Back in a Lotus - 2006 Exige S
Discussion
Cheers chaps. It's worth just adding a note about the switch pack module that I got repaired. I wasn't convinced that it was broken initially so I'd messaged Jon Seal (who sold me the car) asking if he had any known good working spares knocking about for me to test. He didn't, but he did recommend the chap who did the repair AND covered the cost of it as a warranty item which was a really nice surprise. You read so many horror stories about used car warranties on PH nowadays I just don't really expect anything from them.
I did indeed pick up the sump on Friday so that allowed me to get covered in oil (a few times) over the weekend.
The engineering shop had drilled a 1/8npt thread into a blanking bung that the sump came with which made for a nice fit for my oil temperature probe. I wound this in with some teflon tape and made sure the sump was properly cleaned out.
I idled the car for a bit while I tinkered about to get some oil temp up, then dropped the old stuff... which wasn't very old at all.
Pictures are few and far between now because I ran out of gloves and my hands were a complete mess, but after dropping the oil I had 12 bolts and 3 nuts to undo on the current sump. The 3 nuts were on studs in the block which needed extracting before the new sump could go on. The new sump has a thicker flange so came with longer bolts (15x) for all fixings.
Once the studs came off it was the painstaking process to clean the oem gasketmaker from the block. This engine/sump combo didn't come with a real gasket from the factory so you need to sort out your own messy version with a liquid gasket. Cleaning it off took ages, but once done I wiped everything down with a degreaser.
Once cleaned I put a bead of loctite stuff round the new sump and then shuffled into position. Putting it into position without the 3 studs to guide it on was a bit of a pain in the ass but I managed to get it on with minimal smearing of the bead and got a couple of bolts in hand tight. I did find that a couple of the bolt holes didn't quite line up - off by maybe 1-2mm but with a bit of adjustment I managed to get all 15 in without drilling or enlarging any holes. The torque spec for these is way under the minimal threshold for my torque wrench so I winged it. Hopefully it's fine
Pictures are a bit out of sequence as you can see the installed oil pressure sensor in the background there, but that came next.
The factory oil pressure switch is fitted just above the oil filter housing and in all the pictures looks dead easy to access - but as my car has the twin front oil coolers, it's totally blocked off by the pipework so I had no chance of getting a spanner onto it. A trip to Halfords later and I had a tool that I hoped would help.
Sure enough the socket went on (just) and with the 3degrees of angle I could get on my ratchet I (very slowly) took it out.
My plan was to replace this with a remote t-piece and then refit it along with a new pressure sensor for the gauge. I did this on my Subaru and much prefer this approach to screwing a t-piece directly into the block as it seems to add a lot of weight and leverage to a cheap 1/8bspt fitting.
All parts teflon taped in, this adaptor is 1/8bspt male (to go into the block), 1/8bspt female for the original switch and then 1/8npt for the new sensor.
Once fitted, I had a P-clip to mount it somewhere but I can't (yet) find anywhere obvious so it's temporarily cabletied to an oil cooler line. This may end up permanent if I don't find anything better, as long as there's no weight/strain on the fittings during engine vibration I'm not too concerned.
Both sensors are now easily accessible and easy to check for leaks.
Final job for the weekend was a boost pressure sensor. I found a nice threaded hole on the rollover bar support to mount the sensor itself which was within a few inches of the pipework on the cold side of the intercooler.
I popped the pipe off and cut some spare 63mm silicone joiner up to make some slightly longer joins. This extra length would accommodate a self sealing nipple attachment:
Once refitted I could connect up to the boost sensor with some vac hose. The sensor came with a cheap inline filter, I had one of these fail on my Subaru but to be fair I was running almost 4x the boost pressure that I expect this car to be... so hopefully it's fine!
I cut up my silicone with a stanley blade that's a little second hand - so I'll whip it all off to tidy it up once I know the setup doesn't leak. If I get any boost leak issues at all like this, I'll just revert to the standard setup and do without a boost gauge - it's not my long term goal anyway once I get a decent gauge fitted.
Once installed, I gave the loctite 24hours to cure and then filled the car with oil, including the extra 1litre capacity. I had a particularly frustrating 45mins as I dropped the dipstick into the engine bay and it totally vanished. I couldn't see it from above or below and spent the full 45mins trying to find it. Eventually I decided to take a wheel and arch liner out for a different perspective to find it sat curled up in the sidepod! Unbelievable how a 2foot pole with a bright yellow handle can vanish like that.
Oh, and I almost forgot - sometime between all that I also changed the gearbox oil.
I still had half a bottle left from my Elise change so I used that to flush it through a bit, then pumped in 2.5 bottles of the new stuff. This stuff stinks, but I'm slowly growing to like it. As with the supercharger/aux belt - this is a service item that I can't find record for, so at least I can tick it off now.
I did a few mins of oil pressure testing last night, unplugged sparkplugs and cranked it a few times to get the pressure light off and checked for leaks. Everything seems dry, so once I get my gauge wiring (hopefully early this week) I can finish off the gauge install and leave the car running for a bit longer to keep an eye on pressures and leaks.
My social media feeds are filling up with people getting early trackdays in... so going to have to get stuck in very soon!
I did indeed pick up the sump on Friday so that allowed me to get covered in oil (a few times) over the weekend.
The engineering shop had drilled a 1/8npt thread into a blanking bung that the sump came with which made for a nice fit for my oil temperature probe. I wound this in with some teflon tape and made sure the sump was properly cleaned out.
I idled the car for a bit while I tinkered about to get some oil temp up, then dropped the old stuff... which wasn't very old at all.
