S1.... RElise some summer tips!!
Discussion
As this is my first summer with the Elise (and by reading the lounge daily) i'm not the only one... could the experienced 'old timers' ;-) give some tips for summer use, ie - any need to keep the heater on to keep the engine cool in traffic (old trick with fords!), will she need topping up with water regularly? is their a 'practiced' way of putting the roof in the boot - asumeing it fits!?! Is a shower cap a must?....blah blah blah...
Thanks for any advice...
Thanks for any advice...
I used to find the same problems on my Mk2 RS 2000s, boiling hot with windows down to stop the engine temp climbing. Shouldn't have a problem in traffic, you will see the temperature climb initially since the fan cuts in about 102 Deg C IIRC; I was a little concerned when I first encountered this sat in a huge jam on the M6 on a baking hot day last year. Best cure, off at next exit and B road blast.
As for the roof I pop the cross pieces forward to de-tension the roof, release the camlocks with the allen key, fold the 'ears' forwards and tuck into the elastic loops, fold forward again, undo the presstuds from the cant rail, release the front edge from the lip upto the seam and fold the edge of the roof with flap towards the centre (roughly along the line of the seam), repeat for other side opening the boot on the way. You can now fold the roof forwards into thirds (it will rest on the cross bars) and slide the remainder of the header from the lip; this neat parcel will fit neatly into the boot or into the bag if you can be bothered. Sounds like a faf but the routine works well and is remarkably quick. Remove cross pieces and push one inside the other; I find the best way to fit these in the boot is tabs facing front feed one end into the rear right upper portion of boot, it should go far enough into the corner to allow the left end into the aperture before the pair are stowed against the forward upper edge of the boot (just below the stay) with the tabs either side of the engine bay. Cant rails are placed carefully in deepest part of boot forward of roof, there is a little well which should stop them departing through the clam during spirited cornering.
Wow, wish I hadn't started that paragraph, easier to do than to explain.
Bought a shower cape at the start of the year (off Davey S2 as it happens), great piece of kit, on and off quickly, not only do they keep water out but also bird droppings and general muck and has thus far survived helicopter downwash as well.
Above all, if it isn't raining or about to rain the roof should be at home or in the boot, it only keeps the noise in!!
You just need to be aware that if it has rained hard since you last drove the car they store a significant amount on the radiator that becomes a fountain at about 60 MPH.
>> Edited by turnamere on Tuesday 28th March 18:02
As for the roof I pop the cross pieces forward to de-tension the roof, release the camlocks with the allen key, fold the 'ears' forwards and tuck into the elastic loops, fold forward again, undo the presstuds from the cant rail, release the front edge from the lip upto the seam and fold the edge of the roof with flap towards the centre (roughly along the line of the seam), repeat for other side opening the boot on the way. You can now fold the roof forwards into thirds (it will rest on the cross bars) and slide the remainder of the header from the lip; this neat parcel will fit neatly into the boot or into the bag if you can be bothered. Sounds like a faf but the routine works well and is remarkably quick. Remove cross pieces and push one inside the other; I find the best way to fit these in the boot is tabs facing front feed one end into the rear right upper portion of boot, it should go far enough into the corner to allow the left end into the aperture before the pair are stowed against the forward upper edge of the boot (just below the stay) with the tabs either side of the engine bay. Cant rails are placed carefully in deepest part of boot forward of roof, there is a little well which should stop them departing through the clam during spirited cornering.
Wow, wish I hadn't started that paragraph, easier to do than to explain.
Bought a shower cape at the start of the year (off Davey S2 as it happens), great piece of kit, on and off quickly, not only do they keep water out but also bird droppings and general muck and has thus far survived helicopter downwash as well.
Above all, if it isn't raining or about to rain the roof should be at home or in the boot, it only keeps the noise in!!
You just need to be aware that if it has rained hard since you last drove the car they store a significant amount on the radiator that becomes a fountain at about 60 MPH.
>> Edited by turnamere on Tuesday 28th March 18:02
Don't the cross peices locate in a recess behind the seats, with the roof folded carefully and then placed behind the seats with the cant rails tucked into the folds?? That's how they showed me to do it when I bought the thing, there's precious little room in the boot as it is!
Agree on the fan, it is a little concerning when you see it head north of 100Deg and then start flashing. Soon down to a reasonable 90 though. (Did it for the first time in a big jam outside Rouen for last year's LM. Thought I was coming back on a lorry.
Agree on the fan, it is a little concerning when you see it head north of 100Deg and then start flashing. Soon down to a reasonable 90 though. (Did it for the first time in a big jam outside Rouen for last year's LM. Thought I was coming back on a lorry.
reubsta said:
As this is my first summer with the Elise (and by reading the lounge daily) i'm not the only one... could the experienced 'old timers' ;-)
Oi cheeky
reubsta said:
any need to keep the heater on to keep the engine cool in traffic (old trick with fords!)
Can be done but shouldn't neet to. As above the fan should kick in and bring things back into order pretty quick. One tip I've found is if you're stuck in a jam, don't sit right up the arse of the car/van/truck in front and let it ram hot exhaust fumes into the vents which feed air onto the rad. Leave a good few feet to prevent that. You'll be surprised how quickly it'll heat up if you don't!
Other tips noted above are completely right also.
reubsta said:
will she need topping up with water regularly?
Shouldn't need to be unless you've a leak in the system. Check the level when it's cold (will prob sit just below min), and then when it's hot (mark off if you feel happy doing so, so you can remember where it sits). Then top up to min line when cold again, drive around until up to temp, then check the level. If there's too much in there, it'll eject what it doesn't need.
reubsta said:
is their a 'practiced' way of putting the roof in the boot - asumeing it fits!?!
Sure it fits in the boot.
I do the following:
* release the cams to take the tension out of the roof
* unclip at the back and along the cant rails
* remove the roof and lay flat on the deck outer side on the floor
* fold the flaps with the cam's on, up and tuck inside the elastic
* then fold the flaps which clip round the cant rails, intowards the centre along the seam.
* then roll-up from the bottom edge towards the plastic front edge, in folds the same size as the sections which enclose the cams - roughly 3 or 4 folds IIRC
This will tuck nicely into the boot, or behind the seats.
The roof tensioners will go either in the boot as described above, or behind the seats also if you want the boot space. The cant rails can be stowed in the folded roof to prevent them moving around.
reubsta said:
Is a shower cap a must?
Thanks for any advice...
Not a 'must' but very useful. Means you can leave the roof off while you're out at a meet, or having a pub lunch say, and not have to put the full roof on. Also useful to put over the roof to keep the car super-dry in downpours. Get one second hand if you can an save a few quid.
Over the last 18 months I've discovered that the roof will fit in the boot, carefully behind the net behind the seats or, if you're a short @rse like me you can also stow the roof and cant rails in their bag behind the drivers seat - just. The boot is the easiest but the other options are available if you need the room in the boot and there is always the last resort of on your passenger!
It's a sealed pressurised cooling system, so it shouldn't need topping up any more than any other modern car (ie. virtually never) if it is in good order. If it does lose coolant, find out why immediately. There isn't a lot of spare capacity in the system, so it is easy to cook the engine if the level drops. Common causes are a loose hose connection at the radiator, leaking inlet manifold gaskets or blowing head gaskets.
Shouldn't overheat at all in the UK, unless your rad fan has failed. They are prone to failure, though, because rainwater runs down though the horizontal rad and finds its way onto the fan motor, which seizes. I check mine regularly by removing the relay and bridging the switched terminals with a bit of wire; the fan should spin up smoothly and rapidly and slow down smoothly and gradually when you remove the current.
Hood fits fine in the boot. Early cars carried the hood bows stored behind the seats (there were holes at either side for the locating pegs to snap into), later cars had a slightly different boot box which allows the hood bows to be stored in the boot too (toward the back, counter-intuitively - you'd expect the boot box to get narrower toward the rear, but in fact there are 'pockets' to either side which increase the width). In either case, the hood and cant rails will fit in the boot just fine.
Shower cap is very useful indeed - I'd say that it borders on the essential. Mine even lives in the garage with the shower cap on, to keep dust and spiders out of the cockpit (single garage, so I can't climb in and out easily with the hood on).
If you are still running the dreaded 'red clutch hose', you might want to get it changed, though. It gets soft when hot, which prevents the clutch being disengaged and so prevents gear selection. Known fault, the cure for which is to fit a braided steel hose.
>> Edited by Sam_68 on Tuesday 28th March 20:59
Shouldn't overheat at all in the UK, unless your rad fan has failed. They are prone to failure, though, because rainwater runs down though the horizontal rad and finds its way onto the fan motor, which seizes. I check mine regularly by removing the relay and bridging the switched terminals with a bit of wire; the fan should spin up smoothly and rapidly and slow down smoothly and gradually when you remove the current.
Hood fits fine in the boot. Early cars carried the hood bows stored behind the seats (there were holes at either side for the locating pegs to snap into), later cars had a slightly different boot box which allows the hood bows to be stored in the boot too (toward the back, counter-intuitively - you'd expect the boot box to get narrower toward the rear, but in fact there are 'pockets' to either side which increase the width). In either case, the hood and cant rails will fit in the boot just fine.
Shower cap is very useful indeed - I'd say that it borders on the essential. Mine even lives in the garage with the shower cap on, to keep dust and spiders out of the cockpit (single garage, so I can't climb in and out easily with the hood on).
If you are still running the dreaded 'red clutch hose', you might want to get it changed, though. It gets soft when hot, which prevents the clutch being disengaged and so prevents gear selection. Known fault, the cure for which is to fit a braided steel hose.
>> Edited by Sam_68 on Tuesday 28th March 20:59
turnamere said:
...You can now fold the roof forwards into thirds (it will rest on the cross bars)...
Again, I think that this depends on the age of the car. On later cars, the plastic lip that engages with the windscreen header rail has splits which allow the sides to be folded in on themselves as described, before it is rolled up.
Unless my memory is playing tricks on me, early cars (certainly my first Elise - a '97 S1 model) had a continuous plastic lip that couldn't be folded, so you just had to roll the hood backward towards the tails (better done off the car, to avoid scratches).
edited to add:
Doh!! Ignore me...just checked your profile and I see you have a late model? Turnamere's advice should be spot-on!
>> Edited by Sam_68 on Tuesday 28th March 20:57
[quote=garydvo]If it rains with no roof on once over 55 MPH most goes over the head, when you stop in the rain its like a bucket of water being chucked over you.
quote]
And if you're on the motorway and a sudden hail storm starts, get ready to explain some interesting red marks on your forehead.
quote]
And if you're on the motorway and a sudden hail storm starts, get ready to explain some interesting red marks on your forehead.
BalhamLotus said:
[quote=garydvo]If it rains with no roof on once over 55 MPH most goes over the head, when you stop in the rain its like a bucket of water being chucked over you.
quote]
And if you're on the motorway and a sudden hail storm starts, get ready to explain some interesting red marks on your forehead.
Or keep it above 70 and you should be fine... just hope you don't have to stop or slow down, it gets painful after that. Keeping some ski goggles in the car mightn't be a bad idea
trevorh said:
Nanny says - Don't forget the sunscreen - it's surprisingly easy to get burnt.
Or a suitable baseball hat, but don't ever wear it with the roof on
It also gets pretty hot in the cabin on a nice day in stationary traffic, largely because non of the vents can be directed onto you, nearly got heat stroke last summer in a traffic jam.
S Works said:
[quote=garydvo]If it rains with no roof on once over 55 MPH most goes over the head, when you stop in the rain its like a bucket of water being chucked over you.
quote]
And if you're on the motorway and a sudden hail storm starts, get ready to explain some interesting red marks on your forehead.
Or keep it above 70 and you should be fine... just hope you don't have to stop or slow down, it gets painful after that. Keeping some ski goggles in the car mightn't be a bad idea
Above 70 in a hail storm????? Balls of steel mate!!!!!!
Mark Benson said:
I check mine regularly by removing the relay and bridging the switched terminals with a bit of wire; the fan should spin up smoothly and rapidly and slow down smoothly and gradually when you remove the current.
Where do I find the relay to do this?
On the relay/fuse block on the passenger side wing in the front compartment. There is a diagram in the the owner's handbook that shows you which relay and fuse does what. Page 76 in mine, and it shows the cooling fan relay as being second from front.
Turnamere's comment about the baseball cap is valid, too. I don't like the things, so personally I'd use suncream for the sunburn problem, but since the Elise has no sun visors they are useful in to prevent yourself being blinded, sometimes!
BalhamLotus said:
[quote=garydvo]If it rains with no roof on once over 55 MPH most goes over the head, when you stop in the rain its like a bucket of water being chucked over you.
quote]
And if you're on the motorway and a sudden hail storm starts, get ready to explain some interesting red marks on your forehead.
Or keep it above 70 and you should be fine... just hope you don't have to stop or slow down, it gets painful after that. Keeping some ski goggles in the car mightn't be a bad idea
Above 70 in a hail storm????? Balls of steel mate!!!!!!
Sh*t for brains I think is more appropriate. Suffice to say you only need to try it once
As for the baseball caps, I wear 'em all the time in summer. They are my sun visor/head protector.
No chav tat though, only good driving related ones, like my SELOC one and my Goodwood FoS one 
some great advice, hope some of the other newbies appreciate it too... 
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