removing the head and cam towers

[bigsi]

i will add pictures of the removed pieces later, after they are cleaned up.

[t70]

you should be able to cut that piece away and re-glass it back into place... i would think

[bigsi]

todays update:

the weather was very sunny and quite hot so i was allowed out for a few hours to carry on with the pods. i was able to take the passenger side out, however this took about an hour as the main rod that goes through had siezed against one of the fixings, so some wd40 and a hammer and i got it out.

i removed all the light adjuster screws and the washer blocks they screw into as they were all no good anymore due to corrosion

i gave everything a good coat of matt hammerite and will let it dry overnight.

here is the pod with the most damage to a fixing point.

tomorrow if i feel upto it i will start refitting things.

[bigsi]

update:

today with some help i refitted the pivot hinges into the body and the pods, i had to use a larger rivet on the damaged pod but it took fine and is strong.

one of the fittings had a new copper bearing pipe inside and this was a touch too small in diameter so i had to use a grinding stone bit on my dremel to open it out a touch, now the main rod fits snugly and rotates freely.

i have brought the pods in so ican clean them up and finish putting the push arm brackets on today in the warm as its quite cold out and starting to rain.

then a good clean up and a re-fit.

pics to follow.

[Goose]

Nicely done Si. Easy once you get the bonnet off...

I fixed the hinge area on mine by grinding a V into the crack, sanding down the surrounding area and covering with fibre glass cloth and resin. On the inside I used fast acting Araldite and left it over night. Worked well for me.

Getting the bonnet back on was an effort on my own so you might want to get some help with that!

Angus

[punky]

Hi Big Man

Good pics of the light pod and bonnet hinge stripdown by the way, as thats another job on the list for me too.Ive had a small block of rubber in the top corner of the bonnet - wing shutline holding mine straight for the last year or so because the lower hinge is knackered on the drivers side.

As for my light pods I removed the black plastic covers, took one look at the big blobs of rust holding the lamps in place and quickly replaced the covers.

Did you or Simon(Taff) have any luck finding a supplier for the Krylon wrinkle paint? I think I need some for my cam covers.Frost do a wrinkle paint but not sure about the colour.

How about this stuff??

Dosnt look to wrinky, more sandpaperesque!!!!

Might get some myself!!!!

Simon

[bigsi]

the frost stuff will do the same finish, speak to troy.

[Esprit Aviation]

Si,

You're making tremendous progress!

I'v got a question on the bonnet hinges. Where do they bolt to the body? If you have any pics of the areas, could you post them?

Our US spec cars appear to have a very different hinge method, and from the look of it, I like yours MUCH better! Since I have the fuel cell up front, I would like to have a cleaner look like yours.

Thanks & keep up the good work!

Lee

Edited March 17, 2007 by Esprit Aviation

[USAndretti42]

When I put my bonnet back on, I connected up the bonnet stay first to support it while I put the hinge pivot pins back in. Made it fairly easy to do by myself.

Looks like you are still doing excellent work, Simon.

[trackmagic]

todays update:

the weather was very sunny and quite hot so i was allowed out for a few hours to carry on with the pods. i was able to take the passenger side out, however this took about an hour as the main rod that goes through had siezed against one of the fixings, so some wd40 and a hammer and i got it out.

i removed all the light adjuster screws and the washer blocks they screw into as they were all no good anymore due to corrosion

i gave everything a good coat of matt hammerite and will let it dry overnight.

here is the pod with the most damage to a fixing point.

tomorrow if i feel upto it i will start refitting things.

You might try a TWO PART EPOXY for your repair. I the States we have a product called JB Weld. Stuff is a real life saver.

Looking good,

Jeff

[bigsi]

one of my biggest problems was the broken float tower on one of my carbs, luckily speaking to mike from lotus bits at donnington i was able to get a replacement tower section off an dhla 45 carb. now mine is a 40h carb so we had to check first if it would fit. after troy checked with one simon350s had bought we found it matched. so now all it needs is a good clean up and fitting to my carb assembly.

