Lotus Europa Community
Lotus Europa Forums => Members Cars => Topic started by: richardi40 on Tuesday,December 17, 2019, 04:52:33 AM
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:newhere: Just found this forum,looks good.
Some years back, I subscribed to the Yahoo Europa Group, but never found it very user friendly, or useful (now defunct?). Also, looking at the Europa Register, that looks as if it hasn’t been updated since 2015. My car is now more Lotus Type 47A than the 1970 Europa S2 as it started life:- Courtesy of Banks Europa and some of my own efforts, it now has Type 47 bodywork, a semi-race Lotus Big Valve Twincam engine, Type 47 exhaust, Banks loom, Banks AVO suspension, GLTL scheme, etc etc.
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:Welcome: Richardi!
The out-of-date registry is a constant source complaint around here. My 74 TCS ins't in it. In fact I think most of the Europas on the road now were still hiding in a barn somewhere when the registry was last updated.
Let me be the first in a chorus of forum members to say we would LOVE to know more about your awesome sounding 47A with LOTS of pictures!
Cheers,
Tom (aka Surf)
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:Welcome: Richard!!
This is the perfect place to share your Europa passion. Membership is really close to a 1,000. Glad you found the forum.
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Richard :Welcome: I also have a 70 Europa. Love what you have done. My steering wheel is on the sinister side being sent to the left side of the pond. My car came to me with a partial Gold Leaf paint job. Could you please post a picture of the door so I will know where to put the graphics?
Sandy
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:Welcome: Richard!!
Your car looks great but I'm afraid we'll all want to see more of it an learn all the details! She's looks too good not to share! :)
Edit: I forgot to post the new home of the old lotuseuropa yahoo group in case you want to try it again. https://groups.io/g/LotusEuropa (https://groups.io/g/LotusEuropa)
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Hi Richard, and another :Welcome:
A lot of us here have either migrated or have dual membership with the Yahoo group which has recently stopped due to Yahoo pulling the plug. I never got on with the individual email format of the older newsgroup style and opted for the digest format but even then I had to search through pages to find message replies. So I find this forum much easier to use however the Yahoo group has moved to Groups.io which apparently offers a similar service.
It's very early days and it looks as if the basic free service won't replace everything Yahoo offered but should you want to explore that option I reckon it will be around for a while yet.
Brian
ps - now that is one fast looking car !
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:Welcome:
What a fantastic looking car. Gives me some crazy ideas.
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Welcome to the forum, Richard. Your Europa is gorgeous. Like the others, I'm interested in learning more about it. Cheers :beerchug:
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Here’s some of background of my ownership of the car. I have lots of photos of the car, both in action on the race track and also during the whole build process, and some while at Banks, and some at home. I’ll stick a few on here. If someone is thinking of building a similar car, then the some of many pics that Richard Winter at Banks took during the chassis modifications, may be useful. Altogether, it was a quite few years project!
According to the Lotus archivist, the car was built as a UK car in early 1970, but converted by Lotus to type 65 spec (to meet a USA sales reqmt?). In 1986, the car was bought by Paul Kruger of Oklahoma, it then returned to UK in 1991, and then presumably reconfigured to RHD spec..
I purchased the car in November 2009 as a base for conversion into a Lotus 47A recreation. As bought, the car already had flared arches, Banks side windows and some body and some interior mods. It drove very well with it’s nice tuned Renault engine, but for my project, the engine had to be changed to a Lotus engine.
The car was delivered to Banks Europa in early 2010. Richard Winter modified the chassis and fitted a semi-race Lotus Twincam engine, Banks TC gearchange, body mods (NACA ducts, door scoops etc). Car was collected Sept 2010.
I then commenced the other bodywork modifications - removal of frogeye front indicators and door handles. Body was then removed for all the other necessary chassis jobs.
Banks subsequently supplied the uprated AVO suspension, Type 47 exhaust, new loom, Davies Craig water pump system, the correct cables, pipework, correct body fasteners etc.
With the body refitted, the twin Weber carbs, Facet pump and Luminition systems were fitted, twin fuel tanks installed, etc. I also installed a proper metal bulkhead structure to accommodate substantial mounting bars for the 6-point Willans harnesses.
The car was then sent for painting in correct Gold Leaf Team Lotus scheme. Although the bodywork had virtually no crazing or cracking, the finished job was far better than Lotus ever achieved! The body shop people were very excited to work on the car, and after over 8 weeks in their care, the result was outstanding.
To finish the car off, I fitted a fully plumbed-in Lifeline fire extinguisher system, FIA battery cut-off system, a pair of light weight 12v race batteries, a set of wider Revolution Wheels fitted with Toyo Proxes 888R tyres.
Before putting the car on the road, I took the car to Sigma Engineering in Dorset for a rolling road session. Sigma did a superb job, retiming the ignition, rejetting the twin Webers, changing plugs etc. Even with the high lift cams, they managed to tune the engine such that it starts on the button, ticks over nicely and delivers smooth power right up to around 170bhp at 7000rpm.
Since finishing the car in 2014, it has been remarkably reliable – the only modifications necessary has been fitting a big red oil pressure warning light. This was required after an oil gauge pressure line failed, thankfully without damage to the engine. Also some wheel clearance body mods were required for full lock.
Used on the public road, it's OK but not the ideal road car! However, when on the track it is truly sublime. Not surprisingly, it tends to attract quite a lot of attention. In the last couple of weeks, I’ve been having fun on the Goodwood circuit. I thought that it may be a bit legless on the long straights there, but it held up very well on every part of this great circuit.
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Thanks for the bit of history and bigger picture! I know I'm not the only one here who'd want more pictures! She's a real beauty and it seems her motor and suspension are properly done, too!
I'm really looking forward to more pictures (did I mention that already?)!
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:Welcome: Richard.
Beautiful job on that 1970 Europa. What is your serial number? I just hung my plate on today after 25 years in my garage. That was my first choice in paint schemes but went a different direction.
You definitely have a screamer there. Can’t wait for more pics.
Dakazman
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:Welcome: Richardi40
Glad your here and can’t wait to see more detailed photos of your car. Really looks amazing and can’t believe you drive it on the road!
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Hello Richard!
:Welcome:
What a beautiful car!
I also live in Somerset (on the southern tip of Exmoor) - it's great to know that there's yet another Europa in the South West!
Mark
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Hopefully here’s a few pics from ‘as bought’ to finished car. It seems that I may have to upload any photos in twos, as the site doesn’t appear to like multiple files.
I mentioned that the car has been super reliable, however on the last few laps of Goodwood, I felt a distinct rear wheel steering effect. Not nice. I have now just discovered a radius arm mounting failure. Clearly, pounding round a race track does accelerate component wear rate.
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A couple more - as bought and as finished
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I'll try 3!
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Try 4!
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Richard,
You can upload as many pictures as you want (though there must be some limit??). When you click on "Attachments and other options" you then click on choose file (which you obviously already know), then click on "more attachments" for each additional picture. You should get a "more attachments" under your last picture. The one limitation I do know is that each picture (or file) must be 1 MB (or 1024KB) or less. There are instructions for resizing your pictures (I love your big pictures but for some with small screens, it might be tough to view the whole pictures at one time) here: http://www.lotuseuropa.org/LotusForum/index.php?topic=1379.0
There are many ways to resize pictures but most people seem to prefer that one.
I can't wait for more pictures!
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Hello Richard,
:Welcome:
You have a wonderful car! I love the S2 car with a twin cam, as I much prefer the S2 bodied cars but love the heritage of the twink.
I will enjoy hearing about your adventures building and driving the car.
Cheers, :beerchug:
Ross