The Lotus Grand Tourers

Really good post's, would anyone do an engine swap for the price of an lotus 2.2 engine with head gasket gone? It's got to be a good deal!! The carbies only are worth? Lot's, and all those other bit's.

your engine as is £400 if you are very lucky
Carbs if ok£400
starter and alternator £150
dizzy and ign. amplifier £50
total £1000
cheapest v 8 available- old rover v8 £250 rebuild £1000
exhaust manifolds about from mg v8 say £500 exhaust £200
carbs, £200
starter and alternator £150
total £2300
Engineering to chassis and new bell housing £1500 at least unless you can do it yourself.
you may diagree with some of the above estimates but the short awnser to your qauestion is NO.
i think that you have four options, fix the engine and enjoy the car say £400, fix the engine and sell the car, sell as is or, finally, get lotus bits to fit a replacement engine, £800 for engine plus fitting say £400 plus vat.

Also in my book £400 is an overestimate of the value of old/used unrestored DHLA45 carbs. £200 - £250 for a pair or ropey ones is more like it unless you wait for the unwary willing to pay over the odds.

If I were in your position (caught-out having bought a dog with no auto-mechanical knowledge and apparently little extra money to spend), I'd do as advised and find a 2nd hand Lotus 912 engine, fit it, then sell the car on to recoupe at least some of the money spent so far. Much easier to sell a complete runner with original parts than an abandoned transplant project.

Then, if you still really want another Excel, wait for a really good one to come along with no issues and be prepared to pay good money (£5K - £7K).

You can only run a Lotus on the cheap if you buy a GOOD one with NO issues OR you're prepared to do ALL of the work yourself and beg /borrow or steal the parts you need, because parts tend to be expensive.

You're not the first, and won't be the last, to be caught-out by the apparent low values of the 70's/80's 2+2 Lotus cars.

alanbell wrote:your engine as is £400 if you are very lucky
Carbs if ok£400
starter and alternator £150
dizzy and ign. amplifier £50
total £1000
cheapest v 8 available- old rover v8 £250 rebuild £1000
exhaust manifolds about from mg v8 say £500 exhaust £200
carbs, £200
starter and alternator £150
total £2300
Engineering to chassis and new bell housing £1500 at least unless you can do it yourself.
you may diagree with some of the above estimates but the short awnser to your qauestion is NO.
i think that you have four options, fix the engine and enjoy the car say £400, fix the engine and sell the car, sell as is or, finally, get lotus bits to fit a replacement engine, £800 for engine plus fitting say £400 plus vat.

And then you'll have to upgrade the brakes. No-one has mentioned that so far.

unless you increase the weight of a car the energy required to bring it to a halt from a given speed remains the same no matter how quickly it accelerated to that speed, indeed a high performance engine will exert a greater braking effect than a lesser one until the clutch is engaged. nevertheless i agree that upgrading the brakes on any excel is not a bad idea

sorry i meant to say until the clutch is DISENGAGED

This made me think about engine replacements.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1UZ-FE#1UZ-FE

Why hanv't anyone done it yet? :O seems to me that it is a quite good alternative.

yroll wrote:This made me think about engine replacements.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1UZ-FE#1UZ-FE

Why hanv't anyone done it yet? :O seems to me that it is a quite good alternative.

chap in NZ did it

I think that there is an issue here over ambition exceeding ability. The discussion has been interesting though.

Bash

Chap in Berkshire fitting a 1uzfe to an eclat with an excel chassis - but taking a long time!

mentioned further up this thread with that same wikipedia link included!

Cheers, Mat.

Have bearly any money, but willing to offer free tea to anyone close by with the tool's to change the head gaskets, I've grow attached to this car, I think sometime's you've got to get to know how to treat the car and I didn't realize what I was doing,what are these cars? Race cars right, it's not a GT car, it's not a run about. It's not really what I'd call a sports car. It's a race car.

Ps- do have some stuff to trade.

Another one.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Lotus-Elite-1 ... 8668333677
A holley390 or weber500 would get rid of the bulge.
Bash

Or alternatively, Mazda rotary !!!!
http://www.alsoranracing.com/?cat=7

Bash

257spring wrote:Have bearly any money, but willing to offer free tea to anyone close by with the tool's to change the head gaskets, I've grow attached to this car, I think sometime's you've got to get to know how to treat the car and I didn't realize what I was doing,what are these cars? Race cars right, it's not a GT car, it's not a run about. It's not really what I'd call a sports car. It's a race car.

Ps- do have some stuff to trade.

There just isn't that much tools needed you could buy them for like £20-30.
I changed my headgasket in about 5hrs, FIRST time ive done it on an lotus so quite fast.
Sadly i live in sweden and don't have ability to help you but i am sure u can find someone in the forum who is willing to help for a dinner, cup of coffe(tea for you haha) and 20 quid

bash wrote:Or alternatively, Mazda rotary !!!!
http://www.alsoranracing.com/?cat=7

Bash

That seems to bit a bit too much work for me lol