Lotus Elan and Lotus Elan Plus 2 Forums

Hello I have noticed that my s3 coupe has a strengthening hoop around the rear shelf, with three hefty brackets bolted to it. The brackets are presumably to hold the rear shelf in place. I'm just wondering if anyone else has encountered this on their ?lan? Doesn't look factory, way too heavy and over-engineered. But the way it's been glassed in, the car would surely have needed to be upside down....and this car doesn't look like it's had a rotisserie resto before....can anyone enlighten? Robert

From memory, my S3 coupe has the hoop too. The brackets are definitely added on instead of the sprung steel clips (there should be five). The clips were unavailable for a long time until Sue Miller started to offer them again.

Regards,
Adi

Hi Robert,
Both my S3 coupes were reinforced in that area by, I believe, Somrib paper ropes which have a wire insert and were fibreglassed in to the panel. The shelf is supported by 5 clips 036B0540 which sit under the rear screen weatherstrip and as mentioned are available from Susan Miller ( I hope as I have just ordered some from her)
I hope this helps
Alan Pate

Thanks for clearing up that mystery, Alan and Adi. My rear window had the clips too, albeit rusted to almost nothing. Looks like a worthwhile mod from the PO, which I'll probably retain

It does look like a pretty good mod and a much simpler solution than original. The steel clips which are held in place by the windscreen rubber always seemed like such an esoteric answer to a simple question. When I was rebuilding my car, most of the original clips were completely rusted away, with just enough left, held in place by the rubber, to make them dangerous.