Lotus Europa Community
Lotus Europa Forums => Garage => Topic started by: cal44 on Saturday,October 06, 2012, 06:41:29 PM
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I need to make sure this is right in my thought. The jacking point for the rear is just in front of the rear tire where the inner fender comes down.....right?
My reason for asking is, I believe the PO cut away some of the glass to get to the fuel tanks.....I think.
I placed the floor jack under the drivers side and notice (and heard) some damage while getting the car up in the air.
Does the glass go all the way under the gas tanks? or does it go just half way? I need a reference point.
Lucky for me I live in a boating repair community. I will ask around and find out the proper cloth and resin for strength. I am also thinking about cutting in on both bottoms and installing some gussets (balsa wood) for a little back up during jacking operations.
Layer, sand smooth, layer, sand smooth........and on.
Mike
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Hi Mike,
I know the owners manuals tell you to use the fibreglass bodywork for jacking up the car, but personally I prefer not to.
At the front I normally place the jack under the central cross member and lift both front wheels. At the rear I normally lift off the rear chassis loop (where the gearbox end mounts are) by using a wooden spacer to make sure the jack doesn't slip. If I just want to raise one wheel then I put the jack under the box section trailing link, as close to the wheel as possible.
The horizontal fibreglass directly under the tanks is only thin, about 1/8", and completely seals off the tanks from the road making a proper compartment for the tank. To replace either petrol tank I think the only way is to cut out these sections, lift the car & drop the tanks out from underneath. (at least that's the way I replaced mine)
I used 2 sheets of thin aluminium pop-riveted in place over the holes rather than replacing the fibreglass; if I ever need to do anything with the fuel lines then it's drill out the rivets for much better access.
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Fine idea B,
Maybe I will go one step further.
Fashion a multi point lift bracket to go under the rear frame, then comes down to a 1/4" flat plate. Make sure it fits in the back stow away box behind the engine then weld it up. That way many kinds of jacks can be used.
Perhaps pieces of angle steel with flat rubber attached so as not to damage the frame and 3/4" to 1" mild steel thick wall pipe for the lift frame.
I'll think of something.
Mike
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Lucky for me I live in a boating repair community. I will ask around and find out the proper cloth and resin for strength. I am also thinking about cutting in on both bottoms and installing some gussets (balsa wood) for a little back up during jacking operations.
Layer, sand smooth, layer, sand smooth........and on.
Mike
I wonder if the glass bodies on these light weight cars aren't more like a surf board than a boat. Lucky for me I work with a great board shaper. Who'd have guessed this far from the ocean!
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I don't trust the points where the frame are bolted to the body. If I recall correctly there are only 8 bolts holding the body to the frame, (maybe 10 :confused: ) The fiber glass is so thin on the bottoms side of my car, I'm not comfortable picking it up in the rear except by way of the center of the transmission. But having said that here is one on a 2 post lift. Now this looks scary to me.
(http://www.lotuseuropa.org/gallery/albums/Zetec/Europa_on_a_2_postlift.jpg)
I have the same cut outs where my fuel tanks are as shown in this picture. I'm assuming this is a factory opening. As I recall I could not get my fuel tanks back in the body even with the frame off the car and ended up inserting through the bottom.
Reinforcing the corners may help to keep the floor jack or the jack-stands from poking a hole in the bottom, but again I'm more concerned about the frame falling away from the body.
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:huh: (http://www.lotuseuropa.org/LotusForum/Smileys/default/212.gif)
Oooohhh, I don't think I'd like to work under that, certainly not having to pull hard on anything ! But on the plus side, it does show the jacking points are strong enough to hold the car up ?
The cut outs are the same on my car so you could be right about them being OEM. To be honest I can't remember if I cut them or they were already there when I got the car. I do have vague memories of lying underneath and cutting away with a hacksaw blade, but in hindsight that might just have been to widen the hole to make the access better as in those days I was working with the car on axle stands, so not as much room.
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Was the center section between the body and the backbone covered with tape? Seems I recall peeling it off when I lifted the body off my car. I'm thinking the hole beneath the tanks may have been closed with similar tape. :confused:
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Now that I can remember ! There was no tape there, it was exposed & you could clearly see the backbone. If you had tape it sounds like a demon tweek by a PO to improve aerodynamics and get that extra 2mph out of it ;)
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Only the brake lines are covered by tape along the backbone. :)
Was the center section between the body and the backbone covered with tape? Seems I recall peeling it off when I lifted the body off my car. I'm thinking the hole beneath the tanks may have been closed with similar tape. :confused:
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I knew I remembered some tape somewhere along the bottom of the backbone. :trophy:
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Mine looked like gaffers tape. No pealing required. It just fell off onto the garage floor.
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Mine looked like gaffers tape. No pealing required. It just fell off onto the garage floor.
Ahh !! Chapman's secret weapon, the added lightness modification.... ;)
My brake lines go inside the central tunnel, so you can't see anything from underneath. They were like that when I got the car and considering how rusty they were I'd always assumed them to be OEM. Aren't they supposed to ?
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Mine is taped along the seams between the frame and under side of the body. Also, the seams between the splash gaurds and the body was taped.
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I don't know about other years or non-Federal cars, but mine has a notch at the point you mention on the frame in front of the rear wheel. It matches a bump on the original jack that came with the car. I was told (several times) by the PO that this was the only point to lift the car. I seem to recall an article an old issue of ReMarqe that talks about how bad it is to use the body as a lift point. I'll try to find it.