Lotus Elan and Lotus Elan Plus 2 Forums

Both of the interior door release mechanisms in my 1971 U.S. Spec +2 have come adrift on the same drive! Simple enough. There's a rod coming from the lock and a rod coming from the interior door release. These are fastened together by a plastic clip. However, there's a coil spring "over" the rod coming from the interior pull so that once released, the handle will return to its flush position. The problem I see is that the spring pushes directly against the (very flimsy) plastic clip that holds the two rods together. It now works fine but just doesn't seem correct as it appears that with use the metal spring will destroy the plastic clip. I've searched the doors cavity trying to find other pieces that may have fallen away. My shop manual doesn't show an exploded view of this mechanism. Am I missing pieces or is this just the way this apparatus functions?

Any insight is greatly appreciated.....

Don't think you are missing any bits, that's how it is..........

And yes unfortunately those nylon plastic connection bars are not available separately from the whole handle assembly.

One of my rods kept on popping out, I added a tie-wrap & it seems to help retain the rod on the clip...

Oldelanman, Pic is worth a 1K words. Pharriso, I thought about the nylon strap but got a bit lazy and simply buttoned things up. It is good to know in any case that I'm not missing bits. I'll try the nylon ties next time. Something tell me this won't be my last sortie inside the doors...

Thanks so much to you both.

Yup, I've either wired or nylon cable tie/zap strapped the rod onto the plastic clip in the past, and will do something similar in the future when I put my doors back together.

Good example of an ounce of prevention . . . etc.

Hope all is well in San Antonio . . .

Randy