Lotus Elan and Lotus Elan Plus 2 Forums

innesw wrote:Very nice Alan! Especially the adjustible wishbones in the last pic, are you going for adjustible wishbones all round?

Innes

Hi Innes,
Yes adjustment all round on the wishbones, the A frames shown in the picture are going back into Spyders stock and are being changed for the adjustable toe items. I must say it's really nice to see the chassis painted at last, there were one or two moments over the last year where it didn't look as though it could happen without major compromises.

Regards

Lovely, lots of sparkly bits; that looks like fun!
Do I spy a "Raceline" coolant rail there?
If so it seems to have the machining for the "Gerrym" modification.
I don't suppose you have a sketch of the entire cooling system that you could post?
Where do the temperature sensors for the engine management & dash gauge fit in?
Looking forward to meeting up with you & "it" at Donington.

Cheers
John

GrUmPyBoDgEr wrote:Looking forward to meeting up with you & "it" at Donington.

Ain't we all?

As reported elsewhere the car won't be read for Donington, presently it's at SMS having it's paint applied and will be back for the final finishing in a couple of weeks time. Just wiring, front screen, dashboard and interior will then be needed. The body is already fixed into final position on the finished and built up chassis, all mechanicals are in place, everything fits.

Hope Tim isn't following this thread, but I have now settled on the wording for the side stripes. Some of you may recognise the car in the manipulated photo below as the lovely pistachio over white DHC Sprint on Gordon Lunds stand at 3 counties last year, incidentally this car also started life as a FHC. The font for the ELAN SUPERSPRINT isn't correct, but it gives a good idea of what the finished article will look like.



Regards to all, and look forward to meeting up with some of you at Donington.

Oh but I am Alan!

I believe Impact would be the correct font for your sacrilegious bastardisation of the gold sidewinders. Mind you, look at what Mick Miller had on his Sprint! (And I know of only one other car he did it to).

Tim

PS Before anyone asks, Mick always fitted Wolfrace wheels to his Elans. I think the model was Slot Mag, popular in the 70s

trw99 wrote:Oh but I am Alan!

I believe Impact would be the correct font for your sacrilegious bastardisation of the gold sidewinders. Mind you, look at what Mick Miller had on his Sprint! (And I know of only one other car he did it to).

Tim

PS Before anyone asks, Mick always fitted Wolfrace wheels to his Elans. I think the model was Slot Mag, popular in the 70s

Tim,
I knew you would bite, all I had to do was cast out a juicy fat worm and in no time at all I was gonna have you in my keepnet

That Mick Miller was obviously a man after my own heart, sheepskin seat covers, wolfies and doors that fit properly. The only things missing are the Moto-Lita steering wheel, the walnut dashboard and a roll over bar with side impact and footwell protection bars.

I'm pleased you like the stripes, I'm using them to cover the ridge and very slight uneveness between the 2 colours, I doubt that anyone at Lotus thought of this back in the 1970's and it was probably just a happy accident that the marketing department got the budget for the sidewinders before Colin saw the minutes from that meeting

http://www.paulroachjaguar.co.uk/other-marques.php

Thanks for that link Richard.

I noticed the statement 'Fitting a Duratec would have been easy'. Perhaps that should have read fitting a zetec would have been easy.

They obviously haven't followed this thread then, or perhaps know better? There isn't another road car in existence for them
to base that claim on as far as I am aware.

Old Elan engine a Jaguar engine? Guess they had a ghost writer for the website.

A read of Tony Rudd's book; "It was fun" throws some light on the similarity of the XK & Twin Cam engines.
Both borrowed their combustion chamber design from BRM engines, which in turn were derived from the Manx Norton engines; the Grand daddy of them all!
With 4 valve engines the book had to be re-written.
BMW made an attempt to retain the hemi-head design with their 4 valve F2 engine but the valve gear required to open & close those radially arranged valves was a nightmare.
Cosworth got it right by opting for a pent roof combustion chamber, making everything so much simpler.
BMW eventually saw the light & copied practically everything from the FVA but did it better, eventually achieving 315 PS/BHP from 2Litres.
Since then the pent roof design has been universally adopted for production 4 valve engines.

Tony Rudd------One of the great engineers!

Cheers
John

These pictures were added to another thread today, but are relevant to the progress of the S4 Duratec project as they show the shell with it's initial coats of paint. Pistachio Green all over to start and then masked off for the white. The car was delivered to SMS complete with it's fully built chassis including engine and drivetrain, but the shell was removed for painting as SMS wanted to repair the front section where they discovered the car had some accident damage that had been repaired using a new front section, nicely done but really needing a few more hours spent to make really good. SMS say the shell is in excellent order with very little oil contamination to the underside which is probably attributable to it's being laid up since the early 1980's just waiting for someone to restore the car. The new front section was fitted when the car had it's first colour change from original French Blue to Gold Leaf Sprint livery ( reading the paint layers ) and is almost certainly the result of a frontal impact repair, the owner or new owner taking the opportunity to update/upgrade the car to Sprint specification apart from the mechanicals that remained SE Stromberg specification.

Unofficially the car is now known as the 'DuraLAN' , I think it is a name that will stick ............

[quote="Spyder fan"] Unofficially the car is now known as the 'DuraLAN' , I think it is a name that will stick ............

Please, please, don't let it!

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/search?q=duralan

Apart from which, it sounds like a carpet underlay!

Gee I sat up all night long trying to think up something original and you go and ruin it.

ardee_selby wrote:

Spyder fan wrote: Unofficially the car is now known as the 'DuraLAN' , I think it is a name that will stick ............

Please, please, don't let it!

http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/search?q=duralan

Apart from which, it sounds like a carpet underlay!

How 'bout Etec?

Greg Z

"DURalan";sounds like you'll get some "RIBbing if you don't build it "Featherlight".
I guess that won't worry someone who's not "extra sensitive" though?
The "Colours" maybe "Fruity" but without doubt it'll be an "orgasmic" drive