Elise SC owners please read this

[Happy Dave]

Anybody out there who has recently taken delivery of, or has ordered an elise SC; please read on...

<snip>

As this matter is now sub judice i have been advised to remove this post.


Dave

Edited by Happy Dave on Monday 28th April 00:03

[kevin ritson]

That's not nice to experience...

Do you know if the SC uses a different 'stat to the other 'yota cars? Don't want to cause panic (although if I had a new S, R or Exige I'd be thinking of giving the dealer a bell just to make sure) but I wonder if they use one that opens at a lower temp to compensate for increased inlet air temps?

[midas029]

that doesn`t sound good

[Fidgits]

wow...

On my 111R I notice sometimes if i press on the temperature can drop even after its warmed up.. though i dont think it is the same problem?

[Gallandro]

I dont understand

why dosnt the ECU get info from the real engine temperature?

the stat only measures the water temperature.

i have a 74 degree stat so when pressing on have no temperature reading at all.

just seems weird

[purpleperil]

Gallandro said:

I dont understand

why dosnt the ECU get info from the real engine temperature?

the stat only measures the water temperature.

i have a 74 degree stat so when pressing on have no temperature reading at all.

just seems weird

I think the ecu will be using the same feedback 'channel' as it does to display the engine temeprature on the stack. I must admit when the other SC (lady) owner posted on here or Seloc that her temps were dropping into the 70's I thought it was a bit odd! My (albeit not Lotus fitted) SC does not drop much below 90 even when 'making good progress' on a cold day

[Happy Dave]

kevin ritson said:

That's not nice to experience...

Do you know if the SC uses a different 'stat to the other 'yota cars? Don't want to cause panic (although if I had a new S, R or Exige I'd be thinking of giving the dealer a bell just to make sure) but I wonder if they use one that opens at a lower temp to compensate for increased inlet air temps?

I don't know what rated stat came out, (it was done under cover of darkness!...) but the one that has now replaced it is 82 degrees.
I don't know if the cutting out problem would affect the S because I am not sure if it has two rev limits. ( ??? )

[Happy Dave]

Fidgits said:

wow...

On my 111R I notice sometimes if i press on the temperature can drop even after its warmed up.. though i dont think it is the same problem?

I've had 3 'R' s - they've all dropped to about 84 or 85 when you first give them some beans, especially when there is a low ambient temperature. They've also all recovered pretty quickly to 89 or higher immediately afterwards.

[RobM77]

As an interesting comparison, my Elise 111S (K series), rises to 86 degrees after about 7 or 8 minutes of driving. It then stays there resolutely, whether I'm toddling along at 40mph in traffic or driving round the Nurburgring. It rises once I come to a halt, but as soon as we're moving again it locks back onto 86.

By the way, I wish Lotus would design their dashes so I could actually see the temperature gauge without leaning forward! It's hidden under the steering column cowling. Does anyone else find that?

[Happy Dave]

Gallandro said:

I dont understand

why dosnt the ECU get info from the real engine temperature?

the stat only measures the water temperature.

i have a 74 degree stat so when pressing on have no temperature reading at all.

just seems weird

<snip>

As this matter is now sub judice i have been advised to remove this post.


Dave

Edited by Happy Dave on Monday 28th April 00:07

[Gooby]

This is an old problem. Early generation 111R's have (had) this problem. I am suffering the same problem at the moment and a diligent member of the work shop staff found it refered to (fix and all) in a Lotus technical bulletin. Funnily enough, untill that point lotus were denying all knowledge of the fault.

We had tried it all to solve the problem even to the point of a new ECU...

[Happy Dave]

purpleperil said:

I think the ecu will be using the same feedback 'channel' as it does to display the engine temeprature on the stack. I must admit when the other SC (lady) owner posted on here or Seloc that her temps were dropping into the 70's I thought it was a bit odd! My (albeit not Lotus fitted) SC does not drop much below 90 even when 'making good progress' on a cold day

<snip>

As this matter is now sub judice i have been advised to remove this post.


Dave

Edited by Happy Dave on Monday 28th April 00:08

[Happy Dave]

Gooby said:

This is an old problem. Early generation 111R's have (had) this problem. I am suffering the same problem at the moment and a diligent member of the work shop staff found it refered to (fix and all) in a Lotus technical bulletin. Funnily enough, untill that point lotus were denying all knowledge of the fault.

We had tried it all to solve the problem even to the point of a new ECU...

<snip>

As this matter is now sub judice i have been advised to remove this post.


