Hgf + Diy = Kr1

[Elise+Imp]

Seems like someone is trying to catch us out Phil, 3rd time luck on gasket, the second one had about a half millimetre gap in the outer elastomer. Third one passes initial inspection, will have a look with fresh eyes tomorrow.

[Phil S1]

Phil, that's bad news but at least you spotted it prior to fitting.

 

Is that a week lost ?

 

Paul

 

Probably Paul, it looks like Bri's finally found me a gasket that passes his quality control so it's really down to when he's up for another 100 mile round trip I did feel a little guilty for his wasted journey on Sunday, I even offered to wash and detail his Elise to make up for it, but I think he must see at as an antique these days....he didn't want me to remove it's patina and devalue it

 

I had a reply to my email to DVA. He's had 3 faulty BW750 gaskets in the past, one of which was with missing elastomer as Bri's just spotted, so it seems even when you opt for a quality branded component you still need to be vigilant before fitting it.

[Martin R]

Have, you been busy ? Phil and Brian ?

[Elise+Imp]

yes, been very busy - in the last two days' i've done about 24 hours or more on lotus', and still not finished, ok - i admit, not all that was on one car but i'll let phil tell his own story

 

need sleep

[smithpaulg]

Come on Phil, give us an update (wioth photos!)

 

Paul

[Phil S1]

Sorry for the delay, I was a bit weary yesterday but at least I had an easy day, unlike Bri. He enjoyed his 12 hour stint with me on Saturday so much, he decided to do it all over again on Sunday, helping Iain (Ninarin) with his Sport 160.... and he's not done yet

We started back on mine at 9.00am Saturday morning, It was quite a busy day and I'm afraid I forgot to take many photos, what with one thing and another. Apologies also that I may well miss out some of the detail along the way, I'm sure Brian will be able to fill in some of the finer detail.

Anyhow, after a final look over and clean of gasket number 3!, on it went:-

 

Next up, was my KR1 modified head. Once we had it located on the 2 dowels we carefully fitted the 10 new Payen head bolts, after having applied some oil under the heads and onto the threads. Working from the centre of the head outwards and following the Payen instructions, we initially torqued them to 20 Nm. After that, again working from the centre outwards, they each needed to be turned through 360 degrees in 90 degree increments. To do this with some degree of accuracy Brian painted a white mark on each of the bolt heads as you can see in this photo:-

 

Things were progressing well.....

Once the head was in place, I started re-fitting the exhaust manifold whilst Bri worked on re-fitting the cambelt..... "Didn't we leave the tensioner bolt in the head?" asked Brian. "Not sure" I said. After some hunting round and checking of all the bags of nuts and bolts we agreed, we had left it in the head when it went to Rogers. This wouldn't have been too bad if it was an ordinary bolt but no, this one had to be a bit of a special one with a shoulder! As luck would have it Roger was working Saturday morning and I managed to speak with him on the phone, his words were something like..."Ah Jeeese, I wondered why I had 2 of those bolts on Paul's job" He measured it up and told us all the dimensions and also confirmed it was the same as another bolt used on the timing cover. He also kindly sent me some photos of it.....I don't know whether that was meant to help me and just taunt me though

By now it was nearly mid-day. I rang my local fastener place and was amazed that they were open on a Saturday and even more amazed when the said they should have something..."What time do you shut?" I said "In twenty minutes" came the reply......"We're on our way".

The guy there let us have a look through the racks and we found a bolt with a slightly longer shoulder and an allen key head rather than hexagon but it was the best we were going to get at that time, other than scouring a breakers yard. I felt a bit bad trying to buy one bolt and Brian needed some threadlock so we bought that and I got the bolt for free....Result

From then on, it was relatively plain sailing. Bri fitted the tensioner and the new bolt. I coupled up the rest of the exhaust and Bri fitted the inlet manifold. Re-fitted the cam cover, got as much oil in the oil filter as possible prior to fitting and then filled up with fresh oil. Filled the coolant system with tap water initially. Bri turned it over a few times manually and then turned it on the crank with the HT lead and injectors disconnected to get some oil round. Re-connected the HT lead and injectors and fired it up.

One of the tappets took quite a while to quieten down but then it sounded fine.

