Lotus Elan and Lotus Elan Plus 2 Forums

I found numerous comments spread over a long period regarding these pumps but not one where a comparison has been done, unless anyone can point me to a particular discussion. Could not find a "sticky" anywhere on fitting these pumps or has one not been created?

Seems there was a lot of discussion in the past regarding which of these pumps was the best to use, with a number of people coming up with fitting issues. Does anyone know whether the manufacturers of these pumps have made any modifications to overcome the problems found during installation?

Has anyone fitted one lately that can comment on fitting either pump, or where the main issues seem to occur. I know that there are two kits, one for the standard block and one for the 1600 tall block, but it appears that was not a particular issue, it was more the pump and its alignments and catching on bolt heads.

Any help appreciated
Tony

My engine builder just fitted the Tony Thompson supplied front plate and modular pump. No issues reported and oil seals etc all good after a few blasts.

All in about £350 plus fitting. See my posts on twin crankshaft pulley system. One pump has lasted 25 years and HUGELY cheaper. D

TBG
Do you have a link to your article?
Tony

Tony - I will try to find it. Searching on here is not always straight forward!! D

A taster!!

Mileso wrote:My engine builder just fitted the Tony Thompson supplied front plate and modular pump. No issues reported and oil seals etc all good after a few blasts.

Anyone know, is the Tony Thompson pump the Burton design? Or is it a 3rd design?

Same question of the Tony Ingram pump, is it the Bean pump yet another design?

A couple of pictures here to further explain my twin pulley system. It takes all the load off the water pump bearing and you can have the alternator/dynamo belt as tight as you like. Any decent machine shop can turn up the pulleys.
Alternator pulley bottom sketch. D

pharriso wrote:

Mileso wrote:My engine builder just fitted the Tony Thompson supplied front plate and modular pump. No issues reported and oil seals etc all good after a few blasts.

Anyone know, is the Tony Thompson pump the Burton design? Or is it a 3rd design?

Same question of the Tony Ingram pump, is it the Bean pump yet another design?

I think all the original design and possibly manufacturing work on all of the front covers was done by Terry Bachelor, whom was big in Lotus Cortina circles for many years. Terry supplied Burton, but he retired and I imagine Burton picked it up.

I believe the covers supplied in the US are, or at least were, Burton covers. My S2 came with a Bean supplied front cover, I can't tell it a part from a Burton item.

A couple of years ago I bought a new Burton cover and it's a better casting than the old version.

I don't know if US companies have started manufacturing their own version, but I think until fairly recently all the covers came from the same manufacturer.

The Bean pump was different back 10 years ago. i dont know if it still is or whether they now sell the UK usual suppliers / Burton version.

Back then it had a very different bolting and machining of the module and cover

Bean



Burton





cheers
Rohan

I had an "AKS" on a +2 Elan in the past.
Alan

rgh0 wrote:The Bean pump was different back 10 years ago. i dont know if it still is or whether they now sell the UK usual suppliers / Burton version.

Back then it had a very different bolting and machining of the module and cover

Bean

Bean RemovableWP.jpg

Burton

burton module.jpg

burton front cover.jpg

cheers
Rohan

Never seen one of those before! So there were more than one manufacturer.

I remember Burt from AKS, he worked out of an old mill somewhere in Lancashire. I met him once, must have been in the 1980's.

The kit Tony Thompson sells looks like this:


Looks to be the Burton kit.

Tony Ingram's kit looks like:

Also the Burton pump?

And we can see: the bearing, rotary seal, and impeller are the same parts as in the pushrod Ford Cortina & Lotus standard water pumps…

I have the Bean kit in my Elan. I installed it myself, went in without issue at all and didn't leak oil or coolant.

Dave tried rewelding and refurbishing the original front covers with very poor results. The original castings were very dirty and almost impossible to weld repair.

He then tried the early UK sourced kits but had supply issues and cost issues from the fluctuating pound at the time.

At long last, he developed his own kit through several evolutions. Dave didn't do the machine work for the kits. He had a local machine shop near me do the machine work on the castings, then assembled the kits from his usual parts sources. I think the shaft, bearing and seal came from a later version of the Esprit.

The Burton pump uses the same bearing assembly as the standard pump and the origin of this bearing is the Ford Anglia 105E.

Ford push rod engine pumps went to a larger diameter bearing from around 1971 about the same time when alternators instead of generators started to be fitted. The Lotus engine did not pick up this improvement. I suspect the Bean pump uses the later Ford bearing so it should in theory be better than the Burton pump in that respect.