Esprit's '01 Exige Over-winter refresh

[Esprit]

Right so it's not oldschool, but I thought I'd pop this topic up here since it's a similar sort of refresh/tidy-up many of us have done many times with our oldschoolers.

Background on the car is that I imported it from Edinburgh, Scotland September '07 after it had spent its first 6 years on this earth with its first owner in London and Edinburgh. It arrived in NZ along with another for another NZ owner to beat the emissions laws that would ban their importing as of Jan 1 2008. There were no others in the country and to this day remain the only two.

Now the Exige S1 is pretty much similar to an Elise S1 under the skin, basically just being a racing version thereof. Given that the Exige was derived from a competition car though, many of the peripheral items were low-volume bits (they only ever made 601 Exige S1s) and as such many of the bits and pieces had little or no rustproofing on them. As a result, after a few winters on salty UK roads they do start to look tired under the skin.

My car was in superb condition throughout compared to many but it was always my intention to spend its first NZ winter stripping it back, giving it a good look-over and pretty much bringing it back to new condition underneath. This meant replacing all the bushes, balljoints, rod ends and cleaning up all the steelwork beneath as well as the chassis and all its hardpoints (which, because they're in aluminum, stay in pretty good nick).

Given that the clutch was starting to show signs of wear and started slipping badly after NZ Autocar magazine had it to do their 0-60 tests for the magazine, this would be replaced at the same time. Also, given that the front pulleys made a bid for freedom off the end of the crankshaft in November, it was decided the front end of the engine would get all new pulleys and cam-drive to be on the safe side. This would be easiest done with the engine out, and we'd also use this time to diagnose a clatter that had started in the engine over the Easter break... we suspected something amiss in the valvetrain of the mightily fragile Rover K16-VHPD lump.

Anyway... on with the show!

[Esprit]

20 Apr '08

Well I'm embarking on a winter rebuild for the Exige to freshen it up, and basically return it to as-new condition under the skin. Lotuses don't tend to age in the dry, salt-free environment of NZ so I want to get it right so it'll be many many years before it needs any further care under the skin.

First step's been stripping the car back, removing the bodywork, which was finished today. Car's to be trailered into KW Historics this week to have the engine removed and then stripped down and inspected before being rebuilt. The rolling chassis will come back here in the meantime to be stripped and refurbished, before hopefully getting it all back together in time for spring

Introducing the new lightweight, no-frills SEXIGE:

[Esprit]

01 Jun '08

Little progress to be seen in May really... much of May was taken at Lotus getting the engine out.

Got the back brakes off yesterday, will get all the suspension and brakes off today then should be able to start separating hubs and balljoints etc.

Not looking too pretty at the moment

[Esprit]

02 Jun '08

MOAR PICS!!!!!

Suspension's all off now Was a bit of a nightmare getting some of the more corroded bits apart but the good news is that there's nothing that'll not clean up as good as new once I've thrown some money and elbow grease at it

I was actually surprised how good it is. Most of the "rust" has turned out to be caked on brake dust. One of the wishbones has a little flaking on it, but this is very minor and should media-blast up to virgin metal pretty easily and will look like new when re-plated. The chassis has stood up impeccably. It REALLY needs a clean and it'll get a bit of a light buff with AutoSol in places and maybe an undercoating of ACF50 to keep it from any further damage but once it's back together and in a salt-free NZ climate (and under my careful ownership), it should look as good in 20 years time as it does when I'm done

[Esprit]

09 Jul '08

Well it's been VERY slow progress lately... working 100 hour weeks hasn't helped, but hopefully as winter really sets in I'll be making some good progress.

The engine is being stripped, currently have no indication of what the noise was though... hope to find this out in the next day or two.

All the suspension is now off the car and awaiting cleaning up and repainting. All the hubs etc are all split and the old bushes and balljoints have been binned.

Here you can see the wishbones as they've been removed from the car. I plan to have these bead-blasted and re-plated/passivated to the same finish they had when new. I'm intending to get the platers to do a debrittle treatment on them too as I've heard the welds can crack if this is not done... pays to be on the safe side I guess.

Here are the upper shock mounts (rear). They're not too bad, but the plating (looks like hot-dip galvanising or electrogalv) has seen better days. I'll probably leave the front ones as they look okay, but the rears will be replated all shiny and new.

I'd love to replate the rear subframe as well as the galv has blackened here, but still appears to be intact. due to the hassle involved with removing and re-galving it, I'll probably not bother. It's not exposed to the elements and the galv still seems to be doing its job.

