Lotus Elan and Lotus Elan Plus 2 Forums

Hi all.

I've just come to refit my Sun Visors and noticed the Paul Matty Bulb type door seal i'm using covers the two outer holes and sits so close to the inner two holes i'd have to cut a chunk out of the seal grip channel to get a Nut/Washer on (I didn't remove the original holes from the top of the GRP screen surround so can't really move them).

I was just wondering what other people had done to get round this?

I'm contemplating cutting the Bulb of the seal with a razor blade and hiding the outer nuts inside the seal then super gluing the cut back together.... As for the inner two that could be more of a pain as it's on display so has to look reasonable (not sure i could cut the Seal grip rail neatly enough to be frank).

I've just done some searching and couldn't find anything relating to this?? Can't be the first time this has come up? I even contemplated putting nutserts into the inner holes with a a washer on the back but that might also look a bit grotty......

Anyway i'm interested what you think.....

Chris - your post confuses me. Your car is a DHC so if we are talking about the same thing you're fitting the sun visor arms right? If so I don't quite follow what you are getting at as I don't recall there being any screws or nuts on the inside of the car. I believe the rhombus shaped plate the visor arm is mounted to passes down and the arm projects through from above the fibreglass top of the screen and is screwed in place then riveted through the aluminium windscreen rail.

A photo of your issue/fitting might help. (Edit: you aren't fitting FHC sunvisors arms are you?).

I may have gone off at a tangent here?

Steve, I'll get some better pictures.....

I need to replicate this some how when the new seal covers two of the holes. (they were originally machine screws with nuts on the outside then cloth tape wrapped round the excess tread i suppose to make it look better)


Strange positioning of the holes, i used the original Pop rivet holes for the origanal alloy plate so that can't be out of wack........

Interesting...... I see the later production line Sprints had single arm sun visors like the one on this page lotus-chassis-f36/sunvisor-help-t26096.html

I have no idea what was on mine then? i guess S4 Se?? or are they the same as Sprints? (single arm mounting)

I checked the Pictures i have of it being delivered new and annoyingly it had the hood up so can't see if they were there or not....... I'll have to ask.

Chris,

I believe you have incorrect items there. The S4 DHCs thru to Sprint all have the same visors as far as I'm aware. I've never seen them in that style (totally incorrect grain on the vinyl), fitting (two fixing points rather than 1) or shape (they don't fit the shape of the screen). Whilst I know you have a lot provenance with your it might be the first owner didn't specify visors and decided in a different option which could have been fitted from new.

I know you like your originality but I don't think those were ever fitted. If you want to go original I fear it might be a bit expensive exercise as they are very rare (the arms are reasonable I think Sue Miller has them from time to time). The correct visors would solve your issues and are a more elegant fitting to my eyes.

Sorry for the bad tidings.

On the Sprint DHC the visors are single arm fixes, horizontally into the A pillar / frame corner.

Very different to yours as stated above.

A decent pair of sunglasses and a cap and you may not need to fit anything if they are hard to get.

Richard

Chris, here's a pic of the holes for the visor on my Sprint. I believe the top strip holds the visor down, but
can't remember

elanfan1 wrote:Chris,

I believe you have incorrect items there. The S4 DHCs thru to Sprint all have the same visors as far as I'm aware. I've never seen them in that style (totally incorrect grain on the vinyl), fitting (two fixing points rather than 1) or shape (they don't fit the shape of the screen). Whilst I know you have a lot provenance with your it might be the first owner didn't specify visors and decided in a different option which could have been fitted from new.

I know you like your originality but I don't think those were ever fitted. If you want to go original I fear it might be a bit expensive exercise as they are very rare (the arms are reasonable I think Sue Miller has them from time to time). The correct visors would solve your issues and are a more elegant fitting to my eyes.

Sorry for the bad tidings.

It's no problem i have a set of black singe arm visors already but i'm curious how these got fitted?? I haven't spoken to the previous owner yet so there is a decent chance he fitted them at some point. It didn't have those big cutouts in the windscreen surround so i'd guess it didn't originally come with any.

The annoying thing is i wish i'd have known that before painting it etc as i'd have glassed the holes up and maybe fitted the spares.

From what you are saying it would appear your car didn't come from the factory with the fittings and holes for the sunvisors so weren't intended to be fitted. In your position I'd get them on the car as its not really going to cost you very much. Where the cut out is to push the arm in from above would be easy to make and your touch up skills would sort the paint out. But tbh it wouldn't be seen under the Ali strip anyway.

This is a subject that has been discussed in a few different topics on here but not in a definitive way - if you do intend to fit the visors can I suggest you start a separate thread and take detailed photos and it could Resolve a lot of questions from others in a similar situation.

Nope, my car 100% did not come with visors. Just checked with the previous owner who said he had them fitted by a Lotus guy in Bredbury, Stockport (that must have been Chris Neil) bit strange as back in the late 70's early 80's they were a Lotus breaker so bit odd he didn't get Elan Visors in the first place??

They are bugging me a bit as i've seen some with the same vinyl pattern but the problem is a see so many cars i can't for the life of me remember what it was on.