[bigsi]

tomorrows plans include, fitting cleaned carb top, then removing the silencer monting off the back of the gearbox, and possibly removing the rear calipers, stripping them down and cleaning them up ready for a service overhaul. also drilling out the remaining old fashioned ignition key style locking nuts and fitting the nice new ones i got at the donny show, pics to follow tomorrow.

[bigsi]

well i didnt manage to do what i wanted to today, as i had speech therapy this morningand was done in by the time we got home.

so i spent the day cleaning and re-assembling the new piece for my damaged carb, after a few hours of leaning and replacing the pars off my one onto this top plate i put it all back togetertr and its looking like it will work.

Edited March 20, 2007 by bigsi

[bigsi]

i had to split this over three posts as theres a crappy limit on img links in a post (can you alter the limit bibs??)

im sorry i forgot to add the process of this, i did take the pics while i reassembled it all.

here we go.

here you can see the sum of the parts all cleaned up as best as i could.

here you see me adding the valve that sits in the top section, this was stuck fast and coated in dry sedement and gunk, so i managed with a soft rod to hit it out and clean the valve section up and the insides. prior to re-fitting, note the slots machined into it, these will become apparent as we go on.

here you can see the valve in place at its lowest setting.

this is the valve key that rotates and pushes the valve up and down, on its lowest setting the one machined section of the valve rests on the flat part of this key and the pin rotates inside another slot in the valve, upon turning it pushes the valve up or down.

here i have fitted the key and i am now placing the seperator washer in to the hole also

the washer in place

now the captive brass slot nut

the rotator arm, return spring cpring cup, split washer and locking nut

Edited March 20, 2007 by bigsi

[bigsi]

here im fitting the float pin location nut.

the areo quip fitting and screw in micro filter

here im fitting my old gasket as a temporary measure.

Edited March 20, 2007 by bigsi

[bigsi]

this is the float pin, this goes into the underside of the floats in the slot prior to fitting.

here you see the pin being fitted , make sure you fit from the unslotted side first!!

fitting the tower

and then fitting onto the completed carb assembly

i hope this is of use to those of you who have sticking parts on their carbs. the valve i installed first does stick over time and causes carb problems, it only takes 10 mins to remove, clean and replace!!!

[bigsi]

if its clear and warm tomorrow i will take one of the rear calipers off and do that with pics

[Bibs]

Yeah yeah, no you won't!

[bigsi]

ok, well i didnt get round to doing the calipers, but i did manage to remove the real old locking wheel tube bolts. it took a little while to do them, i tried hitting them off with a hammer and chisel and screwdriver but i was hitting about as hard as a 3 year old!

so out came the little grinder, gloves and safety glasses and they were ready to come off in no time, oh.. then i hit em with the hammer and they fell off

job done, now fitted with my new lotus security bolts from donny

[Guest Troy Halliday]

Glad yours fitted my locking wheel nuts are way to big. Looks like I'll be giving them to someone on here. They are most definatelt not the ones for the S3 dispite what SW said.

[bigsi]

right i have now been informed that i wont be doing the calipers and that doing them is very difficult.

so im going to leave them. so im going to find something else to break, i mean fix and make sparkly tomorrow.

[USAndretti42]

Nice work, Simon. Are you sure there's not a bit of Jackdaw in your blood? You do like sparkly thngs.

Keep positive and take it easy.

[bigsi]

todays update:

well having nothing to do i decided to sort out one thing that was really bugging me.

on the back of the gearbox is a mounting for the silencer, mine was looking badly corroded, so i took it off.

not as easy as i thought it was going to be and it required a bit of effort, but i got it off.

i then removed the backing plate from the gearbox also for cleaning.

the back of the gearbox was stinking and coated in gunk and crud so i cleaned that up with a brush on degreaser/cleaner

here you can see the plates before and after.

[hilly]

Blimey, you think your are bad you should have seen the state of mine when I took it off, yours looks like new in comparison......

Keep the good stuff going, you are one of the few regular posters in this section and it help keep me honest with my posts

Hilly

[arbell9]

Top work simon, how do you get your parts all shiny from being gunked up? Do you use special cleaners and elbow grease? They look like new when you have done them.

Alex