Lotus Europa Community
Lotus Europa Forums => Garage => Topic started by: Gmg31 on Monday,March 28, 2016, 12:07:12 PM
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Throughout my restoration project I have been concerned about how thin the cabin floor is. Then last week I watched the Overhaulin Europa episode and they too were clearly very concerned. They laid down 2 layers of glass and then a tailored honeycomb panel before another 2 layers of glass. So my questions are.
What are members views on the need to do this.
Have any members done this like this or differently.
Is this method a bit overkill.
Where can I get that honeycomb board.
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In my opinion, the Overhaulin guys went way into over kill. If you're concerned about the strength of your floor, I would recommend a layer of mat or two that wraps up a few inches on the vertical sides of the backbone and window sides. If you really want to get serious, you could add a layer of cloth between layers of mat, but I think that's probably more than you'd need. Make sure you get rid of all the paint and dust before you lay down the mat and get all the bubbles out when you apply the resin.
I thought I read somewhere that 7upjohn (the owner of the Overhaulin car) said that the stuff they did on his floor ate up valuable vertical space.
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Another option is to bolt a thin sheet of aluminum to the outside of the floor panel secured by the four bolts holding the seat down. The S2 seats have a thin sheet of steel for the seat bottom, the twinks have nothing except the rubber webbing holding the seat foam bottom. There were times while driving my TCS where I would have tightening of the sphincter when driving over debris on the road I couldn't avoid.
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I am sure some reinforcement would help. The body man that did my dad's Elan+2 said that he had seen a Europa back in the day that had a stick or chunk of pole come up through a Europa floor board only to get stopped by the seat. But I am guessing chunky would argue that you should have never hit or driven over the stuff in the first place with the superior handling of his cars. :D
Ross
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Another option is to bolt a thin sheet of aluminum to the outside of the floor panel secured by the four bolts holding the seat down. The S2 seats have a thin sheet of steel for the seat bottom, the twinks have nothing except the rubber webbing holding the seat foam bottom. There were times while driving my TCS where I would have tightening of the sphincter when driving over debris on the road I couldn't avoid.
After I posted my reply, I thought about aluminum sheet. I believe the sheet in the tub of my Sports 2000 Lola T492 - you know, back in the dark ages - was about .040 thick. A piece of that would be plenty additional strength and armor for those times Grumblebuns mentioned.
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I put a sheet of fiberglass mat on the floor boards in my TCS. Also got a couple of pieces of sheet metal (I forget the gauge) for under the seats. I bolted between the seat rails and floor, using the seat bolts.
Seemed the least I could do to, you know, protect my junk.
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great.
before reading this, i was perfectly happy w/the floor.
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I didn't touch my floor and I'm happy with it. I can only think that some cars are victims of Lotus quality control. If you were happy with it before, there's no reason not to be now.
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Personally I thought the Overhaulin' team's approach was a bit OTT on the floor, I just didn't get that part. If you wanted to stiffen up the structure surely you'd look at the side sills which is what Lotus did with the S1 elise, which incidentally also has a very thin (1mm ? 2mm ?) aluminium floor albeit with stiffening ribs.
If you think about it you don't put a lot of weight on to the floor and the seat spreads your weight over the attachment points which rarely (if ever ?) fail. Whilst it looks a questionable design under modern eyes I think we need to put it into perspective; they built nigh on 10,000 of the things and while I accept something could punch through the floor, it's not a common occurrence, is it ?
The whole car is lightweight and if you look hard at the side sills or doors then you see 3mm GRP. The front & rear wings, roof, windscreen pillars, in fact most of the car is thin GRP and side impact protection is a few years away with these cars. Added lightness or skimping on the resin ? It's Lotus.... you decide :)
Brian
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Overall I feel my TCS is at least nearly as safe as a modern motorcycle.
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Overall I feel my TCS is at least nearly as safe as a modern motorcycle.
:)
You made me smile there Mark, that's pretty much the way I look at them as well. They're definitely not made for leaning on things !
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And you don't get bugs in your teeth! :)
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I used to like the sound of bugs bouncing off my crash helmet- as long as they don't get inside.
The floor on mine is about 2mm thin - not sure if that's a lightweight racing body, or standard. I was thinking of reinforcing it. Definitely no stiletto heels allowed - can't find them in my size anyway!
I was going to put an ally shield under the floor anyway, but might also put an extra layer or two in the floor
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A little alum work while I wait to remove the body.
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Alternative to consider is laying some Kevlar and bonding it on the floor. Kevlar has very good penetration resistance properties and would be lighter than an ally sheet.
