out board drive shafts

[inxs]

Hi,

I have just got my car on the road after what started as a few quick repairs but finished up in a two year rebuild. Before the rebuild I had one of the CV shafts come loose on the RH side. Well I though I escaped with minor damage but it looks like I have put the RH side out board shaft out of alignment and have aq noise from the rear end, loosening of the hand brake is my only resolve to fix the problem so far!!

My car is an early one (50/00100) I believe there is some differance with the early +2 and the +2S (1968 onwards) shafts. Can some one help with the part number of the older shafts?

Living in Australia where Lotus parts are thin on the ground would any one have one or two shafs to suit they would be willing to sell?

Thanks in advance
Darren

[memini55]

Hi Darren form the frozen land of Iowa,

I would highly recomend a great guy in your country as he sold me a set of shafts for a +2 and an S2, both worked out well. I have copied his imfo from the venders section for you.

Croucher Engineering. Waldara. Vic. Australia.

http://www.elantrikbits.com/index.html

+ 61 3 57 216 244

Col Croucher offers a good selection of performance parts for the Elan.

Best of luck on getting her back on the road!
Mark

[memini55]

Hi Darren form the frozen land of Iowa,

I would highly recomend a great guy in your country as he sold me a set of shafts for a +2 and an S2, both worked out well. I have copied his imfo from the venders section for you.

Croucher Engineering. Waldara. Vic. Australia.

http://www.elantrikbits.com/index.html

+ 61 3 57 216 244

Col Croucher offers a good selection of performance parts for the Elan.

Best of luck on getting her back on the road!
Mark

[Stuart+2]

Hi Darren

Congratulations on the finished job - another +2 hits the roads of Oz. My +2 (also red) is 50/1035.

What type of noise are you hearing? It must take a decent amount of force to get the shaft out of whack - could it be a bearing or a disc out of true?

Kind regards

[ppnelan]

I suggest you check the disc is mounted properly. It is all too easy to get significant disc run-out if there is any trace of dirt on the mounting faces.

Matthew

[inxs]

Thanks all for the replies.
The RH disk is the culprit as I had to back of the hand brake adjustment so I didnt hit the disk. I have seen the disk with the car running and it has a couple of mm movement. What made me think of the out board shaft was before I took it of the road I dropped the CV shaft on the RH s from the diff end, the CV was then supported only from the hub end. (and you think donuts are dangerous!!!).
The result was a dent in the frame and a tow truck home, since then I have pulled the rear apart and when re assembled I noticed the rear disk movement. The noise from the rear end sound like a "bearing noise" when slowing down and dissapears with the brakes on.

I will pull apart the disk next week end and check to see I dont have any junk on the joining surfaces.

One warning on CV shafts with my car I have the CV joints that have a tapped thread in them and they bolt from the opposite, these are different to the ones croucher engineering and the elan factory sell that uses a "through" bolt and vibration nut to hold them on. The bolts on mine come loose and the position of the ones of the diff housing make it difficult to get your ring spanner on to tighten them to "reasonable" level, I will be changing them when I get spare$ $$$$

O well it was great to have it on the road for at least one week end!!!!

Cheers Darren

[blackandgold]

Darren,

Good to see such a early back on the road, did you have much to do in that two years ?

After numerous donut failures my car was changed to U/J 's and sliding splines in the 80's and some time later I had one of the lower U/J 's let go and managed to brake the caliper mount on the strut , so when I have recomissioned the car I always check for excessive movement and lubricate with grease, also the phasing of this setup is important otherwise strange vibrations are felt, the modern CV is definatly the way to go with nyloc nuts

[alan71]

When I fitted my CV drive shafts (the type with the aluminium adaptors) I found the studs on the out board end were not quite long enough to fully engage the nylon nuts. I wasn?t happy relying on the lock washers provided so I used nord-lock washers.
www.nord-lock.com
They do have some limitations, you can?t use additional washers and with bolts you need a set under the bolt head as well as the nut, but for this I think they are ideal.

Alan.

[inxs]

Hi Alan,
Thanks for the reply and link. They certainly look like they will overcome the bolts from comming loose. I will check for a supplier in Australia.

Hi Mark,
what started out as a few repairs ended up with the following:
Recon brakes and booster
Recon steering rack
New Shocks
Re setting of sway bar (sway bar was bolted through the lower control arm!!!)
Mini rewire
New veneer on the dash
Rebuilt gear box
Rebuilt carbies
Making new consul fron ply wood

and countless other little projects.
Unfortunately I still have an issue with the chassis with toe in I cant fix on the rear (even with new adustable A frames) and castor issues at the front, so it looks like body off in the near future!!

Another problem is the "cash flow" requirement on a Lotus so when fund where available I could proceed with the work. (also keeping the dear wife happy with some weekend not working on the car!!)

Overall it has been most frustrating with the Lotus as you fix one problem and another appears!! Keeping you motivation can be hard some times.

Hopefully after the chassis gets fixed or replaced I will have resolved most of the problems.

Regards,
Darren