Pictures are few and far between now because I ran out of gloves and my hands were a complete mess, but after dropping the oil I had 12 bolts and 3 nuts to undo on the current sump. The 3 nuts were on studs in the block which needed extracting before the new sump could go on. The new sump has a thicker flange so came with longer bolts (15x) for all fixings.
Once the studs came off it was the painstaking process to clean the oem gasketmaker from the block. This engine/sump combo didn't come with a real gasket from the factory so you need to sort out your own messy version with a liquid gasket. Cleaning it off took ages, but once done I wiped everything down with a degreaser.
Once cleaned I put a bead of loctite stuff round the new sump and then shuffled into position. Putting it into position without the 3 studs to guide it on was a bit of a pain in the ass but I managed to get it on with minimal smearing of the bead and got a couple of bolts in hand tight. I did find that a couple of the bolt holes didn't quite line up - off by maybe 1-2mm but with a bit of adjustment I managed to get all 15 in without drilling or enlarging any holes. The torque spec for these is way under the minimal threshold for my torque wrench so I winged it. Hopefully it's fine
Pictures are a bit out of sequence as you can see the installed oil pressure sensor in the background there, but that came next.
The factory oil pressure switch is fitted just above the oil filter housing and in all the pictures looks dead easy to access - but as my car has the twin front oil coolers, it's totally blocked off by the pipework so I had no chance of getting a spanner onto it. A trip to Halfords later and I had a tool that I hoped would help.
Sure enough the socket went on (just) and with the 3degrees of angle I could get on my ratchet I (very slowly) took it out.
My plan was to replace this with a remote t-piece and then refit it along with a new pressure sensor for the gauge. I did this on my Subaru and much prefer this approach to screwing a t-piece directly into the block as it seems to add a lot of weight and leverage to a cheap 1/8bspt fitting.
All parts teflon taped in, this adaptor is 1/8bspt male (to go into the block), 1/8bspt female for the original switch and then 1/8npt for the new sensor.
Once fitted, I had a P-clip to mount it somewhere but I can't (yet) find anywhere obvious so it's temporarily cabletied to an oil cooler line. This may end up permanent if I don't find anything better, as long as there's no weight/strain on the fittings during engine vibration I'm not too concerned.
Both sensors are now easily accessible and easy to check for leaks.Final job for the weekend was a boost pressure sensor. I found a nice threaded hole on the rollover bar support to mount the sensor itself which was within a few inches of the pipework on the cold side of the intercooler.
I popped the pipe off and cut some spare 63mm silicone joiner up to make some slightly longer joins. This extra length would accommodate a self sealing nipple attachment:
Once refitted I could connect up to the boost sensor with some vac hose. The sensor came with a cheap inline filter, I had one of these fail on my Subaru but to be fair I was running almost 4x the boost pressure that I expect this car to be... so hopefully it's fine!
I cut up my silicone with a stanley blade that's a little second hand - so I'll whip it all off to tidy it up once I know the setup doesn't leak. If I get any boost leak issues at all like this, I'll just revert to the standard setup and do without a boost gauge - it's not my long term goal anyway once I get a decent gauge fitted.
Once installed, I gave the loctite 24hours to cure and then filled the car with oil, including the extra 1litre capacity. I had a particularly frustrating 45mins as I dropped the dipstick into the engine bay and it totally vanished. I couldn't see it from above or below and spent the full 45mins trying to find it. Eventually I decided to take a wheel and arch liner out for a different perspective to find it sat curled up in the sidepod! Unbelievable how a 2foot pole with a bright yellow handle can vanish like that.
Oh, and I almost forgot - sometime between all that I also changed the gearbox oil.
I still had half a bottle left from my Elise change so I used that to flush it through a bit, then pumped in 2.5 bottles of the new stuff. This stuff stinks, but I'm slowly growing to like it. As with the supercharger/aux belt - this is a service item that I can't find record for, so at least I can tick it off now.
I did a few mins of oil pressure testing last night, unplugged sparkplugs and cranked it a few times to get the pressure light off and checked for leaks. Everything seems dry, so once I get my gauge wiring (hopefully early this week) I can finish off the gauge install and leave the car running for a bit longer to keep an eye on pressures and leaks.
My social media feeds are filling up with people getting early trackdays in... so going to have to get stuck in very soon!
Fonzey said:
I had the same fitment ZZRs on my Elise but I also had Gaz Mono adjustable dampers, so was able to soften them up nicely.
It's easy to be harsh on the ride of the car right now because I can't really use it properly, they come to life a bit when you're pushing on which the conditions are just no good for! Pending any issues with the OEM suspension i'll leave it alone this summer and get a season of trackdays out of it, then maybe consider something over next winter to give me some adjust-ability.
I must admit with spring arriving rather early thing year the car has come into its own when pressing on but I do still find it rather harsh on bumpy back roads (somewhat crashy). This is of course could be due to the dampers now being over 12 years old and have remained static for a lot of that time. It's easy to be harsh on the ride of the car right now because I can't really use it properly, they come to life a bit when you're pushing on which the conditions are just no good for! Pending any issues with the OEM suspension i'll leave it alone this summer and get a season of trackdays out of it, then maybe consider something over next winter to give me some adjust-ability.
Can only commend your work ethic with the car, can’t see myself undertaking half of the jobs you have completed I find them far too daunting (although a single driveway and garage don’t help). What sump did you go for in the end? All the issues with oil starvation with the 2ZZ are quite concerning but not sure it will be a worthwhile upgrade for me as the car will mainly be used on the road.
Keep up the great work!
The Fonze said:
I must admit with spring arriving rather early thing year the car has come into its own when pressing on but I do still find it rather harsh on bumpy back roads (somewhat crashy). This is of course could be due to the dampers now being over 12 years old and have remained static for a lot of that time.
