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scoule

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  • Name
    Steve Coule
  • Car
    Esprit Sport 350, TVR Griffith 500, Excel SE

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  1. #43 has a new owner in Germany.
  2. The belt is only about a year old ... when I change it again I'm planning on a new bottom pulley and tensioner etc. ... Just not right now - I need the car to be mobile again before the MOT runs out at the end of the month! Hants34 ... Unfortunately, I don't think NA will make any difference to the water pump! The front of that engine looks the same as my NA excel (with only a couple of minor differences - one being, that one doesn't have 154,000 miles worth of accumulated muck all over it!).
  3. From that pic, it looks like it can be done with the cam-belt in place... Can anyone confirm that? It's been a long time since I re-sealed my pump to the block! My Excel has just had the same problem sudden water pump problem ... it was fine running on tickover for 20 mins .. drove 7 miles, 82 degrees, all fine, 200 yards before getting to halfords it gets worried about crap parts or furry dice and dumps its coolant ... Would be an easier job if the PAS pump wasn't bolted to the water pump!!
  4. It could be wear on the shims where they meet the valve tip, wear at that point would increase clearances. You can measure that with a mic, and possibly just flip the shims over!
  5. Half an amp sounds like quite a lot since the ECU isn't doing anything when switched off (keeping the trim settings etc in a low power static RAM should be negligable). Half an amp is more than leaving one sidelight bulb on. I would've expected less than 100ma for the whole car but that's not based on any measurements at this time of night! I can check mine tomorrow. Is he absolutely sure that it's the ECU?
  6. Yep, I got the capsules today. I missed the courier yesterday and had to wait for redelivery today. They look so much better than the originals. I've already dismantled them to align the output shafts to match the original. I was too scared to twist the shaft in case it was attached to the diaphragm. Hmm .. thanks for the tip dave, I'll take a look at my vac pump... judging by the way it seems to "breathe" as it pumps, mine might well be the type that can be reversed! I'm also wondering if the fact that one of my capsules was effectively an open vent to the manifold vac line would be causing the lumpy tickover I currently have - but only at the slowest tickover speed (around 850). It's smooth at higher engine speeds and pulls fine with no misfire. Plugs have been replaced, leads checked etc .. fingers crossed the capsules will fix it too!
  7. I can't seem to find a pressure pump (in between working!). I was looking for hand pumps, but pressure pumps seem much rarer than vac pumps. I've noticed that some vac pumps also have a positive pressure outlet even if the gauge is vac only .. unfortunately my vac pump doesn't! Something like the lumbar support pumps for seats might work with a gauge added, although I'm not sure if they'd make it to the 0.35-0.4 bar range! Any ingenious solutions or cheap sources of pressure pumps?!
  8. After much arguing with the warranty company, I managed to convince them to pay for a pair of alloy wastegate capsules from PNM to replace the originals ... this probably was more related to the fact that a pair was cheaper than a single unit from Lotus combined with Lotus dealer fitting charges. Getting anything out of the squirming b*****s has to be considered a success though :-) Now I just need to set them up .. I understand how to measure the movement with dial gauge etc, I'm just wondering how people generate and measure 5psi accurately to set them up? I do have a hand vacuum pump, but I don't think it has a pressure side outlet that I can hook into .. Half of the pump searches I try on ebay seem to end up with and array of devices designed to increase manhood size!!!
  9. If you're using these on standard bells, you may need a 1.5-2.0mm washer to move the caliper outboard (ie, towards the wheel face). The original AP rotors (on my car at least) were stepped a little on their mounting face and the PNM discs weren't. This meant the PNM disc was touching the inner edge of the caliper. Also, since the PNM discs are 30mm thick instead of 32mm, the 1.5/2.0mm washer centres the disc nicely in the caliper, otherwise the 2mm extra gap is all on one side. I did speak to PNM and they said that this stepping (original machined, not wear) was not on all discs as far as they were aware. Perhaps this is why lotus always shipped bells & discs as a unit. Apart from that niggle at install time, the discs work fine!
  10. I wonder if some of the confusion is about where these pressures are acting .. Am I right to suggest that the 0.4 bar is the pressure applied to the capsule diaphragm needed to open the wastegate, whereas the target 0.8-1.0 bar is the pressure in the turbo acting on the wastage valve? The ECU will bleed pressure away from the wastegate capsule preventing it opening until the desired boost level is reached - but in order for this to work, the valve must stay shut with up to 0.8-1.0 bar inside the turbo, otherwise, regardless of what the ECU is requesting, the valve is forced open by pressure in the turbo. So, we need a capsule that can open the wastage with 0.4 bar applied to it for "safety", but will hold the wastgate shut with 0.8-1.0 bar inside the turbo .... correct? Do I get a free chip? ;-)
  11. I'm a bit lost here - I thought the standard ECU / boost controller would bleed away pressure when it wants to allow more boost than the static capsule setting - so that the capsule stays shut. Conversely, under conditions when the ECU wants to limit boost, it would not bleed pressure from the capsule feed and the capsule is then effectively receiving full engine boost levels and will open at its "static" setting. Or does the ECU boost controller always bleed off a percentage of boost?!
  12. Check your bottom pulley carefully ... I *very* nearly had the same problem as you on my Excel but I noticed that 7 teeth were missing / chewed in a row on my belt. I heard a (fairly quiet) whooshing noise, stopped the engine and turned it over by hand to check it out. I nearly died of shock when I saw the missing teeth. The cam & aux pulleys were all ok, as was the tensioner bearing. The car was in regular use, 3000 miles a month at the time. The belt was only 3000 miles old (1 month!), and was correctly tensioned.
  13. The 912 NA engine in my Excel SE has now reached 149,000 miles with nothing other than routine maintenance and re-sealing the water pump to the block when the original sealant started to fail (no gasket on later cars). It's pretty similar to an S3 engine except for the Nikasil liners and Mahle pistons in my Excel so with careful maintence I don't think mileage is an issue. I've used mobil 1 15w/50, 5w/50 or castrol RS 10w60 for the last 100,000 miles - I always allow it to warm up gently, no thrashing until the water AND oil are warm. It's done a few track days in its time, including Castle Combe last year with around 138k on the clock! It still pulls strongly to 7k, no visible smoke ... oh, and a compression test last week revealed all between 210 and 220psi :-)
  14. Are you sure it was the cat at fault? My car failed emissions simply because the joints between the standard cats and the exhaust box were loose and not airtight. The dealer removed the exhaust box and used some snazzy F1 (they claimed) sealant on the cat->pipe joints and refitted the clamps, it then sailed through!
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