Lotus Elan Central

by **Houdini** » Fri 24.02.2006, 01:07

Good call on the Accel coils. P/N is 140017 in case anyone is interested and they are $10 less expensive than the MSD. I pick them up tomorrow on the way home from work.

Yes they are yellow and go great with BRG, but who can see them under the expansion tank.

by **Houdini** » Sat 25.02.2006, 07:28

Got the coils and fuel lines today! The only thing missing is the fuel filter. If I get real lucky all will be done this weekend and then it's off to the dyno. I'm not sure I can pull this off as I have to work this weekend as well, but will give it my all.

Mrs Houdini (also works at Garrett but knows nothing about turbos or cars in general) told me tonight on the way home that I should just forget about having a nice car and go for a track car! :shock:

I'm not going to argue with her, but she doesn't know what this means to our lifestyle. That's how I got divorced the first time!

Off topic:

Gotta share, as today at work a coworker in his 50's (younger than me) showed up with his 1970 VW Beetle. 2237cc with a turbo , blah, blah, blah that does 10.34 in the 1/4 mile at 134 MPH! Oh $h!t you now know how old I am don't you! Anyway a very cool and smart guy with a turbo that's 15 years old and still pulling down fast times. Anyway he'll be upgrading to a newer Turbo (ball bearing and better Aero) and without any other changes he expects to be running in the 9's easily. Besides being fast this has got be one one the cleanest cars of any type I have ever seen. Nothing flashy just a nice stance with a perfect cream color exterior and red (not loud) interior with racing seats, roll bar, simple well placed gauges, a very nice engine/turbo set-up. Just plain understated but mean looikng. All in all a real eye catcher even if you 're not a Bug fan. Wanted to get pictures, but it was part of an SAE racing seminar, and pictures were not allowed because it was next to our race car, and project cars.

by **Houdini** » Wed 01.03.2006, 21:14

Getting close to wrapping this project up. I've had to reschedule my tuning until March 24th. Too many little things to do and I don't want to rush through them. Plan is to officially end the mechanical part of the project after the tuning.

Next project creep will be in the way of cosmetics, getting the car cleaned up, fixing the top, fixing all the paint chips, etc. This will give me time to determine if I want to go for more HP or not. If the car feels really balanced with the new turbo then it ends there with the exception of adding an air to water intercooler and possible new radiator.

My next post will be my last on this thread. If all goes well we're talking about March 25th.

by **Matt RI** » Wed 01.03.2006, 21:52

Good luck!
Hope that all works out well- looking forward to the results...

by **Houdini** » Sun 26.03.2006, 17:45

Well last Friday could have gone better. The car never got tuned because the shop over booked. I was asked to leave the car for up to 2 weeks and they would get to it. I said no thanks and will look for another tune shop. They forgot to call me and cancel which I thought was not too professional. Too bad because I was there for 2 hours and watched as 500 wheel HP seemed to be the norm as a Mazda RX7, 300 Z, and 55 Chevy with twin turbos (900 HP :shock:

) came off the dyno. They seemed very qualified at tuning, but not too sharp when it came to custmer relations. Anyway I found another shop and will check it out on Monday I hope.

by **F1 LOTUS** » Mon 27.03.2006, 21:00

Do they know who you work for?
:roll:

Good luck Russ

by **Houdini** » Tue 28.03.2006, 21:10

"Do they know who you work for?" (sorry quote didn't work for some reason)

Didn't tell them who I worked for because I didn't want to get into it. More than likey they wouldn't care as they are a Turbonetics dealer, but every car there had a Garrett turbo on it. I did tell the guys in aftermarket but they use another shop for tuning and use different ECU's or reprogram the stock one.

Speaking of Turbo Kits - We just finished a kit for the Dodge Cummins and GM Duramax Deisels. The Dodge has 3 stages and the Duramax one for right now. The Dodge stage 3 is 550 HP :shock:

and 1100 lb-ft :shock:

of torque. The GM is 440 HP :shock:

and 900+ lb-ft :shock:

of torque. Our CEO was doing burn outs in the parking lot the other day with them.[/quote]

by **Houdini** » Thu 13.04.2006, 15:46

Here is the Haltech with my new adapter harness made by Casper Electronics. $58.95 shipped to my door.