Can only commend your work ethic with the car, can’t see myself undertaking half of the jobs you have completed I find them far too daunting (although a single driveway and garage don’t help). What sump did you go for in the end? All the issues with oil starvation with the 2ZZ are quite concerning but not sure it will be a worthwhile upgrade for me as the car will mainly be used on the road.
Keep up the great work!
Cheers mate, the first set of gauges I did on my Subaru was a right laugh - didn't even have a driveway, just a single parking space with my number on it. That car spent many a week on axle stands in that parking spot whilst I mucked about and no matter how frustrated I get with car stuff nowadays I think back to those cold/wet Sunday nights desperately trying to put my car back together before work in the morning!Can only commend your work ethic with the car, can’t see myself undertaking half of the jobs you have completed I find them far too daunting (although a single driveway and garage don’t help). What sump did you go for in the end? All the issues with oil starvation with the 2ZZ are quite concerning but not sure it will be a worthwhile upgrade for me as the car will mainly be used on the road.
Keep up the great work!
The 2zz starvation stories scared me with my Elise, regardless that I'll never go fast enough to suffer from oil surge it just isn't worth the risk - and a sump is a cheap measure to take all things considered. I went for the Elise Parts one.
OK update time.
I finished the last update with the fluids changed and all sensors fitted but I was waiting on an auto-electrician to extend the sensor wires so they'd reach the dash.
While I waited I got on with some other odd jobs.
One of my seats had seatbelt rubbing damage which I did a fairly good job of fixing:
At some point in the last few weeks I made a drunk eBay purchase and got some part worn RS4-2 pagid pads for the rear. I've done worse after a few beers on eBay, they have loads of meat left and got them for 25% the cost of a new set. This did leave me needing some fronts though, but a friend and VX220 owner was sitting on some that he was saving for a 2pot rear caliper conversion that he hasn't got round to yet... so I convinced him to sell me those. I now have a matching set of pads front and back! (Car came to me with EBC red up front and Brembo "oem" at the rear, I'm a bit nervous about mismatched pads on track).
Whilst doing the pads, I took the discs off to address something that Track Torque pointed out to me. The insides of my discs were getting very little wear and hence were rusting up badly:
I addressed this with some sandpaper, cleared the holes out and then countersunk the holes a bit to help them clear dust in future. The caliper inside pistons are free as a bird so I'm hoping some more aggressive pads and a good bleed will sort this going forward.
The final midweek job I did was on the driver seat rails, but got no photographs as I did it in a rush at my Grans house (she has a bench vice, I don't). I had a little bit of play in the drivers seat, it would rock slightly if manipulated and there's a documented process of dismantling the rails and squishing them in a vice then rebuilding with grease. I did it, it worked. Yay.
I gave the auto-electrician 8 days, then found he was still waiting on his "supplier" (eBay) for the appropriate wire - so I called him off and decided to sort it myself. Amazon Prime for some 3core 18gauge cable for £12 and was delivered in 10 hours, mental. Sunday I started extending.
Shorts and crocs are NOT suitable clothing for soldering. All was going well until I burned my little finger on the iron, dropped the wire and then instinctively "caught" it with my bare knees whilst the solder was still hot.
I did a tidy job though and got everything extended and insulated fairly quickly, then it was a case of running the wires along the handbrake cable/gear cables through the centre console and into the dash. No pictures here, but I'm sure you can imagine it.
The wires came up behind the head unit through an existing hole, but it wasn't grommet-ed so I could do to bung some sponge in there or something just to stop the wires rubbing.
You can roughly see where the cables go here:
I spent way too long hoovering and cleaning the interior before putting it all back in. Smells lovely in there too after the leather products used on the seat.
Finally I had a working gauge with all sensors connected:
Day time illumination:
Night time:
I've had the car idling on stands for a while, obsessively checking for oil leaks around the new sender but everything seems good.
Last job was to bleed brakes, I put a litre of Mobile DOT4 stuff through it with my eezibleed.
All was going well with loads of air coming out:
I noticed towards the end that way more fluid was going in than coming out... uhoh.
After lowering the front of the car back down, I started getting quite a lot of brake fluid dripping onto the floor. All unions/hoses were dry, no leaks around the calipers this was clearly coming from the reservoir or the booster/master cylinder area under the front clam. I hosed it all down and ran plenty of clean water through to let it dry over night.
Come onto today and the reservoir is still full, pedal has full pressure and everything seems to be fine... I first assumed that the eezibleed had popped a host off somewhere but I can't find any evidence and it seems to hold pressure fine when I hook it back up. The leading (hopeful) theory right now is that the reservoir cap was weeping whilst under pressure and I didn't notice it as it wasn't spraying, it just leaked silently down the side of the reservoir.
I'll take it out for a tentative drive this afternoon and will check again for leaks. If I never update this thread again, it's because I died.
If there is something leaking under there, I really fear it'll be a clam-off job to inspect which I could really do without after all the work I've just finished, car needs to be driven!!
I finished the last update with the fluids changed and all sensors fitted but I was waiting on an auto-electrician to extend the sensor wires so they'd reach the dash.
While I waited I got on with some other odd jobs.
One of my seats had seatbelt rubbing damage which I did a fairly good job of fixing:
At some point in the last few weeks I made a drunk eBay purchase and got some part worn RS4-2 pagid pads for the rear. I've done worse after a few beers on eBay, they have loads of meat left and got them for 25% the cost of a new set. This did leave me needing some fronts though, but a friend and VX220 owner was sitting on some that he was saving for a 2pot rear caliper conversion that he hasn't got round to yet... so I convinced him to sell me those. I now have a matching set of pads front and back! (Car came to me with EBC red up front and Brembo "oem" at the rear, I'm a bit nervous about mismatched pads on track).
