Lotus Elan Central

by **Mcmilab** » Sun 07.10.2007, 12:18

Hi All,
ok so I had a little spare cash so I thought I should replace the brake hoses with the stainless braided.....ok so i pick up the car and there is a nasty scraping sound when rolling forward. So I took the car back to the garage and he said "Oh its your CV joint on the left side." SO i bought a new drishaft assembly and had that put on..... still the scraping sound and it turns out the new hoses are too long for the car.
Now two points;

1. I bought the hoses from SJS who I trust and am a bit puzzled as to why they are not fitting correctly.
2. I just replaced the driveshaft assembly before it really needed to be done.

Now I get to the third point....the scraping sound has now been replaced by a rather nasty rattle under the front left, like something is loose on the driveshaft or front suspension. I have yet to pay the guy for the last bit of work on the car as my Lotus is worse than it was when I took her in, the first time!!!

Any idea what could be causing the nasty rattle, and should I be driving the car at all now?
Help!!
Al

by **Paul.P** » Sun 07.10.2007, 15:06

Al, the hoses are usually a bit long, they get tied against the longerons or they will rub through & cause brake failure ( as some will testify ! ), as for the other noises, perhaps it would be worth seeking a mechanic that knows what he's doing ( it appears your present one doesn't ? ), & getting a second opinium ?

by **Mcmilab** » Sun 07.10.2007, 16:33

Fabulous, thanks for the reply, the longerons would be the horizontal strut leading to the wheel itself? Sorry but I am a complete novice when it comes to mechanics as this post proves

AL

by **Paul.P** » Sun 07.10.2007, 17:59

Mcmilab wrote:Fabulous, thanks for the reply, the longerons would be the horizontal strut leading to the wheel itself?
AL

Al, the longerons are the main front chassis members ( one either side ) that come from the bulkhead.

by **Mike_H** » Sun 07.10.2007, 22:30

hi there,
I bought the S J sportscars stainless hoses for my car and when I fitted them I noticed that they had to be clamped to the suspension arm the same as the OE hoses or they would rub against the wheel and eventually burst through .

The problem is that the location block on the new SJ hose is smaller than the original hose and will not fit without modification to the bracket.

I had the bracket welded up and then remachined back to 15mm dia to take the new hose .

I suppose you could just use cable ties to do the job as a temporary fix but long term I wouldn't recommend it.

I have no idea what the rattle could be but if I was you I would take it somewhere else and get a second opinion.

Mike.

by **nitroman** » Sun 07.10.2007, 23:59

Wow Mike, you are as anal as me. I can't just replace a part; I have to refurbish the whole area while I'm at it!

FWIW there is no "location-block" on the Goodridge front hoses, but I only bought them as a kit to get the rears, which worked fine. The Goodrige front hoses are EXACTLY the same length as the OE ones (I literally just got up & checked), so with a little ingenuity, like fitting a Loom-clamp to lock them in place, they should work fine. The Goodridge is a 5/16" OD hose, so that's the size of Loom-clamp you'd want to buy. Think I manually measured that? Ha! I used my hose/tubing gauge. From the time of the caveman, tools have made man's lives easier. That's why professional mechanics salivate when the Snap-on Tools truck pulls onto the lot. It's their candy store.

If I lived in the UK it'd be very tempting to open an M100-only repair shop. Unlike other shops, I'd offer 2 repair choices:
1) Cheap fix (this is what you get anywhere else; they just don't use the word "cheap"! It's the minimum amount of labour which has to be done to make the car work again.
2) Fix & refurbish... That entire area of car would look factory-new or better, with an eye towards longevity. As I've always believed, a proper job should only have to be done once, forever.

by **Mcmilab** » Thu 18.10.2007, 18:21

Just to give you an update....found a really nice, but more importantly, good mechanic who had a look at the car today, and found that the brake calipers on the left had not been reattched properly. He tightened it all up and I'm now a happy Elan driver once again. It would be a good week had it not been for the fact that some little s**t broke into my car again on Saturady night!!

Never mind, at least they didnt torch it.