Also added a high pressure actuator to the turbo. It opens at 12-14 psi but is adjustable. It's set at approx. 15 psi now and after tuning using the MBC I'll adjust it to approx. 18 psi and remove the MBC.

I'm ready to tune in the next week but will be out of town until Tuesday so I hope to get the tuning done this month yet. About one month behind schedule but I've made good progress in the last month. Even had time to clean the underside up a little. Didn't go over board because this car will be driven and that means it will just get dirty again anyway.

by **Doc Fizzix** » Thu 13.04.2006, 19:22

WOW!!!!

I need to get cought up on this thread, sounds like this info will help me a ton!

by **TommyK** » Fri 05.05.2006, 06:59

If you don't mind me asking, how much did your downpipe and exhaust set you back?

by **Houdini** » Mon 08.05.2006, 20:24

TommyK wrote:If you don't mind me asking, how much did your downpipe and exhaust set you back?

The downpipe cost me $50 in parts and labor, but I have an unfair advantage because the fabricator is a freind. The exhaust was a little different. Because they burned through all of my fuel lines and I had to get them replaced, it only ended up costing me around $100. Not the best job, but I'll keep it for now.

by **Houdini** » Mon 08.05.2006, 20:33

It's smog time again! :roll:

Before I have it tuned I need to put back the 2 bar MAP sensor, the stock injectors, make it look as stock as possible and get the frickin' job out of the way. The only part I don't like is the injectors. Not hard just time consuming.

My only other alternative is go through the test and see what happens. Maybe I'll get lucky. Any Californians got any thoughts on that?

by **Doug** » Mon 08.05.2006, 23:55

it all depends on where you go -- if you have anything fishy looking some places will fail you . . . better to go to a know leaniant place if needed -- ask the SoCal guys and Esprit guys where they go . .

by **Houdini** » Tue 23.05.2006, 21:16

PASSED SMOG

So here's the deal. The car passed smog easily with the new turbo, 550cc injectors, and 3 bar map sensor. I removed the BOV and MBC but left the non stock air inlet on. I can't won't say who passed it but it was all perfectly legal except the visual. I was told that if I get it tested somewhere else in 2 years that it won't pass unless I make it look totally stock.

That involves the following:
1) Connect Stock ECU
2) Put back the stock injectors (RC sticker gives it away)
3) Put back 2 bar MAP sensor
4) Remove blow off valve and piping and replace with stock
5) Put back the stock air filter can with something close to stock ducting
6) Remove MBC if it's still on car

Sounds like alot but it can all be done in about 5 minutes except the injectors which could take 1-2 hours.

One potential problem is the car needs to run for quite some time to make sure the CAT lights up. I replaced the stock CAT with a Magnaflow free flow CAT and it took awhile for it to get warm.

Next step is put the stuff back on and get it dynoed. Better late than never.

by **Houdini** » Thu 15.06.2006, 05:41

A quick update. Today after a long break I had the car running on the Haltech in just 5 minutes. I have been driving it though, and drives very nice with the stock ECU if you drive normally.

I used Ashaman's program as a start. I then drove the car over to my new tuner using the stock ECU and we hooked up the car again with the Haltech. It ran fine but needed tuning work for getting the ignition and fuel maps right. The idle was too high and the fuel mapping was off but it runs pretty good. Because of scheduling problems on my part and his we can't get together again until the 24th. That'a a Sunday and we planned on 4 hours of tuning. Shouldn't take that long but we planned for it.

So when I'm finished there may one or more of you that may be interested in the finished program if you have a similar set up. By the way 18psi is the goal on 91 Octane to keep things reasonable.

So what's the future hold after this tuning? I personally don't need too much more power. I'd be happy with 250 hp but will be very happy with 300. So I might do water injection, I might do a air to water charge air cooler, and I might do porting and polishing. All this after I install Brian's brakes, put on the GAZ shocks, new sticky tires, and I'm still looking for the elusive cost effective 60mm offset wheels. Might have to bite the bullet and go for the Kodiac's.

