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David A's Europa |
uropas were built from 1966 into 1975. There were approximately
9000 built over that period.
bought 2037R in 1982 from the then-current owner in Foster City CA
(near San Francisco). It's a Twin Cam model with the early 336
Renault transaxle. It's had a history of modification and most of the
history is lost. The serial number identifies it as the 37th
Federal (US Market) Twin Cam made (or was it the 38th?).
When I bought it the paint was new but the engine comparment was original black hiding the substantial amount of dirt and oil thrown around in there.
At some time in the past it had air conditioning installed. And then removed, leaving holes in the front trunk and *large* steel brackets, one a frame for the battery near the alternator, the other on the engine left front (thus forcing the battery move). These were very strong and very heavy brackets! I've removed the awful brackets and restored the battery (a 22NF) to the standard location.
The Brand Lotus wheels pictured above are no longer in use: they had some runout (3 were bad, 2 good). I sold the good ones to Jerry Rude and discarded the bad ones.
So I switched to 13x6 Compomotive 3-piece wheels (which had come with the car). But those leaked air and were 30 years old, so I scrapped them and bought Panasports (5.5x13, though I would liked to have 6.0x13).
In 1991 I took the engine out as it seemed a bit weak. Well, number 4 cylinder had some scoring due to (apparently) glass beads embedded in the head falling into the cylinders. Don't let a rebuilder glass-bead your cylinder head... The car is finally (in 2002) running again after a frame-off mechanical restoration. However, there is much more work to do.
One aspect of the restoration was repainting the frame. It had only very light rust (some of it under the factory original black paint). It also had very minor rippling at the very thin rear end area and a little denting on the bottom of the front tee from careless jacking (issues I ignored). It also had a small cut and crack on the frame top near the engine mount: a result of the installation of the air conditioner years before (removed before I bought the car). I had the cut-out piece restored (a patch welded in ) and the crack welded with a small piece added. I was initially reluctant to have it sand blasted (thinking of something softer), but in the end that's what I had done. Following this, I built a holder so I could have the europa frame up in the air where I could turn it around, holding it at each end. I gave it a complete preparation treatment according to the directions and then painted with POR-15. POR-15 is very thin so even with a brush the result is very smooth and shiny. I simply could not let myself use black though, too hard to see any dirt or to keep it clean.
Notice the sway bar on the ground. This mounts to the top-suspension bolt using small aluminum bars and rod ends (rose joints). It goes behind the sprints and a down-link (pictured) goes to the rear of the bottom shock mount bolt. I don't know who designed this sway bar mount. It's design is good (it hides nicely under the body but above the ground) but a few details are not impressive: the tabs welded on the bar are not quite in the right places -- there is sufficient adjustment but it was surely a one-off design.
The door pull is a U-shaped bit of steel (14 gauge?, perhaps 10 inches long, 1/2 inch wide) covered by the blue vinyl of the inside door panel. The picture actually shows the steel uncovered (a bit of surface rust too) inside the door pocket. See arrow, and perhaps you can see the hole in the steel band. The factory just screwed thru the two holes in the steel into the very thin fiberglass. This did not seem very strong to me, given the weight of the windows and window motor. So I made two small bits of .040 inch thick aluminum, each a rectangle about 1.5 in. wide x .75 in. tall with holes for pop rivets, a center hold, and a spring clip which accepts a screw. Note the inch scale for reference. Clip on the clip, pop rivet to the door-pull sides (on the Inside of the door), and one has a firm item to screw into to hold the door pull steel. Here is a picture after riveting. All the pop rivets do is hold it in place when the inner door panel is out for maintenance.