Whilst doing the pads, I took the discs off to address something that Track Torque pointed out to me. The insides of my discs were getting very little wear and hence were rusting up badly:
I addressed this with some sandpaper, cleared the holes out and then countersunk the holes a bit to help them clear dust in future. The caliper inside pistons are free as a bird so I'm hoping some more aggressive pads and a good bleed will sort this going forward.
The final midweek job I did was on the driver seat rails, but got no photographs as I did it in a rush at my Grans house (she has a bench vice, I don't). I had a little bit of play in the drivers seat, it would rock slightly if manipulated and there's a documented process of dismantling the rails and squishing them in a vice then rebuilding with grease. I did it, it worked. Yay.
I gave the auto-electrician 8 days, then found he was still waiting on his "supplier" (eBay) for the appropriate wire - so I called him off and decided to sort it myself. Amazon Prime for some 3core 18gauge cable for £12 and was delivered in 10 hours, mental. Sunday I started extending.
Shorts and crocs are NOT suitable clothing for soldering. All was going well until I burned my little finger on the iron, dropped the wire and then instinctively "caught" it with my bare knees whilst the solder was still hot.
I did a tidy job though and got everything extended and insulated fairly quickly, then it was a case of running the wires along the handbrake cable/gear cables through the centre console and into the dash. No pictures here, but I'm sure you can imagine it.
The wires came up behind the head unit through an existing hole, but it wasn't grommet-ed so I could do to bung some sponge in there or something just to stop the wires rubbing.
You can roughly see where the cables go here:
I spent way too long hoovering and cleaning the interior before putting it all back in. Smells lovely in there too after the leather products used on the seat.
Finally I had a working gauge with all sensors connected:
Day time illumination:
Night time:
I've had the car idling on stands for a while, obsessively checking for oil leaks around the new sender but everything seems good.
Last job was to bleed brakes, I put a litre of Mobile DOT4 stuff through it with my eezibleed.
All was going well with loads of air coming out:
I noticed towards the end that way more fluid was going in than coming out... uhoh.
After lowering the front of the car back down, I started getting quite a lot of brake fluid dripping onto the floor. All unions/hoses were dry, no leaks around the calipers this was clearly coming from the reservoir or the booster/master cylinder area under the front clam. I hosed it all down and ran plenty of clean water through to let it dry over night.
Come onto today and the reservoir is still full, pedal has full pressure and everything seems to be fine... I first assumed that the eezibleed had popped a host off somewhere but I can't find any evidence and it seems to hold pressure fine when I hook it back up. The leading (hopeful) theory right now is that the reservoir cap was weeping whilst under pressure and I didn't notice it as it wasn't spraying, it just leaked silently down the side of the reservoir.
I'll take it out for a tentative drive this afternoon and will check again for leaks. If I never update this thread again, it's because I died.
If there is something leaking under there, I really fear it'll be a clam-off job to inspect which I could really do without after all the work I've just finished, car needs to be driven!!
I find with Eazibleeds that about 50% of the time they leak out of the cap on the reservior, sometimes you notice it, others it seeps out and you only find it when you see a puddle on the floor so that's the more likely explanation.
If you don't post this afternoon, I'll know I was wrong.
If you don't post this afternoon, I'll know I was wrong.
Mark Benson said:
I find with Eazibleeds that about 50% of the time they leak out of the cap on the reservior, sometimes you notice it, others it seeps out and you only find it when you see a puddle on the floor so that's the more likely explanation.
If you don't post this afternoon, I'll know I was wrong.
Yup that seems to be the consensus. When looking back at the higher res version of my photo posted above I can actually make out a damp/shiny patch on the reservoir so looks positive.If you don't post this afternoon, I'll know I was wrong.
I already asked on my SELOC equivalent thread - but if I don't post back would a mod arrange for the last post to be removed so my Wife has a good chance of a good insurance payout?
Still no further leaks of brake fluid so happy to put that one down to an eezibleed fault and move on.
Brakes feel fine, still scrubbing in the discs a bit though as there are some high points on the disks which need wearing down a bit, I'm sure the first trackday I do will fix it!
I got some video of the gauge in operation, pretty happy with it to be honest. Was expecting the stepper motor to be a bit noisier (had issues on my Subaru with cheap gauges) but this one is pretty subtle. I still longer term will upgrade to something which has some programmable alarms and stuff, and will probably drop the boost gauge.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZtdR7gBiMYo
Brakes feel fine, still scrubbing in the discs a bit though as there are some high points on the disks which need wearing down a bit, I'm sure the first trackday I do will fix it!
I got some video of the gauge in operation, pretty happy with it to be honest. Was expecting the stepper motor to be a bit noisier (had issues on my Subaru with cheap gauges) but this one is pretty subtle. I still longer term will upgrade to something which has some programmable alarms and stuff, and will probably drop the boost gauge.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZtdR7gBiMYo
A couple of small updates.
First up, engine mounts. A fairly common mod on the 2zz engined Elise/Exiges is to stick some polyurethane inserts into the existing engine mounts to stiffen everything up a bit. The main complaint that these address is the gear shift, when you're hoofing along the engine moves a lot and the cable linkage struggles with it when you're doing high rpm/aggressive shifts. I wanted to try this out (though I do feel the shift on my Exige is already much better than my Elise was) but also I was getting some rattling of my Exhaust on my diffuser and the clearances I have are just tiny - so reducing any engine movement should help with that too... right?
I'd resisted the temptation to do this on my previous Elise because I'd had a bad experience in the past on my Subaru when changing bushes in the gear linkage from rubber to poly. It made my gear changes a bit nicer but the NVH was shocking, a well known specialist was convinced my gearbox was about to fail! They were a total pig to fit and I put off reverting for months as a result, but when I finally did it the gearbox was magically fixed!
Reviews of the Lotus setup suggested that I'd get a bit of vibration at idle but wouldn't notice them when moving. Let's see about that...
The 2zz has 4 mounts and the front and rear ones can be fairly easily removed and fitted with some powerflex inserts.
Front:
Rear:
I had a few hours on Friday night so got stuck in with the rear, because the internet said it was easiest. I stuck a spare jack under the sump and loosened it off, it was just one big through-bolt then 4 bolts that fixed it to the subframe. It came off easily enough and installation was as easy as popping in the powerflex ones - the original rubber would remain in place, this would just support it.
Getting the mount back in was a complete and utter arse. I'm not sure even now what the problem was, but the bolts just would not go back into the subframe - I didn't feel they were difficult at all to remove, certainly didn't get the feeling the thread was damaged or anything but I just couldn't get the bolts "started" in the holes. They're completely blind and I was doing it by feel, but access was fairly good and there was just no explanation for it.
Eventually I got out an M10 tap and just gently turned it in as the end was tapered it was easier to get it started. I was able to turn it in the full way with no real resistance and certainly no crap came out with it - but that seemed to do the trick and my bolt would now go in. I wonder if there was a bit of powdercoat from the mount or something blocking the top, but it cost me at least an hour!
The following day I did the front, this was viewed as the "hard one" because the two bolts holding it to the engine were quite hard to access - but I had a shiny new set of "go-through sockets" which sit with a much lower profile than a 1/2 ratchet so this allowed me to get a socket wrench in and got it changed within about 10 minutes! Much easier than the rear.
So without the bolt hole shenanigans I think this job would have been 30mins all in, but ended up spending half a weekend on it. I was eager to test though, and I have to say that I'm impressed.
The car does vibrate at idle but barely more than it did before, and it doesn't feel uncomfortable - If I ever have a female passenger they may even enjoy it. As soon as the car is moving the vibration is completely gone and the shifts are indeed a lot nicer even at slower speeds. It may be my imagination but the car feels sharper too, like the weight transfer has noticeably come under control.
While I had the diffuser off for the rear mount I adjusted a few bits and pieces to try and help with the rattling but we'll see how that goes once I can get the car properly warmed up and tested. The rattles I had were fairly easily produce-able with the car warmed up and coming down off-throttle through the revs. Between 5 and 4.5k RPM there would just be a rattle, sounds a lot like under-tray despite them being tight.
Aside from that I had another change to make for my airbox. I did this on my Elise and it's a pretty standard affair for these cars.
Toyota Racing Developments airbox:
It basically just allows for a larger filter surface area and a slightly bigger opening but is still nicely OEM. It came I believe on the later Cup260 Exige cars so I figured I'd get it to go along with my 260 setup but also I had a 7 year old foam filter in the car which apparently aren't cleanable? I dunno - but foam filters have usually caused me issues historically so I was happy to get rid.
This is the standard airbox with the wee round opening, this photo is missing the acoustic snorkel that the cars come with to keep sound in check. That would be in the bin.
I remember this job being a complete pain in the dick on my Elise but it went in a treat this time around. The process involves bonding an adaptor plate to the base of the existing airbox which allows the Lotus and presumably Celica parts to merge.
The bracket on the bulkhead is slightly the wrong shape for the TRD item but you can bend it and frig it into position. There are three rivnuts you need to line up, a pair and a single one. I seem to remember with my Elise that I bent the single one and left the duo static as it was just easier - but this gave me issues lining the airbox up with the throttle body. I followed the Lotus service notes this time and bent the duo and this worked much better.
The airbox is on rubber isolation mounts so you get a bit of tolerance for roughly lining up the bolts and then just torquing it down to bend the bracket into position.
Paper filter popped in a treat, and now you can see the new larger entry compared to the old one:
Up top I just needed to blank off a vacuum hose that previously went to some kind of acoustic chamber in the bottom of the old airbox as it was now redundant.
On my Elise this made a huge improvement to the soundtrack of the car particularly on cam. This time round I'll be honest it barely made a difference, I think removing the acoustic snorkel made 90% of the difference but I'm happier with the filter situation now. Perhaps on my Elise I would have had the same upgrade to soundtrack by just taking the snorkel off, perhaps the TRD airbox is the con of the century - but I can live with it!
Running out of jobs to do now before trackdays start (first one scheduled 6th April) but I would like to stick a 4pt harness in before I go so that's likely to be the next update.
First up, engine mounts. A fairly common mod on the 2zz engined Elise/Exiges is to stick some polyurethane inserts into the existing engine mounts to stiffen everything up a bit. The main complaint that these address is the gear shift, when you're hoofing along the engine moves a lot and the cable linkage struggles with it when you're doing high rpm/aggressive shifts. I wanted to try this out (though I do feel the shift on my Exige is already much better than my Elise was) but also I was getting some rattling of my Exhaust on my diffuser and the clearances I have are just tiny - so reducing any engine movement should help with that too... right?
I'd resisted the temptation to do this on my previous Elise because I'd had a bad experience in the past on my Subaru when changing bushes in the gear linkage from rubber to poly. It made my gear changes a bit nicer but the NVH was shocking, a well known specialist was convinced my gearbox was about to fail! They were a total pig to fit and I put off reverting for months as a result, but when I finally did it the gearbox was magically fixed!
Reviews of the Lotus setup suggested that I'd get a bit of vibration at idle but wouldn't notice them when moving. Let's see about that...
The 2zz has 4 mounts and the front and rear ones can be fairly easily removed and fitted with some powerflex inserts.
