The Mustard Yellow Elise S1 Refresh Thread

[DeanB]

Yeah the 135 cams are oem MG, for the TF135, so properly developed.  Gav put me a pair in to my old engine before it started blowing out oil smoke!  The engine I have now is from an s2 Sport 135 so it has the head, plenum, different ecu plus a bigger throttle body, a fettled exhaust manifold (some of the blobby welding ground away inside) and it had a pair of Piper 633 cams and vernier pulleys in it too when I bought it  🙂

[Daveb99]

Quick update - I’ve resolved a small brake issue, it seemed to be pulling to the right slightly, only noticeable when braking with no hands on the wheel.

I remembered that one of the crossover pipes (near side) was slightly twisted when I removed it to split the front calipers.  I straightened it at the time and thought it would be fine, but it may have had a slightly reduced bore of course.....which could be causing an imbalance of the braking force.    

So I’ve replaced it with a new one, bled the brakes again and have also nipped up the bleed screw a bit tighter as there was a slight weep of fluid before I started.

It now brakes in a straight line!

Other than that, not a great deal to report, I’ve had a few more great drives in it, and it’s booked in for MOT next Friday so fingers crossed it will pass...

I’m starting to really bond with this little thing now - of the 5 S1's I’ve had I think this is easily the sweetest to drive, no rattles, squeaks, everything is just “right”, incredible given the mileage really, and that includes the 13k mile Scandal Green SVA 160, which is basically a monster in comparison - in a good way though

[Daveb99]

And now the shortest update of all.  MOT passed today, I must have done something right 😀

[PJT]

Congrats.  Beautiful and now legitimate restoration.

[SamG40]

Looks great. Who did your geo?

[Daveb99]

30 minutes ago, SamG40 said:

Looks great. Who did your geo?

Cheers.  A very kind and experienced MLOC member who I won’t name because he might get inundated 😉

[kayj_prod]

A certain mathematical whizz with spreadsheets I suspect...

[Daveb99]

7 minutes ago, kayj_prod said:

A certain mathematical whizz with spreadsheets I suspect...

I wouldn’t know Keith but it wasn’t me - although I am a spreadsheet genius 🤣

[Neilshannon27]

Nice, must have been a nice feeling of accomplishment when it flew through the mot. 

[Daveb99]

On 30/08/2020 at 20:16, Neilshannon27 said:

Nice, must have been a nice feeling of accomplishment when it flew through the mot. 

It was indeed Neil - I was expecting something to be wrong but it's all spot on it seems.....👌

[Daveb99]

Quick update - I've been using the car quite a bit for trips and days out and it continues to feel spot on (to me anyway!).   Last week Joanne and I managed a 300 mile round trip down to Wiltshire, via the Cotswolds, and revisited some of the places we used to love when we lived down that way 20 years ago.    It was bizarre because I had my two S1's (not at the same time) back in the day when we lived there too - lots of memories and some great roads 👍

Then today we've been to a couple of places fairly locally, and tomorrow we are heading up to Kedleston Hall, Carsington Water and Ashbourne for the day, before Sunday's run and breakfast meet at Karl's farm (though I may bring the 160, not sure yet).....

I'm still looking for a good name for it though - I'm sick of calling it "the yellow one".   We call the 160 "The Toad" (short for Toxic Toad), so it needs to be something animal related perhaps.....

Here's a photo from the long trip last week.   When you have a driver, you can be a bit more inventive (nearly dropped the phone though).

[Lithopsian]

Not a lot for the MOT guys to see on the Elise.  Unless the brakes fail or you forgot to put the cat back on, you should be good :)

[PJT]

The pit-car nairy 🐥

After all,  it was a relatively “cheap” car and an obvious “chick” magnet.

[IDN101]

Hi Dave,

This is Ian- the 2nd owner of this car 😎

Just wanted to say what an amazing job you have done on it. What has become apparent is that the owner between you and I must have changed quite a few things- including cosmetically. I had the car for 11 years as a daily driver. It only had 11K on the clock when I bought it. And i did nothing cosmetically to it- I just wanted to keep it bog-standard. You can see the car in my profile picture here. 
 

I hope it brings you much pleasure- sounds like it has already. It’s fantastic to know the car lives on!

All the best,

Kind regards,

Ian

[Daveb99]

On 02/09/2020 at 21:57, IDN101 said:

Hi Dave,

This is Ian- the 2nd owner of this car 😎

Just wanted to say what an amazing job you have done on it. What has become apparent is that the owner between you and I must have changed quite a few things- including cosmetically. I had the car for 11 years as a daily driver. It only had 11K on the clock when I bought it. And i did nothing cosmetically to it- I just wanted to keep it bog-standard. You can see the car in my profile picture here. 
 

I hope it brings you much pleasure- sounds like it has already. It’s fantastic to know the car lives on!

All the best,

Kind regards,

Ian

Hi Ian, good to hear from you on here and thanks for the compliments!   As the person who put almost all of the mileage on the car I can only applaud you for looking after it so well.   I have a huge file of invoices and a continuous service history from Day 1, and all MOT certs too - thanks so much for keeping all that.

As per our emails I’ve sent you some more photos, and look forward to reuniting you with the car so you can see what a pretty little thing it is again nowadays 👍🏻