Having sorted the gearbox question, here is another for the gurus on the board. Reading Newtons and Psulkowski's book on the Elan, Cortina and Europa they mention that the early S1 had lift out bonnet and boot lids with no hinges - the rear of the front lid and front of the engine lid had (and I quote)
'both lids on the early Series 1 cars had overlapping flanges on the mouldings to secure the leading edge. Along the rear edge there was a keyed lock, although some report they've seen cars with hood pins just like the NASCAR guys use'
I've checked out my Series 1 parts lists and there is one front (46B030) and one rear (46B040) lid listed and also a pair of hinges (36B6006) - so also used on the Elan) for the rear lid, which corresponds with the S2 cars I've seen, one of which was an early one with S1 type door latches.
So my question is do any S1's have lift off lids (front or rear) and if so when were the hinges introduced?
I do love this part ofthe research cycle when writing a book - there's no end of wierd and wonderful facts waiting to come to light!
Looking forward to hearing from the collective experiances of you guys!
Thanks again
Matt