I also sanded the engine compartment fairly smooth (not taking off too much material) and painted gray, not black. Again, black is just so hard to deal with, dirt is not visible. I just could not bring myself to use factory black paint in the engine compartment. I put a layer of fiberglass over the engine compartment side of the firewall (A bit thicker than I really needed). Then glued on a layer of aluminum-covered insulation. (from Aircraft Spruce). Looks rather nice at present, and much easier to live with than the nasty factory jute. Note the black rod from behind the water tank over the battery to the firewall. This is a remade design for the shoulder harness (5 point safety harness installed). the idea is just like the factory: bolts to the upper shock mount, goes thru the fender with 4 bolts and nuts and plates, and then to the harness. But it's lower down to get to the middle of the seat area. Would not work well with a full size battery as the rod goes right thru the place a bigger battery would be, but the Odyssey PC 680 is plenty of battery.
I've installed a new radiator (Sep 2005) acquired via the europa list group buy. It's made by Macs Radiator, is all aluminum, and has a screw-in temp sensor. Fits just like standard. I did have to reverse the fan blade and wiring to get the fan to push efficiently: as received it pulled air (wrong direction!). Very nice. No more watching the temperature guage and worrying all the time. Stays cool and on hot days the fan comes on reliably and cools things down.
There was a rear sway bar, but it went thru holes in the body near the tail lights and I've glassed those over, restoring the body. So no rear sway bar at present.
The left rear upright and axle and and Banks springs and shocks Dave-Bean lower link show here, along with bits of the frame and the shift linkage (grey tube running off to upper right). Note specially the ujoint straps and bolts (for more on this see below).
I used Safety Retainer Washers on the rod ends (from www.pegasusautoracing.com). everywhere there are rod ends that don't have another retainer.
Gearbox mounts for the 336 gearbox are only somewhat available and they are all 30+ year old New Old Stock and made of rubber. Here are a few notes about them. There are also some notes about the flexible gearbox mounting there, including how much the gearbox moves in a 1G corner.
I aligned the suspension and set the corner weights Jan 1,2006. The factory official unladen weight is 1513 pounds (per shop manual). The weights here are with full fuel tanks and with my weight (155 pounds) in sandbags in the driver seat. No spare tire (don't carry one), and a little Odyssey battery in the standard location. Engine, transaxle are stock. Rear stub axles are from Barry Spencer and a little heavier than stock (and much sturdier). No brake booster system. The scales are 8 ordinary bathroom scales, so the numbers could easily be off by 10 pounds (more?)(not good accuracy here).
Weight balance 1/1/2006 Left Right Tot Pct Front 343 319 662 41.22 Rear 487 457 944 58.78 Tot 830 776 1606 Pct 51.68 48.32
The europa rear window uses a sealing/install that is quite
like the Elan windshield: a long piece of shaped rubber
that grips the glass on one side, the fiberglass on the other, and
a final strip of thin material that helps keep it all together.
The rubber bits look like this.
It's also complicated on the Europa by the need to have the interior
upholstery and the strip providing an air gap for the air exhaust
over the rear windows both trapped *under* the rubber.
The install of the initial larger rubber is not too hard, but
you really need two people to do it, as the window is long and
nothing stays in place by itself till it's all done...
The final small (triangular) strip then must be inserted into
the larger rubber to trap things. For this a
tool from www.frost.co.uk comes in very handy indeed.
The trick here is to realize that the entire diamond shaped
wire bit goes into (spreads) the tiny slot. So even though the
tiny rubber (which must have its 'pointy end' pointing into the larger
rubber) comes in after the diamond passes, it was spread so wide
that the small rubber fits. I'll bet that makes no sense to you.
It does take some force and some soapy water, but it goes very fast.
Because one cannot reach the tool into the tight corners very well
(unlike the Elan windshield) due to the body interfering, a small tool
like a screwdriver may be used to tuck in any final edges of the
tiny rubber strip. I spent hours by myself on the small strip to no avail
before I had the tool (maybe got 25 percent done, and
was getting no further). With a second person
and the tool it was all done in an hour.
