Installation of Various Bits on Lotus Elan S3 1968 dhc

[nico506]

Hi all,
I am putting together my car back together after a full 'glass restoration and respray and would like assistance on the following:

Heater Motor
wher can I buy a replacement unit and/or are they reconditionable?- as i have took it apart and cannot get it to run smoothly as there is a spring loaded tension bearing which stops me from assembling it with ease!

Voltage Control Box
I am in the process of fitting an alternator to the engine and note that these do not require voltage control boxes, if this is the case what does one do with the loose connections that were to go on the control box?.

Would there be a problem in fitting the control box and fitting the alternator?.

Exhaust
I am fitting a stainless steel exhaust to the car with single pipe back box. The problem is that i need to ensure that the long section of pipe between the downpipe and the rear box is as tight to the underside as possible. Any tips on this as i have to install new exhaust mounts in new locations as these were glassed over as part of the restoration.

Radiator
Does any one ahave any idea where the Radiator sits in relation to the Engine, interms of how close to the fan it needs to be sited as I have two brackets and not sure if these are in the right place.

If any one has any information or tips/expereince on the above. This would be much appreciated.

Many Thanks

nick

[ppnelan]

Hello Nick.

When you remove the Dynamo Control box to fit an alternator, you have to connect one or more pairs of the wires together - not sure which, but I think a previous posting covered the details so try a search. The Control box is not used and will not work with an alternator.

I only have experience of fitting the S4 longitudinal single box exhaust system - yours may be the transverse type?
If your exhaust system is a 'good one', i.e. true to the original shape, first I would position the silencer the correct distance off the underside, as defined by the rear bracket & strap. Then position it so that it sticks out the 'right' distance at the back under the bumper - photos of other cars may help here. Note that the further back the silencer, the higher the centre pipe will be. (Mine seems to touch the bolt heads at the rear of the chassis, but at least it rarely hits the ground!)
Try the long centre pipe to see how it looks - I think they are all made too long so you can cut it to suit each car. You should be able to see which end needs cutting (the straight one usually). Cut off a bit at a time, as it is easy to remove too much (I speak from experience!) - it is surprising how much can be pushed into the connections at each end.

Good luck!
Matthew

[worzel]

Hi Nick

Don't hold to thie accuracy of this but I'm sure the heater motor is the same as that used in early minis- it certainly matches the external dimensions. These come up at autojumbles but I don't think brand new ones are that expensive anyway.

I've got brand new 24 volt ones but you'd need to wire in a converter to use these as they're too slow with 12 volts to give a fast throughput of air.

Exhausts are a bloddy awful job- I got fed up trying to pull apart the sleeved ends near the downpipe so I modded this to enable the manifolds to be bolted to the "Y" pipe- takes a lot less swearing to get apart now.

You can also buy external sleeves that provide a gas tight seal for about ?20 each or a good engineer should be able to make them for you.

John

[ElliottN]

Nick,

My workshop manual states that the radiator matrix should be 1/8 to 3/16 inch (or 3 to 5 mm) from the leading edge of the fan. That sounds like a fine tolerance to me and my own fan (multi blade) is about 15 mm back from the radiator (and I have no cooling problems at all).

I have a straight through exhaust. All my mountings except for the rear most mount for the silencer, are off the chassis. The intermediate pipe is held at the front by a clip on the gearbox mounting bracket (standard) and is then held at the rear by a spring loaded bracket welded onto the pipe and bolted on to the end of the chassis (which I know is non-standard). I then have a rear mount for the muffler where the insulator bolts through the underside of the body - with a large plate on the inside to spread the load/vibrations on the fibreglass. I guess I'm saying you don't need holes in the glass except for the rear mount on the silencer!

Good luck.