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My 2001 Esprit V8 had a complete engine rebuild, both bottom end with forged pistons and top end with new valve guides and full turbo rebuild in 2019. Ever since my car has been performing very well and has had about 4000km. In the last couple of months in has had a small coolant consumption, about 200 ml per month. And in the last two weeks the right hand exhaust sometimes is producing some light color/blue smoke. Yesterday when I parked my car I noticed the right hand exhaust was wet with some black burnt oil (I think). Could it be the turbo leaking oil or something from the engine ? How can I check ? Thanks

Has anyone fitted a fire supression system to engine bay or can reccomend a company that supplies and fits them as looking to install one in my V8 after a potentially disastorous occurance. any help or advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks Mike

hi guys,does anybody know if the cam covers can be removed without removing the intake manifold? thanks

I hope someone can point me in the right direction to fix a no-start situation with my '99 V8. I was out for a 100 mile drive with a local sports car club a few weeks ago, and the car was running great. I noticed it was a little slow to crank (but started right up) after the first break, and it continued to run perfectly when I parked it for lunch. After about 90 minutes the engine would crank but wouldn't start. There was no check engine light, but I didn't hear the fuel pumps run with the key in the second position. I ended up having the car towed home because I ran the battery down trying to start it. When I got home I pulled a P1101 code from the OBD port by battery. …

Hello, I would like to introduce myself as a newcomer to this forum. My name is Thomas, I'm from Dortmund, Germany and I drive a 2003 Esprit in Gunmetal. It's my 3rd Esprit and I love it. Sorry for the bad english! Can someone help me, I'm looking for an engine wiring diagram that includes the engine control unit and relays, suitable for Esprit V8 To the problem: Turned off Esprit after a good lap...it should continue after a few days, but now it always goes off after about 5-10 seconds. Ramspott & Brandt from Wiesbaden gave me the tip to check both fuel pumps, then removed both pumps and one was actually damaged. So I replaced both p…

My question is probably answered elsewhere, but I can not find the threads that are relevant. When the engine idles below 1000 RPM (around 900 I think), there is a very nasty vibration of the engine. It does not feel good. When I slightly raise the RPM to 1000 the vibration disappears. Any idea's what this can be? I wish I could raise the idle speed just to 1000 RPM. Thanks!

Hi Everyone, A little while since I have posted on my Esprit as its sat in storage for a few years whilst I wasted money on racing 🤣 I am re-commissioning the car and have a few jobs around the engine so am planning to remove it. The plan is to address the following: Full engine out clean of engine bay and engine itself Replace the turbo oil cooling lines Full service and timing belt change (inc all new pulley bearings and water pump) Remove cams, clean and check all tappet buckets Address 3 broken exhaust studs Replace the exhaust heat shields - cracked Ceramic coat the exhaust headers Refix oil dipstick tu…

The car is a 1998 esprit v8. I have rebuilt nearly the whole car recently but there’s one thing I still cant get. The car will start fine cold, and start fine hot, but once stated it will misfire, run choppy and sometimes die. This will only last for about 10 seconds, and as wick as a snap of the fingers the car will switch to being perfect. On throttle and driving it acts perfectly normal, until you give it more than say 80% throttle and climb above 4K rpm and then let off the throttle, the same thing happens again, and it will feel lean and choppy for 10 seconds before instantly switching to perfect again. this only happens when the throttle is released and wi…

My V8 has developed the infamous hot start problem. Starts fine cold but if the coolant temperature is over 70 degrees then it just won't restart. The CEL stays on but there are no ECM error codes. Weird. The solution is to wait twenty minutes or so for it to cool down. Very frustrating. I have trawled the forum for solutions and found these two: I met a chap called Tony at a Club Lotus Wessex shindig last year and we were discussing V8 problems. I mentioned my hot start problem and he smiled. "Yes", he said. "It's the camshaft sensor. I changed mine and it fixed it". Ah ok. The V8's crankshaft sensor is also used on a Ferrari F50 Coupe 4.7 (1995 to 1997). Uh o…

When rebuilding the cylinder heads of my V8, and checking the hydraulic tappets, a number of these turned out to be blocked; measured in this position it turned out to be in the highest position, compared to the tappets of which I could (finger) press the center plunger in. Could it be that these tappets can block? I love to learn! Ruud.

This will be quite a long one so thank you to anyone willing to help. I found a 1998 v8 that had been sitting for 20 years. After all the usual stuff to get it to fire up (fuel tanks, fuel pumps, fuel filter coils, wires, plugs, radiator, fans, oil lines, water pump and so on I got it to start. It’s been driving for maybe 50-100 miles or so no problem, but over the past few days a few new issue have surface I’m quite stumped on. I’ll list them below hot start- didnt have any issues until a couple days ago. Now it either takes a while, or won’t start up at all after it’s hot. I replaced the ecu temperature sensor, and have secondary injectors on the way. Where…

Has anyone used the Powerlite Alternator that PNM is reselling? I have a rebuilt factory alternator on my V8, but I keep reading that the failure rate is high. I have also tried the Cadillac alternator and it sadly had issues. I don't want to keep going down the rabbit hole of testing products. Anyone that has tried please provide thoughts and mileage/time on the alternator.

Testing the water - High quality replacement rod bolts for the 918 V8 engine. In answer to the frustration of not being able to order sensibly-priced replacement rod bolts, Andrä has been working with a German company to source replacement bolts with the correct thread in 42CrMo4 tempered steel. These bolts will be stronger than the stock bolts and approx. half the price of the stock items. Min. order quatity is 100 pcs. Is there any interest out there?

