Owen's Lotus Esprit GT3 Restoration

[OwenGT3]

It's taken a year to build the workshop to do the work in, but so it begins the start of my Esprit GT3 restoration. In true Lotus fashion, the second bolt undone sheared off, but it hasn't moved for 22 years, so that's to be expected. WD40 is a must. 

With the bonnet off, everything is suddenly a lot easier to get to. Stripping the car will be slow, as all nuts, bolts and fixings needed packaging up and labelling. Most of these items won't see the car again for another year or two.

Looking at most things as I take them off, it is perhaps the right time to do this restoration, giving the car a new lease of life.

The plan is to try and complete the work within two years, but depends on what I find and how high the budget climbs!

ABS is going and I've already purchased Ian Lord's conversion kit.

I will post regularly now to show progress of the project.

[mdw]

Plusgas should be  better than wd40...................but your still going to shear a load, its a right of  passage for lotus ownership.😁

[Rolls]

+1

premium penetrating oils are worth it.

[OwenGT3]

A little more work today. All the Abs has gone other than wiring, never to be seen again on the car. Ian Lord's replacement servo system is being fitted.

Last light pod has also been removed today. Notice the enlarged drain hole, something I did years ago to stop the water collecting in the pod housings.

I was under the car Saturday at the front removing the lower front spoiler lip and under body shields. Most bolts are rusted to hell, so will need to invest in some extractor sockets, as some nuts are just round now.

Getting the nuts off that are holding the front top edge of the bumper on is proving to be fun. I've managed to get one nut off so far, the others are mostly round. I think this is will be one of the hardest jobs on the whole car, at least the back bumper is easier to get to all the nuts.

I've invested in more zip lock bags as well to store and label up all the parts as they come off. Also I'm breaking those bags down into sectional bags, so will be so much easier when rebuilding again know what part of the car they are from.

Once a few of the under-body panels are off, I think things should start to be easier to work on. you just have to keep plugging away.

[OwenGT3]

Had another go at getting the stubborn nut off the bracket holding the side of the front bumper on. I used my action camera to film under the wing, while viewing the live stream on my phone. This did help a lot in see if I was cutting in the correct area. I finally got the nut off by using a small cutting disc in my Dremel cable extension. It took about an hour or so to remove just the one nut, but it finally came off.

Today I spent some time at the rear of the car removing some parts. I removed the tailgate, boot floor and petrol filler flap. Also all the vacuum pump , boot interior lights and screws in the gutter drain holes were removed. The trim tops of the quarter windows and petrol tank covers were also removed. The next part will be to remove the rear bumper, lights and exhaust trim panel.

[OwenGT3]

Well finally the bumper came off today, never again do I want to do that job! I've fitted lots of bumper trims in my time, but that has to be one of the worse to remove, so not looking forward to refitting. Some of the last bolts pulled through their holes, so a couple will need repairing on the body, one on the bumper. Most bolts were easy to get to, it's just that they were all rusted making the job difficult. The ones on the corner where you can't get to are the worst, they are bad. I might do some mods to those fittings to make life easier.

With the bumper off now, I can start to look at the radiators on the front. With no air con I haven't got to worry about removing that and getting the gas removed. I will work on the back bumpers first before removing the radiators.

[OwenGT3]

    

Today I finally got the rear boot spoiler lip removed, Lotus did stick it on with a lot of silicone. Also, I finally got the rear bumper removed, which required the fixing bracket inside the boot to be ground away with my angle grinder. The nuts were heavily rusted and were never going to come undone, also access was limited with the exhaust which is still on the car.

With every large panel other than doors off the car now, I will go back to the front and start removing the radiator, oil coolers, etc. once these items are off I will go back to the engine area again and start to remove that and the gearbox, followed by fuel tanks and then finally all the suspension.

I think the rear lower bumper bracket has rusted so much due to some water leaking into the boot over the years. I know when I first purchased the car, water was leaking through one of the bolt holes on the rear spoiler, all the boot carpets were damp.

