Lotus Elan and Lotus Elan Plus 2 Forums

Hi folks,

Can anyone recommend a supplier of a decent quality Otter switch in the UK?

The current one has a mind of its own at a 90 it isn?t switching the fans on - take the spades of the otter switch and connect them together and the fans come on.

This is the second switch in about 1000miles.

I have just about sorted most of the gremlins since I completed a mini refurbishment on the car

Cheers

George

Have you tested to switch in a different environment to confirm its operation ? The guage in the dashboard may be telling you it?s 90degrees, the heat level next to the otter switch may be different.

Nb my Elan does the same. According to my guage, the fans kick in at 102. But it always kicks in. I?m convinced my guage is over reading

I don't have an otter switch fitted (PO replaced it with a threaded blanking screw) so I'm not quite sure what temperature they are set to switch at but poking around my hot engine with an infra red thermometer the otter switch position is a good 10C cooler than the temp gauge sensor position. So when my gauge reads 90C (and according to the IR thermometer it's more or less accurate) the otter switch is only seeing around 80C.

This topic has come up from time to time in recent years. I have found that the Otter switches available today have inadequate current capacity and fail early. I added a relay to the fan circuitry to take electrical load off of the Otter switch. No problems after that change.

Thanks for the replies.
I have a thermal imaging camera at work, think I will bring it home and give the engine a once over.
Cheers
George