Lotus Elan and Lotus Elan Plus 2 Forums

Thank you both. This is very helpful.

Joe

I'd picked up a rope seal sump from someone here a while back that I used on my rebuild when I realized how rough a life mine had lived. Got some time to clean up old parts to put away, today... and the old sump was truly beat up. Major road rash plus damage from when it threw a rod.

Had a beautiful day to take a drive and tune some more.

The car looks absolutely superb! Well done.

SENC wrote:I'd picked up a rope seal sump from someone here a while back that I used on my rebuild when I realized how rough a life mine had lived. Got some time to clean up old parts to put away, today... and the old sump was truly beat up. Major road rash plus damage from when it threw a rod.

IMG_20211107_172617.jpg

IMG_20211107_172648.jpg

IMG_20211107_172716.jpg

Does "Chicks dig scars, glory lasts forever" apply here?
Innes

Looks great, Henry. Nice job!

Blessed with spectacular 70° weather allowed a couple drives this weekend, after changing the 79°-30' butterflies for 78° butterflies, on Keith Franck's advice. This effectively moved the 1st progression holes downstream by .5mm, which made all the difference in the world in the transition, eliminating the popping on decel while maintaining a nice idle. I have a little more tweaking to do, but think I'm getting very close to finding the right balance now.

My 20 y-o daughter, home from college, got her first ride in it - all smiles and giggles as we accelerated through curves! I'm not embarrassed to admit to giggling every time I drive it, too!

I've got some minor leaking, and though I haven't ruled out seepage from my rope seal or otherwise around the bottom end, I definitely have oil coming out of the filler area - and seeking some input from forum gurus.





I thought, at first, that I was getting some seepage between the rocker cover and the filler neck assembly, for which I'd made a paper gasket and assembled with wellseal, but disassembly, cleaning and confirming flatness and re-assembly with a thin application of loctite copper rtv didn't change matters.

I'm now confident that what is actually happening is that oil is making its way to the filler cap where it then bleeds down through the cap breather holes and onto the rocker cover (and eventually down and around the engine).

I've conceived of a few potential solutions to allow airflow but that might capture the oil and allow it to drain back within the filler tube before it gets to the filler cap, but thought someone here might have a better idea.

My first thought was to fashion a bit of aluminum or maybe metal gauze into a small "tent" with long legs. The legs would sit on the rocker cover and press against the inside walls of the filler tube to keep it stationary, and the top act as a blocker for direct spray. With apologies to the artists and engineers, I'm adding a drawing done on my phone.



Thinking about the construction of the filler cap and simple breathers, being filled with a nest of metal wire, an alternative is to do something similar by stuffing the filler tube with a heavy gauge wire scrubber to foul airflow a bit and capture oil/oil mist (with some metal gauze at the base to prevent a stray strand from going where I don't want it to go). Something like this:



Thanks in advance for any alternate recommendations or suggested modifications the these ideas.

The car looks sensational, motivating me to return outs to same aluminium and coloured guards/nose cone configuration which is was when delivered.
I rebuilt the breather on the block of our S2 Super 7 (SB1744) a few years ago using the stainless gauze you have in second image. It’s worked fine. Prior to that the old finer gauze was almost a solid mass.
How did you clean the filler cap?
Do you still have the block breather fitted?
Cheers
Vaughan

Thanks Vaughan.

Yes, I do have the block breather fitted - it is the simple, straight "stack" variant with the wire inside. I rebuilt that, too, but was able to re-use the wire filter after cleaning it.

I don't remember for sure, but think I used kerosene or maybe acetone for cleaning out the filler cap. Whatever I used I poured it in, let it sit, poured it out - and repeated as necessary.

Henry
Weld a square aluminum plate with 4 mounting tabs under the oil fill tube leaving a 3/8” gap to allow oil to flow when adding - this will shield the oil fill tube from oil spray. You want to deflect the oil prior to the cap

Used this method on all my race 289 Ford road race engines and it worked perfect.

The washer you have in there now is still a direct route so not helping too much


Best
John

Thanks John!

Took a KISS approach and a scrap of thin steel (shipping tube cap) to test. Cut square to just under the filler tube diameter, then folded the corners down to keep it slightly elevated.

After a fairly brief drive that got the engine temp and some sprints to get rpms up, I had no oil on the rocker cover. On removal, I could see the underside of the cap had a bit of oil moisture from mist getting around it, but this appears to have solved the direct slinging problem. A bit of metal gauze above it and this might be fully solved, though only a good long drive will tell for sure.

It looks like you've solved your problem, but I thought this might interest you

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/274432064750 ... SwTj9fE8Tf

Thanks Rob - that is the right one for these, it appears. Mine is not a cap issue - I have a spare and have tried them both just to be sure.