Edited August 16, 2019 by OwenGT3

[Stuart Monument]

Well done Owen your making great progress. Just make sure it goes back to together as quick as I always loved the look of your car. 

[slewthy]

Looking good.

We know you will do a great job, as proved by your other projects. Really looking forward to this thread progressing!

[OwenGT3]

Not much work on the Esprit today (17.08.19), just removing some small parts. Removed some small spats that sit on all the corners of the bumpers. Also removed t h e tailgate locking plates, exhaust splash shield and rear boot breather vent frame.

[tomcattom]

On 16/08/2019 at 18:53, OwenGT3 said:

    

That looks remarkably like the state of mine, except in my case the water ingress appears to have been from the offside tailgate drain being too short and draining into the boot instead

[Chillidoggy]

Good work, Owen.

I assume you'll be checking the rear aerofoil brackets? Mine were so rusty, they were on the point of failure.

[OwenGT3]

On 20/08/2019 at 09:07, Chillidoggy said:

Good work, Owen.

I assume you'll be checking the rear aerofoil brackets? Mine were so rusty, they were on the point of failure.

I don't need them now as I have the late V8 stainless trim centre exhaust outlet. The old ones were rusty as hell, had to be cut off.

[OwenGT3]

A little work on the engine today, started to strip the engine down ready to remove. Most of the work was removing the loom from engine, but to get the loom completely away from the engine, some engine parts needed to be removed.

I've taken loads of photos of the position of the loom and all the connectors, so will know where they go when refitting it all back together. I've done worse in my time restoring cars.

[Mightymetro]

Good stuff 👍🏻

[OwenGT3]

Today (24.08.19) was spent stripping a lot more parts from the engine and engine bay. The engine is almost ready to remove, with just a few components attached. Both sides of the engine bay were also stripped, exposing the petrol tanks. Most components that sit on top of the tanks were removed. The exhaust system and the rear hanging frame was also removed. The loom was removed from the side panels and is now tucked up to one side. Again lots of reference photos were taken for rebuild time.

[OwenGT3]

The remaining items at the front of the car were removed. This includes the charge cooler radiator and the main water cooling radiator, along with the cowling. Some bolts had to be cut off, with a few coming undone by spanner.

The core on both radiators are beyond repair, so will need to have new ones.

[OwenGT3]

Today I dismantled the rear suspension. Most of the bolts came undone with relative ease, just a quirt of WD40 and the nuts could be removed. There were a few nuts that needed cutting off to remove the part, shock absorbers being one of them.

The lower link arm was taken off with the hub, so as to remove the lower pins on the bench. The pins will be cut off so not to crack and damage the hub. Brakes were OK to remove, but new handbrake cables will need to be fitted.

I also got the screw holding the clamp bracket out for the two injectors in the plenum manifold. A better screw will be fitted when assembling this item.

All items will be reconditioned, painted etc. before being refitted.

 

[OwenGT3]

Well today (17.09.19) the engine finally came out. I don't know when the last time it was out, but never in my 12 years of ownership. It wasn't too bad a job to do, some fiddly pipes to disconnect at the front of the engine, awkward in true Lotus fashion, but once they were off, the lifting was relativity easy.

I'd removed the inlet manifold to make fixing the lifting strap easier to go around the engine, which was actually nylon rope as that's all I had to hand. Putting it in I will use something better.

The car was at the lowest point on the jack system, but once the bolts had cleared the engine mounts, the engine lifted with ease, with just a little guidance near the rear of the car so it cleared the panel, Lotus don't give you much leeway in the engine bay.

Once cleared of the bodywork, it was just a matter of wheeling the lifting hoist back to clear of the car. I placed the engine and gearbox on a trolley with a wood sheet on top, luckily Lotus engine sumps are nice and flat to sit on.