Dave
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I found this stuff on line. Looks very interesting
http://www.easycomposites.co.uk/#!/core-materials/closed-cell-foam-and-3dcore/3d-core-pet100-foam-core.html
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Well it turned out that I had a real GRP fibreglass expert only a few miles away and after discussing this with him he recommended Combi matting and Crystic resin. The matting is 2 layers of fibreglass topped with an extra tight woven mat which is all stitched together. The resin is apparently the toughest you can buy and my local expert insisted that I only need one layer. He tells be he used it repair a mini submarine once and it's still in daily use. So that's this weekend plan.
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This stuff is amazing, so easy to cut and fit and because it is woven and stitched it stays together even when it's soaked through with resist. It goes almost transparent when wet and sets rock hard.
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Buzzer has the right idea if penetration is your concern. Layers of fiberglass or thin aluminum isn't going to do much, kevlar on the other hand will stop bullets. But as for the Foose Europa, has anyone seen that car run or drive? Outside of the engine running once when they installed it, I have yet to see a youtube video of the car driving around.
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(part quote) But as for the Foose Europa, has anyone seen that car run or drive? Outside of the engine running once when they installed it, I have yet to see a youtube video of the car driving around.
Yep, there have been a few short videos posted. The owner is "7upJohn" on this forum and he's posted a few times of progress made after the show finished. It's fair to say that the car wasn't fully operational at the end of the show but John & others have been sorting out the bugs. He's taken it to shows and it's been very popular with the punters.
This is the thread on the car http://www.lotuseuropa.org/LotusForum/index.php?topic=338.210 (http://www.lotuseuropa.org/LotusForum/index.php?topic=338.210)
But as for reinforcing the floor, especially to the extent they did on the Foose Europa, well that escapes me. Each to their own though, it'd be a dull world if we all thought alike.
Brian
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Alternative to consider is laying some Kevlar and bonding it on the floor. Kevlar has very good penetration resistance properties and would be lighter than an ally sheet.
Dave
Buzzer I bought some Kevlar for mine. Just make sure your Epoxy is warm because kevlar has a hard time soaking up the resin. I would advise to vacuum bag it. While we are on the topic, I have a friend who works in the aerospace cabinet making business and he offered me some scrap honeycomb panels that are skinned in GRP. I was thinking about getting him to cut the scraps on his router to make a reinforcement for the lower sill. Part of me wants to embrace the motorcycle aspect of the car but the other part is concerned about losing my manhood to a construction site (our entire highway system is currently one). Motorcycles do offer pretty good testicle protection if nothing else.
I also went to a load of trouble to do a carbon/kevlar firewall. Way overkill in price, time, and trouble... If I could do that over I would have just bought marine grade plywood and fully enclosed it in GRP.
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The Crystic resin took quite a long time to set so during that time I had several opportunities to use a flapper roller to ensure full penetration and no air bubbles. Cost was never a concern on this job but it actually only cost me £35
On the subject of other reinforcing products check this out.
http://www.easycomposites.co.uk/#!/core-materials/closed-cell-foam-and-3dcore/3d-core-pet100-foam-core.html
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What do folk think about this 'woven roving' mat? Looking at doing the same thing.
https://www.ebay.co.uk/ulk/itm/121332748564
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I would use woven kevlar matting rather than glass.
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It certainly looks like it will do the job. You do need a lot of resin for this job. I used a full liter on each side and then once it had set I put another half liter on top of each side. Don't forget to buy a flapper roller as well. I would also recommend buying a large bottle of acetone in case of mistakes. I rather clumsily got some in my hair and if I hadn't bought the acetone I would have had to shave my head!!!
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I've bought some Carbon/Kevlar hybrid mat from ebay, and some marine grade epoxy resin (as I read online that it's the stuff to use with Kevlar). It should arrive this week. I'll post an update when I've done something with it.... or when I find I can't cut it :D
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Epoxy resin is more difficult to handle than polyester and much more difficult to work, but it does have a longer working time, on a flat floor it will be ok. It is stronger and bonds better to anything. But NOTE you will not get polyester resin to bond to the epoxy if you need to do any other work on the body. Be interesting to see how it works out.
Dave
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Epoxy resin is more difficult to handle than polyester and much more difficult to work, but it does have a longer working time, on a flat floor it will be ok. It is stronger and bonds better to anything. But NOTE you will not get polyester resin to bond to the epoxy if you need to do any other work on the body. Be interesting to see how it works out.
Dave
Thanks for the tips Dave. I think It's probably worth the aggro for the floor. I can always use epoxy resin if I need to do more repairs in the future, or go from the other side of the floor
Do I need to layer some fibreglass mat on top of the carbon/kevlar to keep it sealed up?
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I don't think you will need to lay up any fibreglass on top and I don't think it will add anything, I think it will be a better finish with the Kevlar. the key bit is bonding to the floor.
dave
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Don't over do it. There needs to be some flexibility in the floor.