Chris K. sent me a private message that I thought might have general
interest for chapman-era, so I've forwarded part of it, with part
of my response to him, below:
Chris K wrote;
> about Elans. We (Pat and I) seem to have the disease. She thinks an
> early Elan would be a nice replacement for her FIAT turbo spider at
> some point. I can't disagree, except that she doesn't do really well
> with cars that misbehave or break. I've been through enough British
> iron now to know that "reliable" and "British" don't really go
> together, no matter how hard I work on the cars - you can get close,
> but not perfect. I can live with that, but I don't know if she can.
> How bad *are* the early Elans?
Chris, I think you are quite correct in believing that there will be
more effort involved with an Elan, than with a Fiat spider.
Close but not perfect, is a very good way of putting it!
How close depends on time and money, of course. If you go to the
effort of upgrading the generator to an alternator, beefing up the
frame in the areas that always crack (especially the motor mounts
and the forward diff mountings) and doing a little rework to the
harness to add more fuses (you know, the same kinda development
engineering stuff you have to do with ANY filbee!) you can end up
with a pretty reliable machine.
Not perfect, because you still have to worry about things like the
rear wheel bearings, the rotoflexes, and the water pump.
Actually, I'd be very interested in other people's responses to Chris'
questions, here on chapman-era. What are your thoughts on the right
upgrades to do (consistent with the bang-for-the-buck imperative, and
the minimum necessary impact to originality) to enhance reliability,
and stretch out the service / maintenance intervals, for an Elan road
car?
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