Pretty much ready to send the lot of stuff out for blasting/plating. There may be a second batch of odds and ends, but this will cover off 95% of the stuff I think.

I've also had a go at cleaning up the hubs. They weren't too bad, but have seen better days. It looks like they were just plain, unprotected cast iron and as the photos show they've cleaned up not bad (see before/after). Some pitting is still evident, but that doesn't bother me too much. I'll probably give these a degrease and mask them up and give them a spray-lacquer (clear) on the exposed surfaces... should keep them in good enough nick for the next dozen years or so.

Will do the other two hubs this weekend and will start to clean up the ali uprights also. Will get the blasting/plating sent off during the week, so hopefully that will progress pretty quickly. I'll then be on to cleaning up various bits on the tub/engine bay and onto cleaning up the driveshafts/CVs as I reckon we can make these a bit prettier before giving these a coat of something to keep them looking semi-okay. That should keep me busy for a few weekends and hopefully by then I'll know more about the state of the engine and can plan the reassembly

[Esprit]

13 Jul '08

This weekend's efforts have involved doing the remaining two hubs, which have come up okay as well as pulling a few more bits off the car and masking for sandblasting. Hope to get this all off for blasting/plating this week! Smiley

I've started on the cleanup of the front uprights too, have one cleaned now and am halfway through the other... the pics show comparison between the two. Once they're both cleaned, they'll be buffed up with some autosol to protect them then probably finished off with a good coating of ACF50 protectant to keep them free from corrosion.

[Esprit]

20 Jul '08

Today's job was to begin stripping and refurbishing the Driveshafts and CV joints. These, like the hubs, were heavily corroded thanks to being unprotected and exposed to salt splash. I decided to only do one side at a time so that I've got less parts sitting around in bits to lose/mess up.

I started off with the Nearside driveshaft assembly, it looked like this.... rather scungy.

I ditched the boots (new ones on the way from the UK) and split the joints from the shaft. Took about 2 hours to get both the CV joint end and the tripod joint end all degreased and meticulously cleaned and inspected for wear. They look good with minimal signs of wear so they're worth refurbishing rather than getting completely new ones.

Next task was to mask them up with duct tape so prevent the ingress of dust/grit and also to protect the engagement splines. Pics show the Outboard and inboard joints respectively before they were cleaned up. Corrosion is worse on the outboard end because it's more exposed. Note the trigger wheel for the ECU speed sensor... corrosion on this was causing some ECU faults, so carefully cleaning this up would be a priority. Pic also shows the bare driveshaft.

[Esprit]

20 Jul '08

What followed next was a couple of hours of cleaning up with the wire brush, the brass brush, the emery and the polish in the lathe. They're not 100% complete here but it shows a bit of an improvement.

The outboard CV is mostly cleaned here with just some fiddly hand-work to do with the emery between the trigger wheel teeth. The Inboard CV cleaned up really nice and required minimal work, while the driveshaft took a little more work but came up well.

Due to the heaviness of the corrosion on some of the bits there's still some evidence of some pitting, but this doesn't bother me too much, they don't need to be prefect, I just don't want them to look like they've been sitting on the bottom of the ocean for 10 years!

This week I'm going to track myself down the POR15 supplier in Auckland and get some of their kits. They do a clear coat now I believe, so this will be used on the outside of the CV joints and hubs to keep them looking reasonable after being exposed to the weather. The driveshaft will be painted gloss black along the centre (left uncoated at the ends where the boots fit over as that's grease-filled and needs no protection).

Next weekend I aim to finish off polishing the uprights I started last weekend (may look at getting these anodised after some recommendations from the SELOC guys... will take them to the anodisers this week to enquire (won't bother if they're not going to come up really nice) and I will do the same as what I've done today with the offside driveshaft and CV joints. Now that I've done one side, the second should be very easy. I also hope to FINALLY get my lot of suspension off for sandblasting and to chase up my STILL undiagnosed engine.... still, if I get all that done, as well as procure my POR 15, by the end of next weekend I should be well on the way!

[Esprit]

21 Jul '08

Got to the bottom of the engine clatter today! Apparently there was a heat-shield that may or may not have been vibrating against the exhaust manifold at certain revs from resonance. Given that we had to bend a few things to get to the alternator when we rebuilt it, and the knocking started immediately after that, it's very very plausible that this could be the cause of the noise.

Still, I wouldn't mind inspecting the inside of the engine, perhaps replacing things like the valve-guides, main and big end bearings. Will take some advice from the UK K-series gurus though and see whether this is worth doing or whether I'm best leaving it all alone (if it ain't broke....)

