dodgedavidson

Well done, all I managed to do was split mine. First the ring went out of round, then the boot split when I'd almost got it on. Hey ho, I put the old one back on with a bit of black gaffer wrapped round it. 6 months and several trackdays later, all in one piece and not leaking any grease :-) If I need to fix it I've decided it's not worth the time and hassle for less than £20 extra to replace the complete rod end. Roger

LOL, they're probably mine, Dave's just upgraded my engine with forged pistons a couple of weeks ago :-)

Congrats Stuart, great to hear a good story. Took about 4 weeks from seeing mine to driving home as the dealer didn't want to take it out in the wet :-) It was kind of pristine though. 2 years on and loving it, not quite so pristine after lots of trackdays :-) Cheers, Roger

Some help and advice please. Does anyone have a spare pair of black cycle wings? I'm converting from flared wings and Caterham are out of stock of black ones. Any advice/experience on 3rd party ones kit-car trader kitcardirect, ebay,.....? I also need headlamp brackets, I've got 7" lamps, standard S3 not wide track front suspension, will the new brackets that mount on the top wishbone work? https://caterhamparts.co.uk/brackets/4447-headlight-bracket-lh.html Cheers, Roger

I swapped 5 speed to 6 speed in my 1.6K a couple of months ago. For track use it's much better and I love it, really helps keep the engine buzzing. On the road it's fine, just have to shift more frequently but to be honest with the closer ratios you can easily just skip a gear. I'm still running a 3.92 diff which means about 4000rpm at 70 but then I don't do much motorway cruising. I bought a race box that just been serviced by Road&Race, only downside with a race box was it's fitted with the race crossgate detent spring, great for 3-4-5-6 but stiff going into 1-2 and real force to get into reverse. The upgrade is not insignificant in terms of cost and effort. Finding a decent box, fitting, plus you might as well put in a lightened flywheel and new clutch while you got everything apart then you could put that money towards a car that already has a 6 speed box. Cheers, Roger

I'm after 4 wheel nuts (M12x1.5) with the separate washers to match the ones on the car already. Does anyone have some or know of a good source, Caterham don't seem to have the washers any more on their site. Cheers, Roger

Yep, Andrew's is the same as mine the LMA one but I got it from Demon Tweeks ebay store http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/LMA-Oil-Pressure-Remote-T-Piece-For-Gauge-Fitment-Race-Rally-Motorsport-/310846011163

Don't know if you've had any luck. I was looking to do the same when I fit my Apollo on my 2006 S3 K Series. I traced the Black/Yellow from down by oil pressure sender back to the engine loom connector on the rail under the inlet manifold. There's no connection on the vehicle side of the plug! I was debating about getting the bits for the loom plug but decided by the time I've fiddled around it will be quicker to run a new wire all the way. Cheers, Roger

I fitted mine this evening on my K Series, LMA Remote Kit with M12x1.5 connector, 500mm long pipe. I decided in the end the best mounting point was on the horn post on cross member so I've relocated the horns to the front of the cross member. Fits nicely and all working just need to tidy up the wiring as I ran out of spade connectors, doh! I was a bit surprised how much oil came out but had an old takeaway container handy to catch it.

Weird, I've just ordered the LMA one earlier this evening from Demon Tweeks http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/310846011163. General consensus seems to be mount the sender on the chassis rail away from the engine vibrations.

@DRH, the 6 speed box will take the speed sensor from the 5 speed but my box didn't have a speedo drive worm gear fitted on the gearbox mainshaft, no easy fix for that. Fitting a wheel sensor was dead simple, I followed this BC post https://www.lotus7.club/forum/techtalk/change-gearbox-speed-sensor-wheel-speed-sensor-k-series It was a doddle, less than £30 for the sensor and I made my bracket from a piece of aluminum sheet I had left over. Recalibrate the speedo, job done. Cheers, Roger

Hi Rob, that was me :-) used it a few times for work, so far only got wet once. Off to Cadwell on Thursday, must get a coffee in B2 sometime, I'm on 2nd floor. Cheers, Roger

Hi Simon, I've PM'd you. Cheers, Roger

Hi, did you get it fixed? I have a spare Caterham gearbox speed sensor now as I've fitted a 6 speed box and wheel speed sensor. Cheers, Roger

Hi, do you still have the gear knob?

Well I've been in the garage this evening to fit my air duct. Couldn't get the IAT sensor out of the backplate with reasonable force so I erred on the side of caution and ordered a second hand one for a tenner which can be my roving IAT while I take some measurements, with and without the duct, then decide where to fit it more permanently. Going back to the beginning of the story I found my Emerald logs with IAT readings which set me on this path. Saturday 28th Jan - Ambient 9C (when I switched the ignition on) - after warming up @ 15:56 the IAT was showing 14C and after a bit of happy motoring 28C @16:29. Sunday 9th April - Ambient 19C - after warm up 25C @ 17:13 and after a bit of thrash 33C @17:30 That backplate gets pretty warm :-) Roger

@Superwhite R283 My IAT is in the same place.

