More Progress...

[Bryan Boyle]

Nope. I know lots of people who swear it makes your tranny shift better. I had a slightly rough 1->2 shift that was cured with Red Line. If you use their product chooser page (https://www.redlineoil.com/find-products-for-my-vehicle), it tells you to use 75W90NS which is a GL-5 gear oil but because the pinion is not severely offset from the ring gear, you can use a GL-4.

Here is an email they sent me:

Thank you for contacting Red Line Oil, in your Lotus/Renault transaxle the 75W90NS would be recommended as they call for a GL-5 gear oil.

Obviously they don’t require a GL-5 gear oil as they don’t use a high offset ring and pinion and the included owners manual lists a MIL-L-2105B as being suitable, a GL-4 gear oil. Based on that and the viscosity called for, one of our GL-4 gear oils would be suitable such as the MT-85, likely providing similar viscosity at operating temperature to the original 80W. 

You know...I was looking around in a box I brought up from PA...and there are 3 bottles (albeit 13 years old...) of MT90 that I had (damn memory fails me sometimes) from my last go round with a Europa resurrection.  Thinking it's past its 'use by' date...IIRC, it did quiet the 336 I was running at the time and just kept on topping it up (I had leaky outputs I never got around to changing before selling her off...). 

Cross member out...yeah...release the rear mount to the frame, remove mount from tranny, remove the half shafts, disconnect the shift mechanism, disconnect clutch, remove starter, free up bell housing...and out...at least that's what I'm thinking. 

Now, to order the clutch parts.  Previous message mentioned weak/dying spring fingers on the pressure plate.  Figure, if you go with fresh stock replacements...it should work as the manual says, right?

I still have wiggle of the universal on the shift shaft (the rest of the mechanism is tight; new top hats on the shift, new bushing and top hats on the intermediate joint, rose joint at the mid-point has no play...) but that fitting at the end that captures the shift rod is not as tight as it should be.  Somewhere along the line, a (d)PO honked out the holes for the pin that is supposed to be there and resized to put in a bolt.  A couple folks suggested one of three solutions (besides shooting the (d)PO): 1. Tap the through-hole in the shift rod to accept an AN5 bolt that will be used to pull the female portion tight up against the shift rod, and pack the other side with a proper thickness shim, or 2. Tap the top side of the universal that attaches to the rod to an AN5 (or 4...have to measure what's in there now) thread and pull the universal tight against the rod (same idea, just from the other side), or 3. tap the shift rod, bore out the universal (this is assuming that my shift rod is 13mm) to 15mm, insert a 15/13 brass sleeve, drill out, and bolt up from both sides.

Damn (d)POs.  That spirol pin worked just fine; drilling out to put a bolt in was NOT the right fix if there was slop.  Sigh.

[GavinT]

I know nothing about TC's but I'm sure there was someone on the old Yahoo list who cut a slit in the uni-joint yoke on the gear change shaft side. That converted the situation from a pinned installation to one that could be 'clamped' with a bolt replacing the pin.

Or perhaps I completely missed the whole point of that exercise.

[Bryan Boyle]

I know nothing about TC's but I'm sure there was someone on the old Yahoo list who cut a slit in the uni-joint yoke on the gear change shaft side. That converted the situation from a pinned installation to one that could be 'clamped' with a bolt replacing the pin.

Or perhaps I completely missed the whole point of that exercise.

yeah, that was on the old list; I remember that discussion.  I wonder, though, about how much "clamping" you can really get out of a cast piece (which that end of the universal is...).  I surmise that the reason pinning was used on the production line was speed of assembly...not that the Hethel production line moved at a rapid clip, still, time and motion studies have a lot to do with how parts go from the drawing board to manufacturing...and a couple minutes and pennies saved per unit add up, right?

In an ideal world...if I can find them and assuming (I have to measure it) that I have a 13 mm shaft, I would prefer (and maybe I can get a machinist to make one...) to build a bushing (13mm ID x 15mm OD), open up the universal to 15mm (and minor more), tap the shaft for a set bolt from both sides...maybe overengineering the damn thing, and certainly adding 1/4 ounce of weight...lol

[Bainford]

  A couple folks suggested one of three solutions (besides shooting the (d)PO)

I shot a DPO once. But, the original problem remained, and I ended up with a host of new ones to deal with. Not worth the bother.

[Bryan Boyle]

  A couple folks suggested one of three solutions (besides shooting the (d)PO)

I shot a DPO once. But, the original problem remained, and I ended up with a host of new ones to deal with. Not worth the bother.

In fairness, the PO of 3291R didn't do anything during the 3 years he owned her...except bring to a couple shops north of Boston to attempt to get it going, and finally admitted he was in over his head about the car, which, after calling around to other lotus owners he knew after I expressed my interest, he was willing to sell her to me (I guess I have a reputation in the Europa world...lol).  But, before him?  70% of my time thus far has been backing out the bodges and hacks that others (whether they're "D"POs or just POs is left as an exercise) performed in a misguided attempt to get her running properly. 

For instance...the common belief that you start at the rear to bleed brakes...unless you think about it and realize that the furthest cylinder in the fedspec TCS is actually the one closest to the MC because of the spaghetti routing of the piping...you will never evacuate the system.  But, a couple minutes spent looking at the parts diagram will tell the whole story.  In fairness, a production shop will not have (or not want to) the time to research...time is $$$, and no one wants to spend (or charge if they're honest) more than they need to in order to get the thing out the door and roll in the next patient.  It's up to us that have an intimacy with the Europa formula to set it straight.

I'm at the stage now where I know 1) age and probably leaks have roached the clutch (it's either on or off, and very little, if no, 'mid point'), so, time to pull the trans and rectify (along with prophylactic replacement of the rear seal) with fresh plate, pressure, throwout, return spring (iI installed a new cable yesterday...no difference in the actuation...figure a head-down weekend should do it...2) 'While I'm in the area'...with the tranny out, pull the lump and attend to the multitude of leaks from aged gaskets and seals and refresh the head (I made a virtual handshake deal with someone who listed one in the for sale section...no $ changed hands yet, still waiting to hear back...)...and clean out the years of accumulated schmutz in the engine compartment and put it all back together...I like a clean engine room.

If it's not one thing, it's a dozen others, right? 

[GavinT]

yeah, that was on the old list; I remember that discussion.  I wonder, though, about how much "clamping" you can really get out of a cast piece (which that end of the universal is...).

Hey Bryan,

What does Andy Harwood reckon, 8 years on?

http://www.lotuseuropa.org/LotusForum/index.php?topic=759.0

[TurboFource]

“I shot a DPO once. But, the original problem remained, and I ended up with a host of new ones to deal with.”


That’s a good one Bainford!