C43

not a great back to back but FYI I fitted the IGUS bushes in my brothers car and standard bushes in my car and I can't feel any difference in gear change between the two. cheers Christian I think one of the priorities on the First Esprit was to improve the gear change after it was so poor on the original Europa. I have not had much to do with the Elise gear change as never worked on one.

not a great back to back but FYI I fitted the IGUS bushes in my brothers car and standard bushes in my car and I can't feel any difference in gear change between the two. cheers Christian

the gear change will improve if you change it (along with all others that will be in a similar state.

I fitted polly bushes to my brothers S2 and definitely not too hard, these bushes are working hard and make a big difference to front end feel. If you do go OEM make sure you get these from somewhere that produces them in the correct shore rubber and they are not too old. Just because they are black and rubber does not mean they will be correct. C43

thanks Andy, I had forgotten that.

basically you follow the instructions in the manual for replacing rear pads. 1. Remove the two self locking screws securing the caliper body to the two guid pins, whilst holding the guide pins stationary with a spanner to prevent damage to their dust covers. 2. Remove the caliper body and support to avoid straining the flexible hose. Remove the pads and clean the pad abutment areas taking care not to damage the guide pin or piston dust covers. 3. Before fitting the new pads, the pistons must be pushed back into the caliper body and the handbrake auto adjustment mechanism reset. Fit a screwdriver against the end of the pistone and turn the piston 45 deg to disengage the adjustment ratchet. Press back the piston (take care that the fluid reservoir does not overflow), and then return the piston back 45 deg to re engage the ratchet. The slot in the piston should finish pointing at the centre of the disc (but tell the truth it does not matter which way the slot finishes, either pointing to the centre of the disc or parallel to the disc mounting bolts). If unsure post a picture and I will check it out. by pushing the piston back you should create enough room to allow the pads to clear the disc. You should not need to open the bleed nipple or any other part of hydraulics to allow the piston to be pushed back. If you do have to it suggests the fluid is not return correctly. The only times I have seen this in the past it has been because the brake pedal is holding the brakes on slightly and the master cylinder piston is not returning. If the master cylinder does not return correctly it holds the reservoir closed and the brakes stay on. good luck C43

I don't think you screw it back. If they are the same as on my 84 turbo then you rotate the piston by 45 deg (there is a slot in the piston to allow a large screwdriver to fit) then push the piston back. Once pushed back you rotate it back the 45 deg to engage on the hand brake assembly. I must admit I agree with Eric, seems strange for both to seize at the same time, very odd. I also agree that probably not the master cylinder but can't be totally ruled out. cheers C43

thanks, went together ok eventually.

Hi anyone have a good method of fitting the dust seals on the rear brake callipers. I rebuilt mine a year ago and taking them off now I find both piston seals have come adrift. ta C43

Thanks Andy, I was forgetting about the spring platform sketch. Worth doing if you are that way inclined. I did see the released damper curves but tell the truth did not double check. My front were bang over each other so very unlikely to be a problem there and one of my rears was obviously soft in bump so got a new pair. I have one off good rear damper if anyone is every interested! My brothers S2 is running on Koni and feels good so I am probably being a bit OTT, but given everything else I have done seems worth going the last mile!

not sure if these images are of any use.

Agree with dr doom but to add an additional thought more bump damping at the front will prevent the car diving so much under braking. BTW the effect can be quite big in terms of jacking, it's used a lot in most form of motorsport. FYI I removed the dampers from my 84 turbo that had completed 70k and the front dampers were good, one of the rears was very low on bump damping from the dyno plots (I am lucky enough to be able to produce force v' velocity curves for the dampers). Lotus dampers are originally quite soft compared to the modern AVO equivalent, unfortunately there is not much we can do about it. My rear was low and when I stripped it I found on of the rubber platforms was missing. cheers

there should be a roll pin in the stick that is sprung loaded down I think to work on the reverse interlock.

I actually bought a cheap temperature gun off ebay so I could check how hot I got the upright to. I aimed for less than 150 deg C so pretty conservative. As I said took a day eventually to get it out. My wife could not work out why I was cheering so much for the removal of one insert. BTW picture below shows it back together now, makes it all worthwhile! good luck C43

I used a combination of plus gaz and temperature to get mine out. Took me pretty much a week of plus gaz and then a day of heating. |You need a piece of threaded bar and lots of washers/spacers to act as a pull as its slow progress to remove. BTW I used a heat gun rather than a flame as I was worried about getting the aluminium too hot. good luck C43

Hi I can see peoples point when it comes to keep the car original, Lotus generally know what they are doing when it comes to setting a car up. However there are a couple of things to remember; technology has moved on, what was state of art 30 years ago is not now and we don't have to work to the same compromise as Lotus when it comes to production costs or making the car driveable for everyone. I think the good part of owning a Lotus (and I suspect old Ferrari or Porsche) is no two are the same, we all tune them to our own preference. I do want to caution people about the shore hardness of the rubber bushes they are getting. I saw some supposed Lotus spec ones last week that are much much harder than you would ever want to fit. So if you do go rubber just check they do not have the consistency of rock! cheers Christian

Hi Andy thanks for the feedback. I know it is always difficult on these forums to know what to believe as you don't know the depth of knowledge of the person you are talking to and to tell the truth its the same with the specialists when it comes to something like suspension setup as generally they are not vehicle dynamics engineers (sorry guys, please don't shoot me). My experience from quite a few years of vehicle dynamics engineering is as follows: Polly bushes can transmit a little more vibration, pretty obvious I guess. I have fitted stiffer bushes to both an S2 (my brothers) and and S3 turbo (mine) and I could not feel more vibration, but theoretically it's there. Polly bushed steering rack will locate the rack better sharpening up the car (a little, you might not even notice) such that turn in is quicker. However, as I said the change is small and you might not notice it. Understeer / oversteer change will be negligible. Polly bushed ARB on the front will sharpen up turn in. This I think you can feel and to me feels better, I would be surprised if anyone says otherwise. I guess you could argue that on limit mid corner the car might have a little more understeer. However, again the change will be very small. Now I get the argument to keep the cars as standard as possible, I totally understand it. But given one of the biggest items that affects handling, the tyres, one can't get original spec I see no harm in subtly changing other items to help. cheers Christian

Hi Andy could you explain the physics behind saying that poly bushes make the car oversteer as I am curious? ta Christian

Quite surprised that the bushes made that much difference, might be worth checking your geometry?

I would have thought the poly will speed up steering response a little (but not much), will last longer but might transmit a little more vibration. Not a deal breaker either way.

thanks

Ok thanks mate. Can you do it with the screen in place? If so I might wait as it goes to get the screen (and lump and gearbox) fitted in a week. Taking the glovebox out looks like being a bit of an epic... cheers Christian

Hi the demister vent in the dash has broken and come away from the screws on the passenger side of the S3. At the moment the windscreen is out so seemed a good time to repair the demister vent on the passenger side. However I can't work out how to get this out as the aircon pipes are all in the way. Has anyone found a devious route to get this out? cheers Christian

yes sorry, I was only doing the table for myself so did not bother putting any key on it. Column G is number off, column D is the Illus No. in the Esprit parts book. I did change a couple of bolts to get a closer fit. For example the radius arm bolt was imperial but the hole in the new bush I bought was a size up metric so I opened up the hole in the radius arm to get a closer fit. I also went up a size on the front lower wishbone outboard bolt from metric to imperial, again to get a good fit on the trunnion. I don't think this is really necessary but I was just trying to get rid of any slop in the suspension. cheers Christian