Once everything had cooled down a bit we rolled it out of the garage and I disconnected the coolant hoses to drain it again. Brian seems to find it amusing that I have matching red mats in my garage so here's one or two photos he took to illustrate both that and me trying to get a socket on an elusive jubilee clip:-

 

It also illustrates the crack in Brian's clam left by a badger.....probably about 6 years ago now...I'm sure he'll get round to it one of these days

 

Once it was drained, we got the hosepipe on it and flushed out any trace of the old coolant. Then I re-connected the hoses and filled it with 4 litres of new antifreeze and as much de-ionised water as I could.

We got it back in the garage and out of curiosity Brian checked the amount of valve lift. This was all new to me but involved removing No 1 spark plug such that a DTI arm can be passed down the spark plug hole onto the top of the piston in order to detect when it is at TDC. A second DTI is then placed in contact with a cam follower on the inlet and exhaust sides. Here's Bri checking the exhaust side:-

 

According to some PTP info; with standard cams, which I still have, the lift at TDC should be 25 thou on both the inlet and outlet. Mine measured 18 thou on the inlet and 16 thou on the exhaust. DVA does some offset dowel pins for the cam wheels to correct this but I'm not sure at this point whether it would be worth pursuing or not......it's running, that's the main thing at the moment.

Thought I'd just include one more photo from outside as it shows some of the other jobs I've done along the way like re-painting the roll bar stays with POR 15 and also re-spraying the rocker cover with engine enamel:-

 

Shortly after this we were ready to re-fit the clam. It's a horrible part, stretching the sides out to fit around the door pillars but thankfully it went back on relatively unscathed. That was as far as I'd hoped to get on Saturday, leaving me Sunday to get all the spacers back in the right places and finish putting everything else back on, so we had some tea.

Then Brian offered to stop a little longer and before we knew it, all the fiddly bolts and spacers were back in, the speakers were re-fitted, the tail lights re-connected, the boot cable re-connected, air intake duct and alternator duct re-connected, fuel filler surround re-fitted, arch liners were back in, exhaust supports re-connected, rear window and roll bar cover clipped in place, undertrays back on and we were ready to go.....at 10 minutes to nine, as you can just see on the clock. We were like a Formula One pit crew..............only in slow motion :-

 

After all that, we had to go for a little test drive. It was great to be back behind the wheel after some 2 months. The car ran fine and sounded pretty good too, especially now the exhaust manifold isn't leaking, not sprung any leaks either. I've been to work in it today and will continue to do so whilst the weather holds and get some more miles under it's belt before Chatsworth and Donington. I've not really pushed the car much yet but the porting work has certainly made the car feel 'stronger' in it's power delivery. There's no sudden kick in acceleration it just seems to pull more solidly and continuously, right through the rev range. It will be interesting to see how it compares in a straight line with a standard Elise at Donington.

So that's it, I'm back on the road again.

Thanks to all those that helped out and offered help and opinions along the way.

Thanks to Martin for the new crankshaft bolt and the loan of his liner clamps (I'll get them back to you soon).

Thanks to Kiwirog (Roger Fabry at SabreHeads) for his lovely porting work and help in sorting out my exhaust manifold and thanks of course to Brian for doing all the hard bits and making the journey up and down the M1....I literally couldn't have done it without you

[Martin R]

Top, top job by you both. If Carslberg made S1 Elise it would be this one. Possibly the cleanest S1 in the world Enjoy.

[Daniel]

Well done Phil and Brian. That man certainly deserves a case of Carlsberg, what an absolute star.

[jimbo07g41]

Great work Phil and Brian.

 

Did you ask Brian how much difference the timing being slightly out would make?

 

DVA doesnt have any dowels at the minute so I am looking into getting some made up.

[Martin R]

Phil, buy some verniers. You will need them for the new cams when you get the urge for some. Donny or Chatsworth will do for the liner clamps. Hopefully i dont need them for a while

[Elise+Imp]

The cams are slightly retarded, however i didn't think the 10 thou discrepancy was worth chasing on the day, probably worth only 1 - 2bhp, might make a small bit of difference in drivability, on the imp i've swang the cam around a bit and you can barely feel a difference of 10thou on that, but it's on a wild-ish profile.

 

i did contemplate slotting the sprockets on phil's (I have done so on my own car, but not ideal on a someone elses car). Some of it, but not all, is due to skimming the head, the rest is component tolerances etc.