There are 4 rivets helping hold the window frames to the door fiberglass. Under the rubber/fabric in the channel. A standard pop-rivet gun can't reach into the channel to properly rivet the frames back in. So I made the following little adapter from a bit of steel rod I had laying about. The threads I simply cut with a standard die (I did not thread on the lathe, just cut the basic shape there). Having cut the thru hole and threads and machined the long neck I simply cut it off the steel rod and was done. Almost.
The ruler alongside the part for comparison is measured in inches. It replaces the standard extension and is thin enough to reach into the channel easily. After making it I realized I needed a little nub so that on opening the pop rivet gun the rivet nail would free up. So as an afterthought I brazed (welded) on a bit of brass alloy under the threads.
The wheels are difficult to center using the factory wheel nuts. So I made tools pictured here. I use these two to get the wheels located then snug up the wheel using two factory nuts then remove the tools and do the other two wheel nuts. Of course now I'm using Panasports with conical steel nuts and conical steel seats on the wheel, so these wheel center tools are no longer of too much use.
It was not too much help with the Brand Lotus wheels. The Compomotive wheels seem to be better made though. There is still radial runout at the rear due to the marginal factory hub-spline design. No, there is no 'taper' in the wheel holes, but a hand snugging of the tools requires no taper. Of course now I'm using Panasports with conical steel nuts and conical steel seats on the wheel, so these wheel center tools are no longer of too much use. And I have a much more substantial rear axle design in use, see below.
Another handy tool (purchased, not made by me) is a hubpuller. Here's one set up to be used. I think I got it from Harbor Freight.
I was not happy with the length of the stock wheel studs yet did not want to drill out the hubs. So I ordered a set from a Spitfire specialist in England, Jon Wolfe. They are 12.5x1.5mm and are a good fit in the existing hub stud holes and are at least 1/2 inch longer than stock.
I completed the engine rebuild in 1996 and the engine sat on a stand till 2002.... All the moving parts replaced except crankshaft and rods and jackshaft, which were crack-tested.
The rear hubs/stub axles are now quite special. The stub axle is a specially made piece with GM 32 MM nuts on each end. The outer end is a Spicer piece with holes for the stock wheel studs. The inner end is also stock Spicer with straps and bolts to hold the u-joint in. The outer ujoint is GM standard. The actual axle shafts had to be shortened a bit. No spaces and good support everywhere. Can use stock bearings, but is using a wider inner bearing.
The wiring is based on Enos Custom Components wiring and fuse box (making me a DPO, I guess). So it has 18 fuses and each wire has a (different) color and every 4 inches has the words on it saying what it is. The infamous relay-box is gone: to activate brakes and turn signals independently thru a single bulb I use pairs of large diodes. The lights and radiator fan are arranged with relays. I have a wiring diagram on paper (a bit messy), but have not yet drawn it on the computer. The door windows use 16 guage wire, but don't have relays: they do have 1980 vintage Arrow switches that fit and look like original. I know the windows do not slide easily (doing it by hand before assembling to the door proved that) but astonishingly the window motors are so strong that the windows move up and down quite well.
The odometer is a TPI/Daytona electronic unit, and the sender is driven off a the stock 336 transmission gear thru a 6 inch cable. So gear/cable is unlikely to break or wear out, being so short. The instructions with this meter are pretty poor, I had to call tech support to calibrate the thing. But at least it can be recalibrated as necessary for ones wheel/tire size by driving the car a measured mile.
The tachometer is stock-appearing but the internals were changed to voltage-sensing. This has the odd effect that for the first while the tach does nothing. After a 50 yard drive it figures out the situation and starts reading.
John Zender's front brake kit is installed (vented discs, Wilwood calipers).
Front/rear springs/shocks are Banks Europa items, with Banks AVO shock setup. This lowers the car some, but not really low (unfortunately: but it's my fault, not Richard Winters, I just did not communicate well with him and the options were not clear). (There are a *lot* of options and it was, in retrospect, too hard to make sense of them on the phone, at least for me.) I measured 1 front sprint at 200 lb/in. The rear would (to balance wheel rates) likely be 120 lb/in, but not measured yet).
Plans include:
