Another newbie to the forum.
Posted: Tue May 16, 2017 9:16 pmHi all
I've owned my Plus 2 chassis number 50/0143 since 1977 and am the second owner of the car. I took it off the road in 1985 when I moved to Aberdeen as the dreaded rust had weakened the front cross member on the chassis. I stripped the car and ordered a Spyder refurbished chassis and started to rebuild it, reconditioning parts as I went. Then I changed job and moved house so the car was partly assembled and moved to a barn on my in laws farm for about 10 years. It finally joined me in Lincolnshire in the mid 1990's and was eventually sent to a local specialist to have the rebuild completed due to lack of time on my part. This all went wrong and the car was returned, partially completed with many parts off the car and in a variety of boxes and bags. Again it sat untouched for some years, until I had some time around 2002 and I sent the body for a bare fibreglass respray and rebuilt the suspension a second time as the bushes had deteriorated and rust had appeared on some parts. Then my job moved to Aberdeen, but I didn't relocate, just commuted every week for over 8 years so again, nothing got done on the Lotus. I finally retired last summer so after a few holidays and essential jobs around the house I decided that it was time for one final push to finish the Lotus. First job was the garage, it was full of "stuff" and needed a good clear out. Then it was clean and paint the garage, fully rewire it with new sockets and lots of new lights, set up my lathe, milling machine, compressor, grit blaster, welder, bench grinder etc. Finally I was ready to actually start on the car! A second set of axle stands were purchased and the car jacked up, put on them ready to work on at a reasonable height. Next job was to go through all the boxes of bits and see what I had and what condition the bits were in. I forgot to mention that in 2007, the garage was flooded and all the Lotus parts were at that time in cardboard boxes on the garage floor! After the flood everything was washed down with many cans of WD40 and put into plastic storage boxes and there they stayed till early this year when I started the restoration.
As I have progressed I have found that somewhere sometime in the 30 years the car has been off the road, some vital bits have gone missing, mainly, the brake servo and the complete pedal box, plus some smaller brackets and bits, but eBay has come to the rescue for some parts and others I have been able to make in my workshop section of the garage. So, where am I now? The chassis engine, gearbox, suspension is all complete, the resprayed body is on the chassis and I'm gradually refurbishing all the engine ancillaries or replacing/upgrading them, and replacing all the underbonnet wiring with my own custom harness incorporating the relays and fuses that were absent on the early cars. I've managed to buy a genuine Lotus workshop manual so have reasonable documentation, but some bits aren't covered in enough detail, so a google search for images has proved useful.
I've bought some after market replacement parts and although they are generally good, there has been some small problems with all of them. The new alloy fuel tank doesn't have the two small recesses in the bottom to clear the diff top mounting bolts, hence the need to put the bolts in upside down with the bolt heads on the top and the nut underneath to get the clearance, not a major problem unless you want to remove the diff at a later date. The alternator fitting bracket and kit had the wrong length bolts supplied, you can only get a replacement pedal box of the later type so more work to machine up an adaptor plate, and so it goes on, slowly but surely I'm getting there.
The car will be 50 years old in early November this year, and it's our 40th wedding anniversary at the end of October so my goal is to drive to our anniversary do in the Lotus, wish me luck!
Simon Babb
I've owned my Plus 2 chassis number 50/0143 since 1977 and am the second owner of the car. I took it off the road in 1985 when I moved to Aberdeen as the dreaded rust had weakened the front cross member on the chassis. I stripped the car and ordered a Spyder refurbished chassis and started to rebuild it, reconditioning parts as I went. Then I changed job and moved house so the car was partly assembled and moved to a barn on my in laws farm for about 10 years. It finally joined me in Lincolnshire in the mid 1990's and was eventually sent to a local specialist to have the rebuild completed due to lack of time on my part. This all went wrong and the car was returned, partially completed with many parts off the car and in a variety of boxes and bags. Again it sat untouched for some years, until I had some time around 2002 and I sent the body for a bare fibreglass respray and rebuilt the suspension a second time as the bushes had deteriorated and rust had appeared on some parts. Then my job moved to Aberdeen, but I didn't relocate, just commuted every week for over 8 years so again, nothing got done on the Lotus. I finally retired last summer so after a few holidays and essential jobs around the house I decided that it was time for one final push to finish the Lotus. First job was the garage, it was full of "stuff" and needed a good clear out. Then it was clean and paint the garage, fully rewire it with new sockets and lots of new lights, set up my lathe, milling machine, compressor, grit blaster, welder, bench grinder etc. Finally I was ready to actually start on the car! A second set of axle stands were purchased and the car jacked up, put on them ready to work on at a reasonable height. Next job was to go through all the boxes of bits and see what I had and what condition the bits were in. I forgot to mention that in 2007, the garage was flooded and all the Lotus parts were at that time in cardboard boxes on the garage floor! After the flood everything was washed down with many cans of WD40 and put into plastic storage boxes and there they stayed till early this year when I started the restoration.
As I have progressed I have found that somewhere sometime in the 30 years the car has been off the road, some vital bits have gone missing, mainly, the brake servo and the complete pedal box, plus some smaller brackets and bits, but eBay has come to the rescue for some parts and others I have been able to make in my workshop section of the garage. So, where am I now? The chassis engine, gearbox, suspension is all complete, the resprayed body is on the chassis and I'm gradually refurbishing all the engine ancillaries or replacing/upgrading them, and replacing all the underbonnet wiring with my own custom harness incorporating the relays and fuses that were absent on the early cars. I've managed to buy a genuine Lotus workshop manual so have reasonable documentation, but some bits aren't covered in enough detail, so a google search for images has proved useful.
I've bought some after market replacement parts and although they are generally good, there has been some small problems with all of them. The new alloy fuel tank doesn't have the two small recesses in the bottom to clear the diff top mounting bolts, hence the need to put the bolts in upside down with the bolt heads on the top and the nut underneath to get the clearance, not a major problem unless you want to remove the diff at a later date. The alternator fitting bracket and kit had the wrong length bolts supplied, you can only get a replacement pedal box of the later type so more work to machine up an adaptor plate, and so it goes on, slowly but surely I'm getting there.
The car will be 50 years old in early November this year, and it's our 40th wedding anniversary at the end of October so my goal is to drive to our anniversary do in the Lotus, wish me luck!
Simon Babb