Front:
Rear:
I had a few hours on Friday night so got stuck in with the rear, because the internet said it was easiest. I stuck a spare jack under the sump and loosened it off, it was just one big through-bolt then 4 bolts that fixed it to the subframe. It came off easily enough and installation was as easy as popping in the powerflex ones - the original rubber would remain in place, this would just support it.
Getting the mount back in was a complete and utter arse. I'm not sure even now what the problem was, but the bolts just would not go back into the subframe - I didn't feel they were difficult at all to remove, certainly didn't get the feeling the thread was damaged or anything but I just couldn't get the bolts "started" in the holes. They're completely blind and I was doing it by feel, but access was fairly good and there was just no explanation for it.
Eventually I got out an M10 tap and just gently turned it in as the end was tapered it was easier to get it started. I was able to turn it in the full way with no real resistance and certainly no crap came out with it - but that seemed to do the trick and my bolt would now go in. I wonder if there was a bit of powdercoat from the mount or something blocking the top, but it cost me at least an hour!
The following day I did the front, this was viewed as the "hard one" because the two bolts holding it to the engine were quite hard to access - but I had a shiny new set of "go-through sockets" which sit with a much lower profile than a 1/2 ratchet so this allowed me to get a socket wrench in and got it changed within about 10 minutes! Much easier than the rear.
So without the bolt hole shenanigans I think this job would have been 30mins all in, but ended up spending half a weekend on it. I was eager to test though, and I have to say that I'm impressed.
The car does vibrate at idle but barely more than it did before, and it doesn't feel uncomfortable - If I ever have a female passenger they may even enjoy it. As soon as the car is moving the vibration is completely gone and the shifts are indeed a lot nicer even at slower speeds. It may be my imagination but the car feels sharper too, like the weight transfer has noticeably come under control.
While I had the diffuser off for the rear mount I adjusted a few bits and pieces to try and help with the rattling but we'll see how that goes once I can get the car properly warmed up and tested. The rattles I had were fairly easily produce-able with the car warmed up and coming down off-throttle through the revs. Between 5 and 4.5k RPM there would just be a rattle, sounds a lot like under-tray despite them being tight.
Aside from that I had another change to make for my airbox. I did this on my Elise and it's a pretty standard affair for these cars.
Toyota Racing Developments airbox:
It basically just allows for a larger filter surface area and a slightly bigger opening but is still nicely OEM. It came I believe on the later Cup260 Exige cars so I figured I'd get it to go along with my 260 setup but also I had a 7 year old foam filter in the car which apparently aren't cleanable? I dunno - but foam filters have usually caused me issues historically so I was happy to get rid.
This is the standard airbox with the wee round opening, this photo is missing the acoustic snorkel that the cars come with to keep sound in check. That would be in the bin.
I remember this job being a complete pain in the dick on my Elise but it went in a treat this time around. The process involves bonding an adaptor plate to the base of the existing airbox which allows the Lotus and presumably Celica parts to merge.
The bracket on the bulkhead is slightly the wrong shape for the TRD item but you can bend it and frig it into position. There are three rivnuts you need to line up, a pair and a single one. I seem to remember with my Elise that I bent the single one and left the duo static as it was just easier - but this gave me issues lining the airbox up with the throttle body. I followed the Lotus service notes this time and bent the duo and this worked much better.
The airbox is on rubber isolation mounts so you get a bit of tolerance for roughly lining up the bolts and then just torquing it down to bend the bracket into position.
Paper filter popped in a treat, and now you can see the new larger entry compared to the old one:
Up top I just needed to blank off a vacuum hose that previously went to some kind of acoustic chamber in the bottom of the old airbox as it was now redundant.
On my Elise this made a huge improvement to the soundtrack of the car particularly on cam. This time round I'll be honest it barely made a difference, I think removing the acoustic snorkel made 90% of the difference but I'm happier with the filter situation now. Perhaps on my Elise I would have had the same upgrade to soundtrack by just taking the snorkel off, perhaps the TRD airbox is the con of the century - but I can live with it!
Running out of jobs to do now before trackdays start (first one scheduled 6th April) but I would like to stick a 4pt harness in before I go so that's likely to be the next update.
james_gt3rs said:
I had the same engine mounts on my old VX220, made a big difference to the gearchange and throttle response... Lotus seem to use bits of marshmellow as standard!
Yup the standard setup certainly seems to be soft but I do have sympathy for them as people are so quick to complain about NVH even on a "track day" car, myself included!I had a work meeting today in a particularly nice part of North Yorkshire so I took the Exige on the first real journey for quite a while. I've just been doing loads of "A to A" driving recently so it was good to get some meaningful mileage on it. I put about 70 miles on it so I got to see how the oil temperature settles properly for the first time since fitting the gauge, I'm definitely measuring it at it's coldest (in the sump, after its been through the coolers) so it's not the most meaningful measurement in the world - but it does give me a relative benchmark for when I go on track to make sure that the coolers keep performing. It settles at around 60degrees whilst cruising, climbs to mid 60's after a bit of boost but quickly falls. Nowhere near the temps I saw on my Subaru, but that was measuring from the 'top' of Cyl3.
I think the exhaust/diffuser rattles are now fixed - I did make a few adjustments whilst fitting the engine mount inserts but it feels/sounds a lot more 'together' now. Happy days.
Road manners are still absolutely fine with the mounts, there's a bit of trim rattle at like 1500rpm but it's barely noticeable so I'm really happy with the compromise.
Ever since I had the car it was a little "missy" at low RPM when cold and I put this down to the larger injectors immediately and thought nothing else of it. After 30secs of driving it never occurred again and I had similar idle issues with the Subaru when I put massive injectors in it. I don't know if it's just a one off, but that didn't happen at all today, so I wonder if dumping the ITG foam filter did me some good. I did give the MAF a clean whilst I was at it, so who knows.
