Handbrake Cables

[ailwyn]

Ailwyn,

We did do some handbrake cables for a Robert Brown a few years ago and I do believe they were for a Lotus. There were 2 part numbers as follows :-

117832 – length 1352/1585mm

117833 – length 1390/1585mm

Price is £37.50 each plus p&c and VAT

Delivery is approx 7 working days from order subject to payment

I am pretty sure we did not make any gear change cables for him. Whether we could make them I am not sure without seeing them.

Regards

Mike Howes DIRECTOR

Registered Address: Speedy Cables (London) Ltd Abercrave, Swansea, SA9 1SQ Tel: +44 (0)1639 732213

If I remember correctly the longer cable was stock spec, shorter cable for the hi-spec calipers.

[clemo]

Doing a bit of nosing around looking for a handbrake cable and so far come across this ...

On ebay there is a listing for LHD rear hand brake cable ... though not sure what the difference between LHD / RHD would be ..
The picture shows BOWDEN 4 / 90 .

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Lotus-Elan-M1 ... SwyWZZPT1P

with a search for bowden 4/90 on google we come up with many various cars they are used on .
In particular the correct looking end is listed for LAND ROVER , which is where our steering rack is nicked from .
Similar is the VW LT
But not saab volvo , bmw

Bowden has become rinngspan uk and no longer used the square end design so i guess this is why LEC went down the road of getting speedy to remake the group buy items . and that is where a draw a blank .

With my inspector cluso hat on i will delve further .

[Brit-Car-Nut]

The cable you are referring to is just a plain, normal D100J0022F cable used on both sides of the M100. The seller is confused as I am assuming he meant to say LH instead of LHD since both cables are the same until Lotus developed a different cable to solve the current problem with most existing rebuilt rear caliper kits arriving with TWO different brake levers as the original design levers used for our left side caliper went obsolete so the more standard end used by GM for the later Lumina was used instead. Since Lotus put the calipers on the FRONT of the rear M100 brake disc and GM put them on the rear of the american car's calipers, the US listings are actually the reverse of what you would need if only ordering only 1 caliper. Thus, the "special" cable fits the LH caliper on the M100, but the RH caliper listed on sites like Rock Auto is what you would need to order to get one. (It has been a long time since I looked at this issue and I think I am right with the caliper placement)

The initial solution by everyone was to cut up the old lever and new lever and weld up a lever that solved the problem. Lotus realized this was less than acceptable and had a new cable made A100J6114S that replaced the original cable for that style lever.

D100J0022F is currently available from Lotus for £93.54 and A100J6114S is currently £17.27. Ironically, a while ago I ordered 3 of the replacement cable and ended up receiving 1 replacement and 2 of the original cables - all for the replacement price. No, I don't want to sell any right now.

Unfortunately, the part number never made it into any of the parts books and I only knew about it as it was hand written in the copied parts book PDF that Lotus sent to me. You can see it in the parts book I designated V7 since it was a cross between the V6 and S2 versions I already had.

There are a LOT of notes and extra pages in this PDF that noted the part numbers for components of assemblies that the other books only offered as the assembly. Items like injectors, ignition coils and all of the sub components apparently have part numbers too, but the parts books never offered the individual parts, just the assemblies. Unfortunately, it hasn't been indexed or otherwise made to easily find parts quickly.

[clemo]

Thank you for taking the time to write that up ..
To throw another curve ball into the numbers my late S2 has SBLG 12 / 95 printed on both .
Which doesn't show up anywhere nor from what i can see is a replacement part .

This rings true with what you are saying .. even so much as they made a late batch to bodge a load of S2's laying around on the workshop floor .

My guess is that S=? B =Bugatti LG= lotus group and the date of December 95 . They are of equal length and not sided .

Also Steve at SJ's is selling cables at £38 unsided .

Any thoughts ?

[Brit-Car-Nut]

SJs part # SJ100J0031 is their "replacement" cable. I have no idea if they are the same or just similar: with or without the teflon inner jacket.

The original cables were never sided since the system was symmetrical. Siding became an issue years later when rebuilt calipers started showing up with different hand brake levers on one side.

The marking on the outside of the cables is just the part designation from the cable manufacturer. I am sure Lotus used several different manufacturers over the years. None of the original cables have the ?100J0022F on the jacket. There were "A", "B", "C" and finally "D" versions over the year and the other prefixed numbers all refer to the current D100J0022F which is currently in the current Lotus price book at £93.54.

[378S2]

Hello - does this look to you like someone has installed the wrong LHS cable please? Seems like it would be easy enough to shorten... is that a terrible idea or a quick way to get this working properly? Your expertise greatly appreciated. Thanks.

[dapinky]

The cables are okay (lengthwise!), but I would suggest having a look at the handbrake lever mechanism on both rear calipers.

There is a chance that one or other of the levers are not getting the full travel to engage the brakes on that side, so it is best to check. If they are getting full travel, then I'd leave it alone (so long as there are no other issues).

There are so many little adjustments that can be made on the rear brakes that it is quite easy to take a 'working' setup and adjusting it "correctly" so that it no longer works (been there, done that!).

Now that I have a pretty good knowledge of the whole system, I find that it is often easier to take everything off and start again - but if it works, it works, so leave it alone.

One thing to note is that there isn't a lot of adjustment left on the cable lengths, so maybe someone has tried to take up the slack in the cables to get the handbrake to work, as opposed to doing it right and getting the levers set right - this may well enable it to work, but can put a permanent tension on the cables and cause issues further down the line (and stop the caliper pistons from self-adjusting if they don't get full travel in use.)

[378S2]

Hi Dave - you’re on to something for sure because I just had a good poke around the rears and I can now see that one lever is sitting against the cable end where as the other has an inch or more poking out, and even with a lever it is almost impossible to move.

I’ll have to learn how to refurb those levers then!