Dave

Edited by Happy Dave on Monday 28th April 00:05

[Fidgits]

Happy Dave said:

Fidgits said:

wow...

On my 111R I notice sometimes if i press on the temperature can drop even after its warmed up.. though i dont think it is the same problem?

I've had 3 'R' s - they've all dropped to about 84 or 85 when you first give them some beans, especially when there is a low ambient temperature. They've also all recovered pretty quickly to 89 or higher immediately afterwards.

okay, i'll keep an eye on it - if it drops below 80 though I might have words with the garage..

[Craig!]

My Exige S gets up to the 86 mark then starts to drop down to 76/77/78 depending on the speed I'm traveling at... I thought it was normal just because of the higher flow of air through the radiator. Is this normal? Or should they get to 86 and stay there??

When I can next drive the car I'll monitor it closely, but I do know the temp does vary some what never seen it stay at a fixed temp like some of my previous car's (all german).

The car's an August 2007 build.

[RobM77]

Craig! said:

My Exige S gets up to the 86 mark then starts to drop down to 76/77/78 depending on the speed I'm traveling at... I thought it was normal just because of the higher flow of air through the radiator. Is this normal? Or should they get to 86 and stay there??

When I can next drive the car I'll monitor it closely, but I do know the temp does vary some what never seen it stay at a fixed temp like some of my previous car's (all german).

The car's an August 2007 build.

I'd like to know the mechanical reason behind this, as from what I've read on this thread it seems normal behaviour for an s/c Toyota engine. My Elise reads 86 degrees regardless of whether I'm doing 30mph through town, 80mph down the motorway or 135mph on an Autobahn (on the rare occasions I've done that!).

[Happy Dave]

Craig! said:

My Exige S gets up to the 86 mark then starts to drop down to 76/77/78 depending on the speed I'm traveling at... I thought it was normal just because of the higher flow of air through the radiator. Is this normal? Or should they get to 86 and stay there??

When I can next drive the car I'll monitor it closely, but I do know the temp does vary some what never seen it stay at a fixed temp like some of my previous car's (all german).

The car's an August 2007 build.

The thing is, until last week I hadn't really paid a great deal of attention to the temperature at all, certainly not with it dropping low! as soon as you're on the 2nd cam (particularly in a S/C car) the last thing to be doing is reading the bloody temperature readout. 76/77/78 seems a tad low to me.

[kambites]

Happy Dave said:

I guess you have a K-series car? On K series there is only one rev limit, and from memory, 2 temp senders on an S1 and one working temp sender on an S2 (and one placebo one!) On the S1 one feeds the stack display, and one feeds the ECU - on the S2 the same working sender feeds ECU and stack.
Apparently the Toyota engine takes the actual engine temperature to be whatever the water temp. sender says it is. Temp. sender feeds ECU feeds the driver display. If the stat doesn't close properly and the ambient temperature is low enough, it would appear there is a window of opportunity in which the ECU thinks the engine is cold, and will apply the lower rev limit to the engine.

I don't know about the other models, but the S2 111S has two rev limits. It holds you to about 4500rpm or something until the coolant reaches 80 degrees or there abouts and then raises it to about 7500.

[RobM77]

kambites said:

Happy Dave said:

I guess you have a K-series car? On K series there is only one rev limit, and from memory, 2 temp senders on an S1 and one working temp sender on an S2 (and one placebo one!) On the S1 one feeds the stack display, and one feeds the ECU - on the S2 the same working sender feeds ECU and stack.
Apparently the Toyota engine takes the actual engine temperature to be whatever the water temp. sender says it is. Temp. sender feeds ECU feeds the driver display. If the stat doesn't close properly and the ambient temperature is low enough, it would appear there is a window of opportunity in which the ECU thinks the engine is cold, and will apply the lower rev limit to the engine.

I don't know about the other models, but the S2 111S has two rev limits. It holds you to about 4500rpm or something until the coolant reaches 80 degrees or there abouts and then raises it to about 7500.

I'm pleased to say I never even knew that I keep it between 2-3k rpm on a light throttle until it reads 86, then wait for the oil to warm up before I give it full beans.

[Craig!]

Happy Dave said:

The thing is, until last week I hadn't really paid a great deal of attention to the temperature at all, certainly not with it dropping low! as soon as you're on the 2nd cam (particularly in a S/C car) the last thing to be doing is reading the bloody temperature readout. 76/77/78 seems a tad low to me.

Hmm... it's not as if the car has just come out at that either its after half an hour of rather sprinted driving. When I next take it out I'll monitor it.