Like I said, it was a nice part of North Yorkshire so would be rude not to take a couple of snaps.
I agree with you on the TRD airbox.
On my NA 2ZZ engine 111R the TRD conversion made a real bark on the change over of the cam! Making the sound more aggressive.
On the 2ZZ SC Elise I have it make no difference, I’ve been told this is something to do with the forced injection of the supercharger but ....as you know Kyle I know nothing about the engineering and mechanical side of cars so who knows hahaha
On my NA 2ZZ engine 111R the TRD conversion made a real bark on the change over of the cam! Making the sound more aggressive.
On the 2ZZ SC Elise I have it make no difference, I’ve been told this is something to do with the forced injection of the supercharger but ....as you know Kyle I know nothing about the engineering and mechanical side of cars so who knows hahaha
Great work Klye, I have the uprated engine mount inserts on mine and it does make a noticeable improvement although I think the standard bushings were in pretty good condition anyway.
Would love to know if you have any tips for reducing resonance in the cabin, I have some around 2-3k rpm and have taken the diffuser off a couple of times and adjusted the plastic air ducts which has helped. Think I need to try and silicone seal the rear under tray as I havnt had that off yet.
Would love to know if you have any tips for reducing resonance in the cabin, I have some around 2-3k rpm and have taken the diffuser off a couple of times and adjusted the plastic air ducts which has helped. Think I need to try and silicone seal the rear under tray as I havnt had that off yet.
Y11 LTS said:
On the 2ZZ SC Elise I have it make no difference, I’ve been told this is something to do with the forced injection of the supercharger but ....as you know Kyle I know nothing about the engineering and mechanical side of cars so who knows hahaha
I'm not sure what that means, but can only assume it's referring to putting on a smaller SC pulley to up the boost a bit. I know this is done on the intercooled Exige setups to go >300bhp but they're severely gearbox limited at that point. I imagine it's suicidal on the non-cooled Elise setups!Y11 LTS said:
Also Kyle where did you get the leather upholstery repair kit from? I have red / burgundy interior. Would it work for that too?
Love the thread keep it coming
https://www.furnitureclinic.co.uk/Leather_Repair_KitLove the thread keep it coming
The Fonze said:
Would love to know if you have any tips for reducing resonance in the cabin, I have some around 2-3k rpm and have taken the diffuser off a couple of times and adjusted the plastic air ducts which has helped. Think I need to try and silicone seal the rear under tray as I havnt had that off yet.
As I've put a few miles on since adding the inserts I've certainly gained a few more trim rattles, but nothing too severe yet. The NACA ducts on the undertray I've just glued in place, I'd also check the foam weatherstrip stuff that's supposed to be on the leading edge of the undertray as it often comes off or wears too thin - that should be easily replaced and can fix a lot of rattles.
Other than that mine have been exhaust related I think, after replacing all of my missing heatshields I'm still missing a bracket on the manifold which may help further - but seems hard to source one, and no aftermarket manifolds seem to have this bracket anyway. I think I'm getting a bit of a hum from the rear numberplate plinth so I'll take a peak next time the diffuser is off - but it's not enough to justify time in the garage on its own!
For the interior the black firewall plastic trim is rattling a little bit so will take a look at that soon when it comes off to check out the seatbelt setup for my harness install.
TRACKDAY PREP WEEK!
Normally I enjoy the buzz of the week building up to a track day as much as I enjoy the day itself, but I've been a bit busy on the car this time round.
My intention was to whip the undertray off, spanner check the toe-links and have one more check of the oil fittings I've added. This was on Monday night.
Unfortunately I found evidence of a bit of oil weepage from the sump, barely anything - and my original intention upon seeing it was to just clean it up and get a track day or two done then get the car to a specialist for the token yearly stamp and have them refit the sump. This would have been fine as the oil "loss" wasn't even registering on the dipstick and it had not seeped enough to even break surface tension and mess up the undertray.
However...
I'm very impulsive with spanners, and after leaving and re-entering the garage a couple of times I eventually suited up and dropped the oil (< 500miles worth!).
I am 90% sure the issue was just me being crap, but to cover all bases I wanted to change everything that I did previously which meant a different degreaser product and a different RTV gasket sealant product to rule out any inadequacies of the stuff I used before. Removing the sump was much easier than it was when I took the original off a few months ago, and there wasn't much evidence of the rubberised "gasket" that the sealant should have formed. It was barely a blue smear on each surface. Hmmm, perhaps I torqued it up wrong and squeezed it all out?!
I went with the same sealant this time as I used on my Elise - as that never leaked. No idea what the chemical differences are here, but the black one is clearly marketed more towards oily environments than the blue one is.
I very much repeated the same process, but with dollops of added patience this time. I noticed that whilst the car was jacked up on an angle that oil persisted to drip out of the engine and onto the block flange for several hours after the oil was drained. This was also the corner where it was weeping, so perhaps between me degreasing and refitting before a smidge of oil escaped onto the contact area.
After draining the oil this time I left the car overnight to make sure any rogue drips were long gone. I also noticed some witness marks on the sump that suggested a casting mark on near the gearbox housing (the problem corner) had possibly prevented a flush fit - so the file came out to sort that.
Beading the black stuff was a lot stodgier than the blue stuff, which gave me confidence even though my hand hurt like hell afterwards!
Both times I've done a sump previously I'd felt rushed to get the bead onto the sump and get it bolted up, but after reading a few forums etc it seemed that it was fairly normal to leave the sealant for 15-20mins before fitting it anyway, so I took my time properly this time and was confident that I got it bolted up with practically zero lateral movement to smear the bead. I followed a very strict torquing process that Ed China would be proud of, and felt pretty comfortable with the end result.
If this leaks, it's off to a garage!
Due to all my patience, cure time and other stuff (like having a job) this took up most of the week and I finally got it finished and topped up with oil today. I only had time for a quick 12 mile test drive but no evidence of leaks, so stuck the undertray back on and cleaned the car.
Next job happened inbetween all that, waiting for cure times and such. This was the installation of my new 4point Schroth ASM harness for the driver seat.
The car already has a harness bar in on the factory mounts, so was a very quick install. I had originally intended to remove all of the trim, remove the inertia reels and tidy all the 3point stuff out but I just couldn't be arsed inbetween all the sump stuff. For now I've cable tied the 3point out of the way, and depending on how annoying I find a harness on the road I always have the option to fit a coexistence kit and keep both in at once.
The car is definitely looking the part now! I can't wait to try these, I've never driven with harnesses before and through both of my previous track cars had real problems keeping myself held in. CG-Locks were a great compromise but hopefully this is next level.
I'll admit to feeling a little uncomfortable with my trial fits of the harness, very claustrophobic when it's done up properly and I seem to be struggling to keep the lap belt down too. I'm aware that I should be tightening it up first, then doing the shoulders last - but for me to get the shoulders tight enough to properly pin my upper back into the seat, I end up pulling the lap belt up a little bit. I know that's bad, so I need to have more practise and adjustment before Saturday.
So there we go, car cleaned - sorting out my travelling toolkit and supplies then I just need to rehearse some gopro positions and we're all ready for Blyton on Saturday. Fingers crossed the car behaves, oh and good weather would also be nice!
Normally I enjoy the buzz of the week building up to a track day as much as I enjoy the day itself, but I've been a bit busy on the car this time round.
My intention was to whip the undertray off, spanner check the toe-links and have one more check of the oil fittings I've added. This was on Monday night.
Unfortunately I found evidence of a bit of oil weepage from the sump, barely anything - and my original intention upon seeing it was to just clean it up and get a track day or two done then get the car to a specialist for the token yearly stamp and have them refit the sump. This would have been fine as the oil "loss" wasn't even registering on the dipstick and it had not seeped enough to even break surface tension and mess up the undertray.
However...
I'm very impulsive with spanners, and after leaving and re-entering the garage a couple of times I eventually suited up and dropped the oil (< 500miles worth!).
I am 90% sure the issue was just me being crap, but to cover all bases I wanted to change everything that I did previously which meant a different degreaser product and a different RTV gasket sealant product to rule out any inadequacies of the stuff I used before. Removing the sump was much easier than it was when I took the original off a few months ago, and there wasn't much evidence of the rubberised "gasket" that the sealant should have formed. It was barely a blue smear on each surface. Hmmm, perhaps I torqued it up wrong and squeezed it all out?!
I went with the same sealant this time as I used on my Elise - as that never leaked. No idea what the chemical differences are here, but the black one is clearly marketed more towards oily environments than the blue one is.
I very much repeated the same process, but with dollops of added patience this time. I noticed that whilst the car was jacked up on an angle that oil persisted to drip out of the engine and onto the block flange for several hours after the oil was drained. This was also the corner where it was weeping, so perhaps between me degreasing and refitting before a smidge of oil escaped onto the contact area.
After draining the oil this time I left the car overnight to make sure any rogue drips were long gone. I also noticed some witness marks on the sump that suggested a casting mark on near the gearbox housing (the problem corner) had possibly prevented a flush fit - so the file came out to sort that.
Beading the black stuff was a lot stodgier than the blue stuff, which gave me confidence even though my hand hurt like hell afterwards!
Both times I've done a sump previously I'd felt rushed to get the bead onto the sump and get it bolted up, but after reading a few forums etc it seemed that it was fairly normal to leave the sealant for 15-20mins before fitting it anyway, so I took my time properly this time and was confident that I got it bolted up with practically zero lateral movement to smear the bead. I followed a very strict torquing process that Ed China would be proud of, and felt pretty comfortable with the end result.
If this leaks, it's off to a garage!
Due to all my patience, cure time and other stuff (like having a job) this took up most of the week and I finally got it finished and topped up with oil today. I only had time for a quick 12 mile test drive but no evidence of leaks, so stuck the undertray back on and cleaned the car.
Next job happened inbetween all that, waiting for cure times and such. This was the installation of my new 4point Schroth ASM harness for the driver seat.
The car already has a harness bar in on the factory mounts, so was a very quick install. I had originally intended to remove all of the trim, remove the inertia reels and tidy all the 3point stuff out but I just couldn't be arsed inbetween all the sump stuff. For now I've cable tied the 3point out of the way, and depending on how annoying I find a harness on the road I always have the option to fit a coexistence kit and keep both in at once.
The car is definitely looking the part now! I can't wait to try these, I've never driven with harnesses before and through both of my previous track cars had real problems keeping myself held in. CG-Locks were a great compromise but hopefully this is next level.
I'll admit to feeling a little uncomfortable with my trial fits of the harness, very claustrophobic when it's done up properly and I seem to be struggling to keep the lap belt down too. I'm aware that I should be tightening it up first, then doing the shoulders last - but for me to get the shoulders tight enough to properly pin my upper back into the seat, I end up pulling the lap belt up a little bit. I know that's bad, so I need to have more practise and adjustment before Saturday.
So there we go, car cleaned - sorting out my travelling toolkit and supplies then I just need to rehearse some gopro positions and we're all ready for Blyton on Saturday. Fingers crossed the car behaves, oh and good weather would also be nice!
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