With the engine and gearbox out, I finally separated the two parts. The bell housing was quite dry, so no rear oil leaks, but release bearing was dry as hell. It's surprising how heavy the gearbox is just on it's own.

The plan now is to get the engine on an engine frame to start stripping the head off. Other items on the engine and gearbox will follow the same for inspection.

[OwenGT3]

I haven't worked on the Esprit for a few day, but decided to get back on it, so today (14.09.19) I stripped the rear hubs down. Again as they haven't been to bits in possibly 22 years, bolts were seized, so first thing all fixings required a good squirt of releasing fluid.

I started to release the bearing hex head bolts, but these were seized solid, so decided to cut them off as it was easier. The lower link arm pin was also solid in the hub, so having heard the stories of cracked hubs, I decided to cut these off as well. This required cutting the pins down between the link arm and the hub pillars. Not much room for the cutter, but I was using the 1mm cutting discs.

With the link arm out of the way one side of the pin just fell out, but the other side had to be worked out. The steel to alloy side was the easy removed side, but the steel on steel side was rusted tight. Able now to be able to hold the hub on a solid surface, I was able to drive the pin out with a punch and releasing fluid.

The last item to be removed was the ABS sensors. Although I didn't need them when the car is rebuilt, I did want to remove them and save them, but I'm afraid this didn't happen. The sensors were corroded in the hub tight, so the only way to remove them was to break them out. This required removing the connection top, then drilling down the side of the magnets. This slot made the body of the sensor loose, so I was then able to hammer them out with a punch.

With everything removed from one hub, it was the same process on the other hub. Another item stripped ready for the big clean up of parts.

 

Edited September 19, 2019 by OwenGT3

[OwenGT3]

Day 20 (26.09.19) of my restoration and I finally took the head off the engine. To my surprise the head, pistons and bores are all looking remarkably good for 97,000 miles. The pistons are still a nice fit in the liners, which have a minimal wear step at the top, although bores will be checked to see if in tolerance. The piston tops are clean, just covered in a layer of oil residue.

I did do a leak test on all the valves and compression chambers, as I was expecting number two cylinder to be possibly damaged with some wear, as this was down on compression so much when I tested it. Actually all the valves are really good, number one and two did drain in the leak test, but the damage just looks to be carbon build up, so I think a good clean, reface the valves and seats, all should be fine. Three and four did leak, but only minimal.

As long as the valve guides are still a good fit, with indications that they are, then the head needs minimal work to put right and has saved me some money, always a good thing!

The rest of the engine is coming apart reasonably well, with only one bolt head shearing off so far in the water pump thermostat housing, but that should still be possible to remove. Hopefully the bottom half of the engine will come apart as easily as the top has.

 

 

 

Edited September 27, 2019 by OwenGT3

[OwenGT3]

Today (05.10.19) I removed the sump from the engine, as I wanted to remove one of the pistons to check the bores of the engine. The sump came off relativity easily, but all bolts are showing some corrosion between the two types of materials.

With the sump finally off, I removed piston one from the cylinder. Luckily Lotus dowel the big end caps, so you don't need to mark them. With the piston out and a wipe of the bore, I was able to see they are very good for the age of the engine. The bores are not heavily worn and you can still see the original score marks.

The crank was also very good with no scoring on the journals. Knowing this now, I should be able to rebuild using standard replacement rings and shell caps.

[Bibs]

13 hours ago, OwenGT3 said:

but all bolts are showing some corrosion between the two types of materials.

Some of this will help when refitting. Used it on the Elise a lot! 

https://www.mbfg.co.uk/duralac.html

 

[Chillidoggy]

What's the crank endfloat like, Owen?

[OwenGT3]

23 minutes ago, Chillidoggy said:

What's the crank endfloat like, Owen?

Very good, I've just done a quick test, but this seems to show minimal movement. I will conduct a full measured test before removing, I just need to check the manual for specifications and tolerance.

Edited October 21, 2019 by OwenGT3