The red-hose clutch problem

[foxbat]

Last Friday I was a victim of the dreaded red-hose clutch problem. After a nice drive out in the sun in the afternoon I got caught up in heavy traffic on the M25 and the engine got quite hot. Nothing extreme, 97 max before the fan came on and reduced it to 89. Anyway I got home, pulled up outside my garage and found myself in the embarrassing situation of failing noisily to get reverse at all and only being able to get 1st with lots of effort.

I'm sure this didn't use to happen to my Elise. Have the other owners here found that it happens after a few years? Do people generally ignore it or is there any benefit in buying the braided steel replacement and having a specialist fit it? I'd like to hear your experiences.

[cuzza]

The red hose fix is definitely something top check for when buying a car as it is at the very least annoying.

Are you sure it hasn't been done by a previous owner already.

The good news is that the Elise is light and you can just push it if necessary!

[foxbat]

I checked, it hasn't been done. I can't believe what a crazy bit of amateur design it is, from a company with F1 experience for goodness sake!

[rfoster]

I haven't had the problem on my Elise (yet) but did on the old Esprit - VERY common on these. Easy enough to replace and makes ahuge amount of difference.

[apprentice]

I continue to be amazed that there are still cars out there that haven't had them changed - we discovered one only last week.

apprentice

[cuzza]

apprentice said:

I continue to be amazed that there are still cars out there that haven't had them changed - we discovered one only last week. apprentice

And me - was it a recall job or a fix it yourself?? I seem to remember the former.

[apprentice]

cuzza said:

apprentice said: I continue to be amazed that there are still cars out there that haven't had them changed - we discovered one only last week. apprentice And me - was it a recall job or a fix it yourself?? I seem to remember the former.

As you say Cuzza - it was a recall.

[Karlosfandango]

Are you sure its a freebie to get changed?? If this is the case then I'll be checking with Strattons before I bust the gearstick off during the next sunny spell.

[foxbat]

Unfortunately we're going to have to pay for this particular design fault. Here's the recall listing:

www.theaa.com/allaboutcars/recalls/recalls.jsp?modelID=A5&modelName=Elise&makeName=Lotus&makeId=C5