S2 #378 (Steve) - hopefully only light fixes

[TorqueHorse]

Oh no, it's contagious! That stinks. At least you were able to get it out.

Painted calipers and polished piston look great! I can't believe you are ruining that beautiful workbench with actual car part work though

Did you upgrade to stainless brake lines, or did you already have them? Looking good!

[378S2]

All done and test drive complete. I had a little bit of fun sourcing new flexible hose retaining clips after one of them went pinging across the garage never to be seen again.

Before I started the previous owner had already done a very good job of painting them black whilst still on the car, so apart from the shiny new hoses that you can’t see anyway everything looks exactly as it was. However, the difference in stopping is immense, it’s gone from a solid pedal with on/off capabilities to a graduated system that feels just like a proper car. Pads and rotors were a bit frivolous since there was plenty of life in them but you can’t spend too much on safety right?

I can't believe you are ruining that beautiful workbench with actual car part work though

Did you upgrade to stainless brake lines, or did you already have them? Looking good!

Thanks Matt - no the hoses are new, I wanted to know I could rely on the system and they weren’t so badly priced. As for the bench, man the fluid has upset my varnish and the hammering has left some dents in the merbau hardwood top…

[dapinky]

Charlie,

Just a thought on your flexi hoses, some people have reported that when fitted, they can rub on the tyre at full lock under suspension movement (heavy cornering!) - I see you have the 'protective springs' over the actual pipe, and it is pretty impossible to check for fowling with the car in the air, but I would suggest checking it after a bit of use to see if there are any signs of the tyre rubbing against the spring/hose.

I fed mine back a bit more through the rubber grommet and secured it with a cable tie when I did mine.

(not meaning to worry you - it isn't always a problem, but better to know that it's worth a check in a while!)

[378S2]

Hi Dave - thanks very much for the tip. Yes I reused the spring just because I was a bit paranoid about it rubbing but I was looking at the suspension not the tyre so this is a great help thank you.

Thanks for all your help on the master cylinder - I’ve got the smaller bore one on order from the UK now.

I’m George by the way, must sort my footer. I don’t mean to be mysterious!

[dapinky]

I’m George by the way, must sort my footer. I don’t mean to be mysterious!

Oops my bad - where did I get the idea that you were Charlie? (I know from the PMs that you're George) - maybe I'm going senile or just plain mad???

[378S2]

Big thanks to Dave Pink for the support in sourcing this, today my new 20.6mm ID BMC arrived to help with the final OEM improvement I plan to make. I don’t think the brakes are bad enough to spend the serious coin on a big brake kit so my hope is that this will be a low cost way to get them good enough to lock up if needed. I couldn’t face fitting it tonight but I had a poke about to see how much fun it will be to fit.

The electrical connector is easy to reach so I will leave the level warning sensor in place, and I can see all 6 bolts I need to undo but how the hell do you reach the one on the right?

[dapinky]

George,

There are 2 ways to get to the awkward bolt - well, 3 actually.

open-ended spanner
Crowfoot spanner
1/4" drive socket

I used a standard spanner to 'break the seal' then (once the hydraulic connector is removed), I could get a socket on the bolt, and using a variety of extensions (some 'straight' some 'wobble', the bar ended up where I could get the ratchet handle on it and then it's easy.

It is easiest to remove the other bolt first, then as you undo the awkward one, you can pull the BMC forward as you go to keep the clearance so the socket/nut doesn't fowl on the casting.

[378S2]

Steve and I have been busy with our own scope creep.

It all started when I spotted that the vacuum take off for the cabin heater was cracked. An easy fix, the hose was fine just the funny 90 degree attachment point that needed to be replaced so I spliced some new 4mm silicone hose in to the existing line. Easy. Trivial.

Then I noticed the line to the boost gauge was looking a little tired. I didn’t have any 3mm but it wasn’t expensive. Again, easy.

Then I decided the EECS line was in trouble, but I couldn’t get to the one way valve to join it there (it’s in the fuel line bundle under the coolant expansion tank so I added it to the list of jobs to do when I do the Samco hoses.

And then, with the WSM in one hand I gave a light tug on the secondary throttle line to check it was ok… and discovered it wasn’t connected to its reservoir. Again, an easy fix I thought so nice to know. But I was curious as to why I haven’t had any associated issues like rough idle or poor low speed running? Maybe this is the source of my soot on the rear bumper rather than too many short trips? (It’s not the turbo, I believe, having consulted Dave).

