DrieStone

So weird to see an old post and realize I was the thread starter! I had totally forgotten about this. I wouldn't be surprised if Lotus used whatever was available to them. I've heard of stories of both MG and even Jeep switching parts but using all the old parts first so you'll end up with cars of the same model year and trim, but with different parts.

You're talking about the gauge panels? They are in three parts and the side pieces aren't flat. I can take some dimensions, but it's probably more work than you're thinking.

Agreed. They aren't going to prevent someone from stealing your wheels if they're so inclined. If your car is somewhere that someone could jack the car up to steal your wheels, it will take them an extra couple minutes per wheel if there are locks on them. Not to mention, 80s Esprit wheels don't have a super standard bolt pattern, so the wheels (especially if you have the stock 15 inch wheels), don't have much value outside of Esprit owners (bolt pattern matches the late 90s BMW 5 series, but the center bore will be too small).

There's a reason my car has sat in my garage for a good 15 years! Every time I work on it, I run into a roadblock. This time I'm not going to let it stop me. I know for a fact that as soon as I think I have everything sorted, it's going to throw more at me. I'm just disappointed in myself for discarding a part before I was 100% sure the problem had been fixed. Now comes the arduous task of setting timing, synching carbs, tuning carbs. Even then, my plan is to just get it on the road, then find someone who can properly tune the car.

My solve was to build an extension that fits over the existing linkage. I just finished it up tonight, and everything seems to work as expected. I'll need to test further, but I'm pretty happy with the result. I just don't like that it turned a 2 hour project into an 8 hour project.

I reached out to JAE, and they said as much. I didn't realize this, and I've discarded the original. I guess I'll be doing some fabrication!

I took a good long look at things again today, and it looks like there's about 2 1/2 inches that I need to come up with. FYI. I bought the master cylinder form JAE in the US many years ago. It appeared to be a direct replacement. I'm scratching my head on this. I'm also pretty damn frustrated.

This is the clutch. You can see in my pic that the pedal is all the way on the floor, I have maybe 4-5 exposed threads on the adjustment, but I would obviously need a lot more than that. There's no way that the linkage will mate up with the pedal. I can press down on the linkage and it seems to have good feedback (and it bounces back), so I think the cylinder is functioning as designed. I'm 90% that I adjusted the linkage to be the same distance out on the new assembly. It seems wild that I wouldn't have noticed that the fork is a good inch shorter (but it's possible). I'd rather not do it, but my "B" plan would be to modify the fork (cut and weld) to make it work, but I fear that I'm just missing something here.

I'm buttoning up things from my Esprit being down for more than a decade. There are a few plugs around the engine bay that don't seem to go to anything that I can tell. Can anyone give me a hint as to what these might be? This is an '83 Turbo Esprit USA. \ This is on a bundle of wires on the right side of the engine. There is a double bullet and a single bullet connector. Part of the same bundle with the connector that went over to the diverter valve. ' This is a long wire that looks more blue than green. It's on the left side over the fuel tank. My guess is it's probably a ground, but I don't know where it might go. Also on the left side above the fuel tank. Two bullet connectors, and that double spade connector. I've poured though the wiring diagrams, and I honestly have no clue what these could be for (or if I should be concerned about them.

I swapped my master cylinder a few months ago, but due to other tasks, I didn't reconnect the pedal at the time. Tonight I attempted to reconnect the pedal to the linkage, but it seems too short. Even with the pedal at the floor, I couldn't line the hole in the linkage up. There is some adjustment left, but even if I maxed out the adjustment I'd still be really short. I'll admit I tossed the old cylinder a while ago, but I did do a side by side comparison and didn't notice a significant difference. I feel like I'm missing something here. I'm regretting tossing the old unit, because at least I could see if the connecting bits were different. I did try pulling on the linkage, but it doesn't seem to want to come any further back.

I guess I'm happy I have a turbo then! Good to know!

Interesting, I just pulled both tanks with the engine in place. Had to remove seatbelts and the mounts for the struts for the hatch, but got them both out and refurbed and back into the car. It's certainly a tight fit that took some wiggling. The right side is the worst for sure. I wonder if there are some differences between Domestic and Federal (US) cars that mean that it's possible on US cars but not UK cars?

Good post, I'm getting close to needing to tune my carbs, and it's the only thing that worries me because there's so much black magic. I'm pretty sure I have a flow meter with 4 indicators and color tune somewhere

I discovered this is only on the Federal car, which makes me feel a lot better. I'm going to disable it, since it was obviously only for US emissions. Other changes (for anyone reading this thread in the future), I'm going to make: The vacuum pump line only supplies vacuum to the HVAC line and the brakes. I'll be removing the internals of the intake flap The ignition solenoid has been removed Instead of a vacuum line going from the top of the distributor to the ignition solenoid, it will go to the back of the front carb. This removes the flap valve portion of the vacuum circuit. It also removes the vacuum advance on the distributor when it's cold and the choke is on. The previous owner of my car didn't have any vacuum lines on the distributor, my guess is that the pressure differential under boost dials in some timing.

No, it's the valve right after the turbo in the air diffuser.