprene pads to the top of the radiator (I'd also rescued the rubber grommets from the old one):

This wasn't 100% a nightmare, I coped well enough but I had to hang the radiator from string, and jack up the mount to get it into position, remove the towbar and gouge a bigger hole out of my grilles, and to top it all off, the brackets ended up going on the opposite way to what I remembered - so the visible side is the one I put a basic coat on - the non-visible sides are pristine!

If doing it again, I would have hand-silvered out the fan mounts but its not a major drama - the radiator is in and I can push on!

[RayD]

Great work Jamie,

Thanks for going to the trouble with all the pictures.

Ray

[HJ2]

I am really, really impressed and i just love this thread!

[Jeemy]

Thanks guys....it really is bottom-up stuff, and as I've said before, without all the pictures I'd go mad. There's a few more to show, some more hoses, the actuators are in, some conduit on the wiring.

I almost asked HJ about Samco today but persevered, identified the parts and worked out where they all go; I've still to upload the latest set of pics but I really *should* know what every part is called by the time its finished.....I was still cross-referencing old pics from Clive, my pics which 6 months down the line make no sense, and 2 sets of manuals. Its much more satisfying decoding the manuals. I'm sure its bread and butter to you guys but I've got no clue which is the thermostat body - and it doesn't help that there are 3 pages missing from the manuals......right about where I am working. Luckily deroure is really handy for an effective search tool to quickly answer queries on parts.

I am very frustrated now -

- need my terminal tool to dissassemble the electric terminals and get the shrouds on
- need more vacuum line for install heaters, should have been here yesterday
- need gaskets & studs for install turbo, no ETA yet
- need chargecooler back in general, this will be quick
- really would like new samco hoses but won't get them, they'll be a later job now it appears
- need alloy piping for coolant fixes
- need spigot rings for wheels

Bit hamstrung.

Haha, only joking, there are bloody hundreds of things to do. But each one is now assembly, not disassembly. I've booked in the leatherwork for 2-3 weeks. I still really believe that in 3 full 8-10 hour days, it can be down off the blocks and to the spray shop.