Well bugger me, getting that hose back on is now a week in. It’s on, hooray, but my Samco job has been brought forward. There’s no way to reach the secondary throttle reservoir with the cabin heater hoses in place. So they came out, and because I had to cut them to get them off their fixings I just kept going.

That has solved two of my great mysteries:

1. My oil pressure warning light does not work because the sender is the wrong unit. It’s a single action one and does not have the warning light pressure switch.

2. The play in my gear shift is caused by worn bushings in the cross gate. (https://youtube.com/shorts/UA3qQx9Xc5M?feature=share)

I’ll never get a clearer run at the gearbox oil, so I’ll do that too, and I will also degrease and clean the gearbox housing which looks a little shabby.

I’m a little impatient to find out what gain I will get from a working secondary throttle. I’m now waiting for parts for my oil sender and gear shift. Part of me doesn’t want to wait, throw it back together tonight and go for a spin tomorrow and the other part can’t be bothered to do all the disassembly again in a couple of weeks’ time.

Steve is no longer a second car, and now is officially recognised as a hobby.

[378S2]

I’ve run in to a small snag with the gearbox oil change, pretty minor in the scale of things but I’d love an opinion or two if anyone else has encountered the same problem.

The bolt which retains the speedo gear has sheered at some point in the past with around 6mm left proud. The person who put it back put an M6 nut on, and I’d say with the plate on there 1/2 to 3/4 of the nut was contacting the thread. Not enough to tighten it down much, it was very loose and it wouldn’t take a lot to strip the threads. I don’t fancy my chances of success with the mole grips with it installed (and I am not pulling the gearbox out for this!).

My plan is to drill and tap the inside of an M10 stud to be M6, then open out the hole on the retaining plate. Has anyone had a similar problem and if so how did you fix it?

[muley]

Sheered off set screw.

Yes, I had an Elan where the set screw was sheered off. It's extremely hard to get to. I did try gripping it with mole grips ~ I even filed flats on it. But no luck

In the end I created a sort of 'holdfast' out of an old bracket bent to a suitable shape and used that to force the speedo drive flange down on to the gearbox.

Bit easier than removing the gearbox and using heat to really get the old one out !

[378S2]

Yes, I’m faced with the choice of doing it properly but potentially making it worse, cobbling together a better fix than the current one or just leaving it the hell alone and pretending I thought it was supposed to be like that!

I’d use a tube of silicone before I pull the gearbox out on this particular snag though.

[378S2]

The transmission oil change was a lot easier than I’d thought it was going to be. Admittedly most of the threads I’ve read had a lot more clutter in the bay than I’ve got right now. Before I pulled the speedo drive out I throughly cleaned the area and blew all the grit away with the air line.

It’s a little time consuming to fill through the 6mm hose but no hardship.

[378S2]

It was well hidden, but I found it! My oil cooler has been modified so that there’s a threaded t-piece at the oil inlet. In to that a previous owner has put one of the easy to get pressure switches and run a blue cable from the location of the combined pressure sender & switch - which has itself been replaced with another easy to get hold of stand alone pressure sender.

I’ve bought a proper Lotus replacement for the dual unit but I cannot think of a way to swap it without taking the intake manifolds off, and I’m not going to do that.

So a simple $10 replacement for the pressure switch is all that’s needed for now. When I get a chance to put the proper sender / switch in I’ll use the threaded t-piece to run an oil temperature gauge. Does anyone have a view on what pressure level I should get? The WSM states minimum pressure of 0.35bar; mine never gets that low so I was thinking I would go for 0.6 for a safety factor.

Some of the hoses are back in, but nothing on the LHS of the engine for now while I wait for my short shift kit to arrive. I've cracked all the bolts off that I will need to undo so I am raring to go.

[378S2]

It’s taken me precisely 9 months, but I’ve managed to fix the first thing I tried to fix. The oil warning light.

I hope you are all basking in my glory right now:

How do you like them apples?

It might not go off when the engine starts, I won’t know that until it’s all back together, but it *should* be fine.

Next bit of scope creep is going to have to be the wheel arches. They need some repairs and a coat of paint.

[378S2]

Alrighty… speedo retaining. I tried a couple of low impact approaches to remove the broken stud but it wouldn’t budge. So I’ve turned down an M10 flanged bolt to be 8mm OD, tapped the centre to M6 and opened out the retaining brackets to 8.3mm.

Pretty simple design to overcome the broken stud.

Ta da! If you’re a future owner of #378 - I make no apology for my half arsed attempt to remove the broken stud. I couldn’t face the likely prospect of making it worse and having to pull the gearbox out. The new retaining bolt is very slightly short of the thickness of the retaining plate.

The end result is that I have the full 5mm of protruding thread from the broken stud engaged, the speedo drive gear is properly retained and I’m a happy camper. I didn’t torque it up much, with a 14mm socket and 3/8 drive it would be too easy to snap it off.

Fully engaged and safe as houses. I’ll do it properly if I need a clutch or have some other disaster requiring the gearbox to come out.

SSK is still stuck in transit… now that’s frustrating. If you have a friend at USPS ask them to look out for it please. I don’t know if I will be able to hold out as I am itching to find out if the secondary throttle fix works and if it does what that’s done to the driving experience. I’m balancing my impatience with the frustration I would feel stripping all the cooling system back out to fit it later on. Maybe I’ll do the master brake cylinder swap while I’m waiting.

Everyone needs a friend with a lathe, and my friend is called Joe. Joe also has a stunning Jaguar E-Type

[378S2]

I was just watching one of Toby’s videos to see if I could find an answer to a question I asked about coolant, and he also kindly talks about gearbox oil. I made a dumb mistake which I will share just in case it can save someone wasting $90 on the wrong transmission oil… I should have looked closer at the names of the Castrol oils because I used GL5 not GL4.

He even told me to watch out for the confusingly named oil… the exact one I bought.

Dumb mistake - that’ll be GL5 right there on the bottle

Frustrating but very pleased to spot it before it had a chance to do any damage.

GL5 flushed out with GL4 and box refilled. On the second time of refitting the Speedo drive I feel like I got it properly seated this time. There’s no play / wobble in it at all now. With a little luck this will have been the root cause of the low speed fluctuations in my speedo.

[378S2]

HE’S ALIVE!! (not an exciting video but a moment of great relief for me)

It started on the first go with no hesitation, funny noises, warning lights or vital fluids on the floor. It’s been a long slog mainly caused by the postal delays and finding enough time to get through the work but I’ve got some important jobs done:

- Short shift kit (feels great in the garage)
- Samco hoses, new recirc pump, new heater valve
- Vac lines
- Secondary throttle now closing properly at idle (no test drive tonight so unknown on the 5,700 rpm opening)
- Gearbox oil change & fix for sheered bolt

That is a lot more than I expected to do when I found the vac line for the secondary throttle had come loose.

I still need to run it up to temperature, bleed the air, tighten all the clamps, pressurise & leak check and put countless little plastic bits back but I feel I’m through the worst of it now.

IT’S ALIVE!

UPDATE: Test drive complete, largely uneventful. I was taking it easy but didn’t notice any performance difference with a working secondary throttle - I will need to give it a proper boot in the backside when the roads are dry. It is idling better I would say. I suppose I was being a tad optimistic to expect a free 20HP!

The Samco hoses are a huge improvement on the old ones, the turbo hoses arrived yesterday and it was a quick but fiddly job to put them on. The old ones were in much worse condition than all the others and disintegrated on their way off the car.

Finally - the short shift kit is wonderful, money well spent. It is a lot less like making porridge now.

[378S2]

Fun road trip today with the WA Lotus Club - 300km or so and hassle free. Steve was running beautifully. Some coolant spatters so I’ll tighten all the hose clamps up again but nothing serious.

In the past I’ve had trouble with (non-oily) soot on the bumper, but that has largely gone now. I am hopeful that it was related to the non-functioning secondary throttle and now that it’s had a good run and clean I won’t see any more.

[Rambo]

Well done on getting this far. Now put some more miles on it and enjoy the driving experience

PS why are all the hoods up in the photo

[378S2]

Thanks Rambo! Hoods were only up for the coffee stop; it was raining off and on today but not enough to drive about with the roof up.

The driving was excellent - I’m no race driver but I was only dropped twice, once on an up hill winding section and once on a long straight. The M100 really is quite easy to drive and what a difference from the short shift kit, I’m very pleased with that extravagance.