Hi Jonathan, Good point, the two issues with the old setup which both impact engine performance 1) High temperature of the inlet air being sucked in from behind the rad. 2) High temperature reported by the IAT due to heat soak from being mounted on the Autoteknix airbox backplate. Making the mods for (1) won't be easily measured by the IAT without moving it as it's output seems to be dominated by heat from the backplate. The effect of cooler air entering the airbox won't be evident until the engine is up to temp with hot air coming through the rad by which time the backplate will be heating up too. So to get an reading before and after adding the new duct (it's easily removable) I'd wondered about tie wrapping the IAT to the air filter, only thing is the loom's not quite long enough. I might be able to get it close enough for a test. Will have a look this evening. To get a reliable reading of ambient air temperature for the ECU I've had a couple thoughts on repositioning the IAT. I'm not sure how susceptible they are to dirt and dust but... a) In Autoteknix airbox away from the backplate. There's a flat section at the far (rear) end but that means drilling the airbox to mount the IAT and if one of the nuts works loose it'll be straight down one of the trumpets :-( b) On my new air duct. Only thing is the loom isn't quite long enough as I said and it'll be sitting in unfiltered air. c) In the heater fan box. That gets ambient air through the bonnet louvres, it's sealed from the engine bay hot air and it'll be easy to fit as it's a plastic case. Ideas welcome and I'll report back on temperature findings. Cheers, Roger

Thanks all. I had a some time yesterday playing around with something that looks a bit like Myles and Steve's ones. Bought some aluminum sheet from Wickes (15% off this weekend) for less than £15. I did some sums on airflow, the airbox intake is 6.5cm diameter which is about 33 cm2. The space over the rad is about 25cm wide by 1.5-2.5cm high which is about 50cm2 so there should be sufficient air flow. I thought worst case I'm stopping the hot air from the rad getting into the intake. I could always put one of those small air scoops, that Merlin Motorsport have, on the side of the nose cone by the indicator. I made card templates and impressed myself with my metal bashing skills, photos of the air duct are here https://1drv.ms/f/s!AlHFjo1mUgofjahc5LCqaPNk3Hi50g I haven't decided what to do at the back around the airbox intake, didn't want to seal it up tight, engine movement, air pressure build up and all that sort of thing. To seal the slight gap between the nosecone and the air duct I could pop rivet a length of brush type draught excluder, we'll see. So hopefully cold intake problem solved. I shall move the ECU Air Temp sensor to the far end of the airbox to stop the heat soak and I've got a bit of ali left over to cover the existing hole in the backplate. Cheers, Roger

@Oily I had a look this morning and can feel the heat from the airbox backplane. I guess the intake is well away from the backplate with 90mm trumpets and the air is not hanging around long enough to get heated up much above ambient. Looking at the loom length, size of IAT and space under the bonnet, it might need be moved to the end of airbox ahead of the pedal box, would that work or is there a better position? Thanks, Roger

Thanks all, useful pointer to the alcester sevens site. @Oily I'll have a look over the weekend and drop you a line.

Hi all, Had my 1.6K tweaked by DVA including Jenvey's and Autotechnix airbox, it looks and sounds great. I was doing a bit of datalogging from the Emerald at the weekend and noticed the air inlet temp quickly gets up over 32C after a bit of a blat. It was a nice day but only about 15C. I know things get pretty hot under the bonnet anyway but the air filter intake for airbox is only a couple of inches behind the rad. As air density falls with temperature that's about 6% drop in engine power My thoughts are to fit an airscoop in the nosecone directly in front of the filter to get cooler air and make a baffle to divert hot air from the rad away from the filter intake. Alternative idea was to fit a hose to the airbox and position the filter low down with a scoop to draw air from below the rad. Was wondering what other people have done? Cheers, Roger

Success! I located the bottom mount, I found a photo of a bare chassis which helped a great deal. Here's what it looks like from inside. OK so it was the second hole I drilled. Managed to get a bolt screwed in Now the interesting bit. Dry fitted the bottom bolt and the strut is about 15mm short of the roll cage. Is that normal? Is the strut too short? Can you lean on the rollover bar when it's tightly bolted on to make it fit? Will the chassis bend enough? What's other people's experience? Cheers, Roger

Thanks guys, mystery solved. You're right, there was no connector but as I was tracing the other ECU connections I did find 3 unused connectors dangling: Post Cat O2 - 4pin, pins 3(BlueYellow), 27(GreenBlue), 29(BlueWhite) & 12V(BrownBlue), by scuttle Charcoal Canister - 2 pin, pin38(BlackOrange) & 12V(BownPink), by engine loom connector 3 pin connector - pins 69(GreenWhite),78(RedBlack) & Earth (Black), by scuttle - not sure what this is for? My next job is fitting an Apollo and I found the black/yellow bare wire for the oil temp sender tie-wrapped down by the oil pressure switch. It’s wired back to the engine loom plug but the corresponding connector on the vehicle side of the plug is blanked off! Cheers, Roger

Hi all, I wired up my Wide Band Lambda on my 1600K today, I have an Emerald with EU3 adapter cable, all working, a good day! It raised a question though. On the MEMS ECU connector, pin 37 (Red White) and Pin 47 (Blue) are wired up and I can see no reference to them in the Caterham's or Andrew Revill's wiring diagrams. Anyone know what these wires are for? Cheers, Roger