I have a start and then die problem with my new to me 98 esprit. I recently replaced the entire fuel system from the tanks to pumps to lines and everything in between due to the car sitting for many years. After all that work the car started and ran fine and I’ve racked up a couple hundred miles the past few days. Today I went out to the car to start it, and the alarm made a noise I’ve yet to hear before, and the car will fire for a handful of seconds and then die almost like fuel has been cut off. Typically when you hop in, the car is quiet, you click the cobra wand to the touch pad and hear a loud click. Then start the car and you’re good to go. Today, the click won’t h…

Hello, I am trying to help two French friends who only have limited English - the garage working on the car and the actual owner of the car. The car needs it's cambelts replacing. The cambelt tensioners (C9E0297J) both need replacing as they are damaged. I have tried to find a pair of new cambelt tensioners (C9E0297J) but have not been successful in doing so. My questions are:- Where can I buy a pair of new cambelt tensioners (C9E0297J)? There seems to be three relevant part numbers:- C918E0297J which I take to be the complete tensioner assembly. It is the plastic part of this which is damaged, so it can't be reused, hence the problem…

Hi All, I am going through my V8 slowly dismantling the engine before tackling the rebuild and I am slowly accumulating the special tools I need (or creating a list of which I need to buy) and I am struggling to see the need for the Camshaft Locking Cap T000T1336F and shown below, item # 1. The manual suggests that you need four of these but DeRoure states only 1 per car is needed and lists it at £127, I don't fancy paying that unnecessarily, even less so four time that, or do they come in a set of 4? In the manual they are used during re-installation and replace caps 3&4, they seem to lock the cams in place while the cam pulleys are fitted,…

Rebuilding my engine, due to too low compression values I also wanted to overlook all the bearings, crankshaft etc. As part of the job I dropped all the caps and send the crankshaft out for polishing. Then I stumbled over new conrod bolts. What is the specificity of the thread type used for the bolts? The thread used in the connecting rods is apparently M8 x 1.25mm. A "regular" bolt with this thread goes in by hand and when fully screwed in, you feel some play. This in contrast to the bolts used by Lotus. Judging by the force you have to use when screwing in, they deform (for lock I presume) This is visible on the thread when unsc…

Got my engine apart and in doing so noticed that the bottom of the dipstick is 40 mm below the rim of the sump and the oil baffle is 45mm down. I put 5 litres in the sump and it came upto 40mm ( 5mm above the baffle and just about to run out of the turbo oil connector holes.) If i had more oil in the sump to the max mark on the dipstick the oil oil from the turbos wouldnt drain easily. I'm wondering if my dipstick tube is mounted too high. Anyone got a measurement of their dipstick protrusion ??

This might help those of you attempting to replace the alternator with the engine in place. If I knew what I know now it wouldn’t have taken two hours! These are my personal experiences- I am not saying the only way but worked best for me. There is a gap between the gearbox cables and the sump through which you must push the alternator. Firstly, pulling out the circlip on one of the cables on a bracket connected to the gearbox and then removing both cables from a rubber clip under the engine allows both cables to be pushed more out of the way. Cutting the cable ties around the water hoses at the front of the engine also improves access. Then the best way I foun…

Ok after a fantastic day at Hethel yesterday I want to try and repair the aircon. I have no idea what the problem is although I suspect somewhere around the compressor as it is stained green. Any forum gurus able to point me in the right direction to fix? TIA Chris

Car was running fine, shut off. Back 6 hours later turn key engine only turns over no firing. Told by local garage,(not Lotus guys) belt is broke. Took home loosened both cam covers and verified belts do not move. Belts are not very tight, but on cam gears. Is this an intermediate cam bolt came loose problem? What is the fix procedure? Engine out? or pull heads in car?

So I was having some issues with my starter and while I could push start the car it was just not working. I took that as the start just needed to be rebuilt so I took it in to a shop here that rebuilds them and used it as a chance to replace my coils and do some clean up. I got the starter back, along with some information on what they did all seemed good I put it all back together but now the starter does not even click or try not even a voltage drop the battery just sits steady at 12.5/12.4. It is a new battery and I even put it on the charger for a little while but the fact that I hear the fuel pumps, everything else comes on lead me to believe this is not a battery …

Okay, so I wanted to find Ignition Coils that were easier to purchase in the US as most Esprit parts are harder to get your hands on. The original Esprit V8 Coils are -- A918E6009F I found these Land Rover Coils -- 48675 (2003 Land Rover Discovery 4.6L V8) Visually they are very close, the coil numbers per tower match, the plug orientation is different but the same connector and they visually look the same when next to each other. I got a set to test with as I think one of my coil packs is getting weak, but sadly the car doesn't run with them and I have confirmed I got the plug wires connected c…

So I am going over a few things after installing a new set of Factory Coils and it seems that although I have confirmed the plug wires are in the right spot I either have a bad fuse or relay possibly although I wouldn't expect a relay to be used... Or the connectors are on the wrong coil packs but as they both look the same I am not 100% sure if that is possible but thankfully it's easy to switch them. The only other thing I can think of is that the connectors/wiring has an issue as well it is older wiring and that happens. I kinda want to see if anyone makes an aftermarket updated harnesses we can buy that allow us to address this but I guess we will address that …

So tonight I finished a tune up and of course one plug wire had to come apart and I had to redo it. I figured since I was planning to pull the intake manifold and redo all the vacuum lines and remove all the EGR Crap that this would be a good time to get quality Coils and Plug Wires. I started looking and I found that PNM doesn't seem to carry plug wires, haven't checked the others but I looked up MSD and Magnacore and found nothing. Are there no Aftermarket options at all? I would really like to just do this job once and while stock is fine most of the time usually I upgraded plug wires... granted it's been years since I had a car that actually used them instead of …