Thanks for all the help and advice

Al

by **gmacz** » Thu 18.10.2007, 18:55

Never mind, at least they didnt torch it. :shock:

Jersey is no longer on the Holiday list.
Yours Gmacz

by **paulrwebster** » Thu 18.10.2007, 19:45

I think that you are being far too reasonable here.
First of all your garage fitted brake hoses that fouled the wheels. This could have killed you.
The garage then did not torque up the brake calliper correctly. This too could have killed you.
At the very least you need to report the garage to trading standards. If they continue to trade, someone will get killed.

by **Mcmilab** » Thu 18.10.2007, 21:04

Jersey is no longer on the Holiday list.

I lived in Dundee for 3 years

Nuff said?

Yeah I realise I'm being too reasonable, especially since the guy said emphatically that the knocking wasnt a big deal and I should just go ahead and keep driving as usual!! Luckily I wasn't happy to do so and didn't. I paid him £150 to do the hoses, which as we've already discussed, was a crap job.

The problem is that I owe the guy £162 for the work he did replacing the driveshaft (which didn't really need doing just yet) but I am a trusting/stupid person...not sure where I stand as I just had to pay another £50 to the other mechanic to fix his mistake! Any advice?

Al

by **nitroman** » Fri 19.10.2007, 03:08

paulrwebster wrote:I think that you are being far too reasonable here.
First of all your garage fitted brake hoses that fouled the wheels. This could have killed you.
The garage then did not torque up the brake calliper correctly. This too could have killed you.
At the very least you need to report the garage to trading standards. If they continue to trade, someone will get killed.

Ditto that. At the least, if mechanic #1 is willing to eat crow & be contrite, I would demand total recall of the £162 bill you should never have received, while billing him the £50 you paid another mechanic to restore your brakes to safe operating condition after another botched job by mechanic #1.

If mechanic #1 is a right bastard then I'd let him know how fondly I looked forward to discussing the matter before a judge in small-claims court... and , if I might add on a personal note (if he pissed me off) I'd privately let him know I looked forward to him slipping-up & giving me the opportunity to put his life on the line; so I hoped to see him every day possible. I'm direct like that when someone imperils my life.

Remember: actions come easy; decisions come hard. Once you have justified something in your mind, doing it is easy.

by **Doug** » Fri 19.10.2007, 04:20

and Nitro's got gunz too :smt068

by **Paul.P** » Fri 19.10.2007, 07:03

Bloody hell :shock:

, don't upset Nitters :smt066

by **Mcmilab** » Fri 19.10.2007, 10:10

I don't have any guns but I do have a few venomous snakes. :twisted:

Thanks for the feedback, will be getting onto him today to sort this out, I'm not so sure he intended to decieve but either way he did a s**t job with possibly dire consequences.

Will let you all know if I end up in court

Al

by **nitroman** » Sat 20.10.2007, 04:19

I'm truly a nice guy unless someone really has it coming. Otherwise, I might possess the sudden-temper of an Irishman, the long memory of the Hatfields/McCoys, and the tactical awareness and legal patience to see you get what you deserve.

by **No 57** » Tue 30.10.2007, 16:24

Ermm, I'm a bit new here, and don't want to play devils advocate. But are you sure the second guy isn't dropping the first guy in it on purpose

It sounds from your story like the second bloke is spot on and has stopped you from driving round in a dangerous car, but I'd want to be 100% before going to bloke 1 all guns blazing. Were you there when he was inspecting the car ??

by **Mcmilab** » Thu 01.11.2007, 10:10

Hi 57,
I appreciate what you are saying, but there is no doubt that the replacement hoses were fouling the wheels, I was the one who noticed that issue, and the replacement driveshaft really didn't need replacing at the time, and the second mechanic is a very good friend of my best m8, he just charges more than the other guy, and now I know why

Jersey is one of those places that word gets around very fast when someone is dodgy or trying to take the p**s, and to be fair, the second mechanic just found the fault and fixed it, he didn't say anything about the fact that the hoses rubbing or the loose caliper was dangerous, all that was gleaned from the very nice ppl on this forum

Still haven't paid mech #1 and it appears he knows that he messed up cos I haven't heard a thing from him in over 3 weeks.

Al

by **DaveT** » Fri 02.11.2007, 09:08

I found your man......

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-QiU1pPx-M

by **Mcmilab** » Fri 02.11.2007, 10:00

That's him!!!

Well found

Lotus Elan Central

Help, dodgy mechanic keeps messing up my car.

Help, dodgy mechanic keeps messing up my car.

brake hose clamp

Who is online