Re: Please Introduce your self and welcome to LotusElan.net
Posted: Wed Oct 28, 2009 2:17 am
Lotus?s started with me very early. My father was having issues with a Sunbeam Tiger at the track with his TR4. The remedy to this situation was a 1966 Elan SE. My father ended up taking me home from the hospital shortly after this when I was born. I would have loved to see the look on the nurse?s face when my Dad showed up to take my Mom and me home in the Lotus. About 5 years later he found a good deal on a 65 Super 7 followed by a 75 Europa in the ugliest metallic purple and gold pen stripes you can imagine. The Seven and Elan sat for many years in the garage without being worked on or driven till one day ay 15 I ask my Dad if he would let me drive them when I turned 16. He looked at me and said you can drive them if you can make them run. He handed me the service manuals and informed me the value guides needed to be replaced in the Elan.
This did not start off so well. I must have spent a couple days on the first page of the manual to the 7 trying to figure out what a bonnet was. Eventually I got up the nerve to ask and man did I feel a bit dumb after that. I spent the next year rebuilding the suspension and motor to the 7. 2 weeks before my 16th birthday to my father surprise the 7 fired up early one Saturday morning. To his credit he did let me drive it once he felt comfortable with my driving. I went on over the next year to rebuild the Elan. The Europa was sold when I was in college which I can understand with all of the trouble he had with that car. The wheel flying off doing 70 down the freeway could not have been that comforting. I had great fun in those cars through high school. After I went on to college that car went back to their resting place in the garage. They have sat in storage now for over 20 years.
A few weeks back my Dad finally came to the concussion that he would never have the time or the energy to bring the remaining two Lotuses? back to life. He decided it was time to put them on a truck and ship them to me for restoration with one condition. I am never allowed to sell them. I must say that is one condition he never had to put forward as I would not even consider it. I am planning on starting this project with the Elan. The main difference this time around is I not only want to make them run I want them to look new. I figure it will take about 2 years for both cars working it around the other projects and the weather up here in the north east of the US.
CJ
This did not start off so well. I must have spent a couple days on the first page of the manual to the 7 trying to figure out what a bonnet was. Eventually I got up the nerve to ask and man did I feel a bit dumb after that. I spent the next year rebuilding the suspension and motor to the 7. 2 weeks before my 16th birthday to my father surprise the 7 fired up early one Saturday morning. To his credit he did let me drive it once he felt comfortable with my driving. I went on over the next year to rebuild the Elan. The Europa was sold when I was in college which I can understand with all of the trouble he had with that car. The wheel flying off doing 70 down the freeway could not have been that comforting. I had great fun in those cars through high school. After I went on to college that car went back to their resting place in the garage. They have sat in storage now for over 20 years.
A few weeks back my Dad finally came to the concussion that he would never have the time or the energy to bring the remaining two Lotuses? back to life. He decided it was time to put them on a truck and ship them to me for restoration with one condition. I am never allowed to sell them. I must say that is one condition he never had to put forward as I would not even consider it. I am planning on starting this project with the Elan. The main difference this time around is I not only want to make them run I want them to look new. I figure it will take about 2 years for both cars working it around the other projects and the weather up here in the north east of the US.
CJ