Later!

by **Doc Fizzix** » Thu 15.06.2006, 06:26

Houdini wrote:PASSED SMOG
That involves the following:
1) Connect Stock ECU
2) Put back the stock injectors (RC sticker gives it away)
3) Put back 2 bar MAP sensor
4) Remove blow off valve and piping and replace with stock
5) Put back the stock air filter can with something close to stock ducting
6) Remove MBC if it's still on car

Ok, give me a brake!

How in the world is someone who inspects the car going to know that you did not just replace the injectors with the "stock" injectors of 330 cc? Maybe all that is avalible for the Elan is RC injectors. :wink:

Also, how would they know about the 3 bar vs. the 2 bar MAP? What kind of inspections are going on in CA? This sounds a little crazy :evil:

by **Houdini** » Thu 15.06.2006, 16:09

Doc Fizzix wrote:
Houdini wrote:PASSED SMOG
That involves the following:
1) Connect Stock ECU
2) Put back the stock injectors (RC sticker gives it away)
3) Put back 2 bar MAP sensor
4) Remove blow off valve and piping and replace with stock
5) Put back the stock air filter can with something close to stock ducting
6) Remove MBC if it's still on car

Ok, give me a brake!

How in the world is someone who inspects the car going to know that you did not just replace the injectors with the "stock" injectors of 330 cc? Maybe all that is avalible for the Elan is RC injectors.

Also, how would they know about the 3 bar vs. the 2 bar MAP? What kind of inspections are going on in CA? This sounds a little crazy

Actually you only need to put back the 2 bar sensor if you go back to the stock injectors. Since that last post we had a little brainstorm session and I think all will be fine if I do the following.
1) Put black electric tape over the RC stickers on the injectors. (Yes they do look for things like that)
2) Take off the pipe with the blow off valve and replace with stock rubber pipe. (That must be done)
3) Run a wire from the oil pressure warning light to the engine check light. (When they test your car they check to see that the light is on before starting the car or it fails.)
4) Remove MBC (I was going to do that after tuning anyway and then adjust boost with the actuator)

You don't have to do anything with the air filter if it's K&N because they all have California waivers. So in 2 years I should be all set to go if I just replace the BOV pipe (5 minutes).

by **Doc Fizzix** » Thu 15.06.2006, 16:15

Houdini wrote:3) Run a wire from the oil pressure warning light to the engine check light. (When they test your car they check to see that the light is on before starting the car or it fails.)

I like this one, very clever

I wish I would have thought of this one before, this is a great "trick". You could also use this if that air bag light it one.

Today is a new day

by **Houdini** » Mon 26.06.2006, 04:25

The "Green Monster" is running and driving on the Haltech. Let me start by saying it is not tuned 100% but closer to 90% done. So how did it do? Well, it can do better but the results are not bad. We know there is more power there but we're playing it safe right now. We ran it at 16 psi and it did 199 at the wheels (approx. 225 at the flywheel) and 214 lb-ft of torque. It will really come to life with head work and port matching plus adding a few more pounds of boost. After driving it for a day I've decided to concentrate on fine tuning and maybe another pound of boost. I don't think it's worth all the money to do all the flow work unless I'm forced to. It drives great and with all the torque it breaks the front tires loose at will in first gear and after taking a corner hard in second it easily broke the tires loose in second as well by just giving it throttle. The car is pretty fast as is and the quaife LSD really helps to keep the power down. I'm sure some of you are thinking that was alot of work for such a small (60HP) gain. Well I don't think so, because there is at least another 50 HP in there somewhere and the car's drivability is now better and it's much faster. What is most impressive so far is all the extra torque available. I'll keep everyone up to date as more changes are made and the tuning is more complete. For the next week or so I'm just going to enjoy driving it.

by **Dave M** » Mon 26.06.2006, 13:44

Way to go Russ! Great to catch up on your thread and hear how things are. Glad you've got the car fairly tuned and can just get out and drive. It sure makes it all the work worth it to be in the car once again and feel the extra grunt.

I'm going to respond to your e-mail, BTW! Can't explain how crazy life has been lately...

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"The Green Monster"

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