[Esprit]

Today I got the other (Offside) CVs split and cleaned up as per the nearside CVs in the pic. These are ready for clearcoating and reassembly now (after some finishing work I'll do prior to clearcoating).

The engine's having its head removed and inspected this week, as tempting as it was to just reassemble it without removing the head and sticking it back in the car, I'd rather just have a looksee so I can inspect bores, pistons and the top end. The engine's a bit thirsty for oil at high RPM (a common VHPD trait) so we'll see if we can't get to the bottom of it.

Big news this week is that the blasting's been done on all the suspension and I picked it up yesterday. No pics of yet as I'm keeping it locked up in the hot water cupboard, warm and dry until I tackle them tomorrow to remove the masking plugs I've put in all the bores. Will snap a photo then. They'll be off to the electroplaters on Monday. Tomorrow I hope to finish off polishing the front alloy uprights as well.... FINALLY some progress... might get this thing finished after all.

Hoping my package of rebuild parts will be here from the UK early next week, that'll enable me to start putting things back together ASAP as hopefully it won't be long before I can start tackling cleaning up the chassis one corner at a time and re-hanging the suspension.

[Testament]

Very dedicated and hardout man! will there be any "improvements" while its in bits? new suspension bits etc? or it's pretty much already had it all done from day 1 anyway and changing anything will just make things worse?

but anyway, crazy looking mad fast things are cool

[Esprit]

At this stage it's just a clean-up. I've got some work planned for the future, but this winter's task is just to get it up and running as it should be and all cleaned up. It's such a quick car that it'll be a few years before I can even begin to really drive it to its potential so not really worrying about mods too much at the moment.

Money situation should be a bit better by year's end (still paying the bugger off as had to borrow a little to import it earlier than I wanted to beat the import restrictions) so then I'll have some decent coin to start throwing at it to do the upgrades.

Currently the suspension is just being refurbished. The shocks and springs are fine and in good condition so these will just be stripped, cleaned and rebuilt. The suspension's being rebuilt with all new bushes, balljoints etc as this will give me a good solid base to modify from later (knowing that things aren't slack and moving about when you're trying to tune them is a big help!).

One mod I'll be doing this year though is fitting of a lightweight battery to try and carve off some kerb weight. I did this on my old Elise S1 and it was a worthwhile mod, saving a cheap and easy 6kg. Will post details of this in September when I get around to doing it.

Plan for next year is to replace the Lotus Sport Koni/Eibach suspension with some new 3-way Ohlins shocks and Eibach springs and perhaps a front-end respray and fitment of some 3M Armourfend to the front clamshell to protect it from the beating the low-nose of these things take on our coarse-chip Kiwi roads. Also plan to get some TMR Racing Podium Forged alloys from Japan to allow me to run different tyres on road and track, although we'll cross that bridge when we come to it

[cute wee gem]

Sweet airbox. Looks like they're built pretty well eh, would be choice to drive I bet.

Just throw that broken Rover away and mash a Toyota engine in there

[Esprit]

Sweet airbox. Looks like they're built pretty well eh, would be choice to drive I bet.

Just throw that broken Rover away and mash a Toyota engine in there

Heh nothing wrong with the Rover motor... makes all the right noises (if you consider a paint can full of nails being shaken to be the right noises!) I was planning to do a Honda K20a swap at some point, but the value of Exige S1s has gone through the roof in the past year as they're becoming collectible, so I'll keep it matching numbers. Will probably take an S1 Elise and build a Motorsport Replica in 2010 with little concession to originality.

[esky 73]

cool cars, i was lucky enough to drive one a couple of years ago, would be one of the best handeling cars i ve driven, not sure where you are based but i have a hook up at a platers if it helps

[84_S12]

Put the front back on, make up a tray and VOILA a fucking fast british ute

Sick car bro, loving the first action shot!

[Dell'orto]

Use a Toyota K series motor, would be more reliable and probably go harder

[Esprit]

Use a Toyota K series motor, would be more reliable and probably go harder

Haha good old Toyota K I'm not sure the chassis could handle all that raw power

As for the Ute comment, I probably should... turn up to a minitrucker meeting like that, would raise a few eyebrows.... would have to fit airbags or hydros first though

[peteretep]

sweet looking car but amazing how much rust on such a new car, is that how bad uk roads are? or poor material use and design?

[fuel]

yeah I was thinking that too... the driveshafts of my 28 year old Mitsubishi which lived next to the sea most its life doesn't look as bad as the ones on the Exige!