 

without knowing the ramp of the cam its hard to know how many degrees out they may be, not much; in retrospect i should have got the cam lift to the right figure and seen how far past TDC the crank was.

 

I've not used the offset dowels route before though might be worth a go, i have the facilities to make some, but i think phil might well put verniers on his chrismas list over the next few years, then cams / ECU :-)

 

Jamie, if you're not in a rush for some dowels i may be able to make some, if you know what offsets you want? according to DVA's site you can do upto 10 degrees cam shift (with offset of 34thou on the dowel) in 2 degree increments.

 

 

and this pic is chalk and cheese, probably the best S1 in the area along side the most used and abused....

 

[DeanB]

Hats off to you guys.

 

Great thread BTW. I reckon Phil's motor is in with a shout for the Chatsworth car of the day award.

(Bri's, not so much!)

[Martin R]

I have just noticed how similar the car regs are. Did you pair order them together ? However thats where the similarity ends it appears

[Phil S1]

Thanks for the replies guys! Credit to Brian though....I only tackle half these jobs knowing that if it does all go pear shaped I can rely on him to sort it.

Not putting any verniers on it just yet Martin, that'll have to wait for a future power hike. I think my next job will be taking the front clam off, still running the standard rad at present so an all ally one will be on the cards at some point.

I do like to see a shiny car, I think I must have something of a masochistic streak in me as I do like to keep my car clean and polished but equally I do like to drive it as well. The two don't really go hand in hand but much as it pains me when I pick up a stone chip these cars, more than most, are meant to be driven.

Unfortunately, Brian and myself didn't order our cars brand new from Lotus at similar times. We did buy them at similar times though, but they were secondhand, so purely coincidence that their registrations are so similar. They originated from SGT in Maidenhead.

 

I'll make sure your liner clamps are in the car for Chatsworth Martin.

Thanks again!

[jimbo07g41]

The cams are slightly retarded, however i didn't think the 10 thou discrepancy was worth chasing on the day, probably worth only 1 - 2bhp, might make a small bit of difference in drivability, on the imp i've swang the cam around a bit and you can barely feel a difference of 10thou on that, but it's on a wild-ish profile.

 

i did contemplate slotting the sprockets on phil's (I have done so on my own car, but not ideal on a someone elses car). Some of it, but not all, is due to skimming the head, the rest is component tolerances etc.

 

without knowing the ramp of the cam its hard to know how many degrees out they may be, not much; in retrospect i should have got the cam lift to the right figure and seen how far past TDC the crank was.

 

I've not used the offset dowels route before though might be worth a go, i have the facilities to make some, but i think phil might well put verniers on his chrismas list over the next few years, then cams / ECU :-)

 

Jamie, if you're not in a rush for some dowels i may be able to make some, if you know what offsets you want? according to DVA's site you can do upto 10 degrees cam shift (with offset of 34thou on the dowel) in 2 degree increments.

 

 

and this pic is chalk and cheese, probably the best S1 in the area along side the most used and abused....

 

 

Dave has recommended offset dowels to create 6 degrees, one for the main belt side exhaust and inlet cam. I know to be really accurate I need to use some DTI's and then use the appropriate dowels.

 

It was after listening to yours and Martins feedback, that I realised (after some reading)that verniers are not an option on the inlet cam of a VVC.

 

When I also realised that you can get a Piper 270 ex cam for the VVC, I couldnt help myself. But I would prefer to time it up better when I fit the Cam. Piper say it is designed to be dropped straight in, but I dont want a lumpy idle.

 

Do you have access to a lathe and milling machine to make them?

 

Dave has recommended offset dowels to create 6 degrees, one for the main belt side exhaust and inlet cam. He has not got any at the minute to sell and he has not told me when he is getting anymore. He has just come back from his holidays and I imagine getting some dowels aint top of his priorities! I know to be really accurate I need to use some DTI's and then use the appropriate dowels.

 

It was after listening to yours and Martins feedback, that I realised (after some reading)that verniers are not an option on the inlet cam of a VVC.

 

When I also realised that you can get a Piper 270 ex cam for the VVC, I couldnt help myself. But I would prefer to time it up better when I fit the Cam. Piper say it is designed to be dropped straight in, but I dont want a lumpy idle.

 

Do you have access to a lathe and milling machine to make them?