Who are you?
An introduction thread seems like a good idea. Thanks Gary for getting it started.
Stu Gilmour here. Age is late 50?s. Live in Calgary Alberta, home of the 1988 Winter Olympics. Grew up in Vancouver BC, home of the 2010 Winter Olympics.
Worked several years on the tools in the construction industry, primarily with insulation and paint systems. After spraying literally thousands of gallons of urethane foams and plural component paint systems, I took my father?s advise from the Service
?the spot you are painting now is very similar to the spot you just finished?, and decided to get a degree.
Have worked as a Petroleum Engineer for 25 years with an upstream Exploration and Production company, primarily in Calgary.
Had a series of British rides in the 70?s; Mini, Midget, MGB, Austin A40. Sort of enjoyed fiddling with them, but longed for better performance. Had a good friend who was the Lotus dealer in Vancouver (
Chequered Flag Garage), and was always attracted to Lotus. Couldn?t afford one though. Had the chance to drive an Elan and a Lotus Cortina Mk 1, and they were a revelation.
Had a Alfa Berlina for several years in the ?70?s, which I really liked, but could do without the annual head gasket repair and rust issues; just not a great daily driver for Western Canadian conditions I guess.
Moved on to some Honda?s, bikes and cars. Really liked my ?89 Civic SI hatchback. The MX5 Miata was introduced weeks after I bought the Civic, which got me thinking. With approx 108 hp and 2400 lb. the Lotus power to weight ratio still seemed attractive. Anyway, a sports car really wouldn?t have worked then with only one car and student loans to pay.
While living in a small town on the bald assed Canadian prairie I worked with a lady who had a Model A and three T-birds. She knocked me on the side of the head and said you should own some sort of collector/classic rather than just reading about them. Really wanted a BMW 3.0 CSi, but ?reason? prevailed and ended up with a BMW 635, and then an upgrade to a ?87 BMW M6. This involved a seven year rolling restoration program that coincided with development of internet forums and mail lists. Great fun, and still have the M6 for sunny days, long trips.
As the M6 was now working OK and I had a ?84 BMW R100RT Airhead bike, I started looking in to things Lotus again. A couple of years ago I found Lotuselan.net with Google, and thought ?this will work?. The site reminded me of the better BMW forums and clubs, respectful support for all participants with focused interest on the vintage stuff, and a sense of camaraderie similar to BMWMOA. Also liked the obvious penchant for upgrades to the cars, which is a pretty common practice in the BMW community and generally doesn?t destroy
all of the value.
Had my wife check out some Lotus ?net photo?s, and the Plus 2 was deemed the correct model for us. Got some much appreciated help from listers here to check out couple of Plus 2?s in Ontario, and drove the selected car across Canada to Calgary.
As mentioned in other threads, the Plus 2 ended up needing a frame-off to pass out of province inspection, be reliable and, more importantly, be viewed as OK by my wife for an extended road trip. I learnt from the M6 process that it's way easier on the home front to have a full restoration project with a
final completion. Somehow every upgrade and repair success seems to be viewed as a reliability issue and failure!
Hope is to be running next spring with the Plus 2. Even in rather dodgy condition, it was great fun on the cross Canada adventure, so pretty excited as I can see the end of the project tunnel now. Under estimated the time and dough required by about double, but that appears to be a pretty common theme.
Getting the Plus 2 also got me to join the local vintage club.
http://www.vsccc.ca/Unfortunately completion of my project looks like it will correspond with the demise of our local road circuit, so will have to wait a bit to track the car the odd time.
http://www.racecity.com/Have very much appreciated all the advise here, particularly the archived material, BTDT contributions from the longer term members, and advice on parts sources. Based on lots of archive reading here I decided a
?Resto-Mod? approach was the best for us, i.e. Spyder frame, five speed, modern upgrades where warranted, but retention of the Lotus TC that first attracted me to the marque. Have also enjoyed following the summer progress of several members that are finishing up their cars this year; very motivational when your car is spread out all over the country in bits!
Beau might like to know we have several Springer Spaniels; my wife breeds them with her sisters. Hoping the rear seat in the Plus 2 will work for one of them on a road trip or two next year.
http://www.bondir.com/Cheers!