Lotus Elite / Eclat / Excel

https://www.dropbox.com/s/5vjuz7zfuduw0p3/Today1.JPG?raw=1 One strange/ cool little car that we have owned was this tiny thing with a tiny engine. It could stow all its roof on board but you if did so yo could only stow a tooth brush and a change of pants. Not a grand tourer but a grand little car....

It's so good I've got a couple of questions: Is it possible to spray paint the 3D printed part? And if it is, what paint would you use?

That's superb! Really great piece of work.

I think you could be taking orders for those if you wanted to produce a few more....

Nice job - it will be good if we can see the gear knob when it is complete?

Cheers

Mauro200 wrote: ↑

Thu May 14, 2020 12:37

For now I have done this.

That looks great! What is it made of?

I think low profile tyres universally seem to make the handling better and the ride worse. When I drive classics now with old fashioned high profile tyres they normally have an excellent ride compared with modern stuff. Handling's usually crap mind you. Meanwhile Car magazine March 1983 also had a r...

The dog-leg Getrags weren't fitted to the Elite/Eclat - conventional pattern. I think the dog-leg boxes were on the BMWs and possibly others of the same period. Pete Ah right, probably a good thing. The BMW had a pattern like this: https://i.ibb.co/vDD8SGh/dogleg-shift-2.jpg which was OK on fast ro...

The March 1983 Car magazine ran a group road test called "Coupe War", pitting the Excel against a 944 and a Starion. Happily the Excel wins, although not by much: https://i.ibb.co/C7cYgjY/Car-1983-March-Lotus-Article-Coupe-War-road-test-Page-1-and-2.jpg https://i.ibb.co/SBhd5H0/Car-1983-March-Lotus-...

Did they fit the Getrag dogleg box to the Elite/Eclat? That's a new one on me, in the 80s I had an E12 with one of those boxes. I somehow assumed it was a bit of a rarity, just fitted to some of the bigger BMWs. Sounds like it was more popular than I thought.

Sorry, can you tell me why 0/D is written instead of 5? Thanks, I will try to have it made by a carpenter and the part with the numbers with the 3D printer. We will see the success. I will explain the answer as far as I know it, but if anybody on forum knows better, please jump in and add comments....

OK at this point I am going to resist the desire to make jokes about the high value of my knob

I can quite believe it Bash - not sure how much redesigning Lotus really needed to do for a gear knob. The same one, or at least it looks the same, is also fitted to some of the S2 & S3 Esprit's as well. Different part numbers though - maybe a different thread?

Hi I've got a 1984 Excel with the orignal wooden gear knob, part number is A089F0411F I think. It's approx 45-46mm in diameter and looks like this: https://i.ibb.co/GkPzTkQ/Excel-knob-1.jpg https://i.ibb.co/1z7wqrm/Excel-knob-2.jpg https://i.ibb.co/bR3kb12/Excel-knob-3.jpg https://i.ibb.co/CbVPPyY/E...

I see that the same seller ("iantheleotard") is also selling an Esprit keyring from the same era, also at £100. Seems a little ambitious I'd say. Mind you he's also trying to sell a Jag one for £250

..and the final piece of Lotus trivia from December 1983 Car magazine is an interview with Oliver Winterbottom: