Scottish Elises

After 5 years of running Nitrons I decided to move the S1 back to a more road friendly setup and got the "S2 dampers for an S1 kit" from Lotus (MMC - with SE discount the cost (including a full new set of nuts and bolts to mount everything) was slightly less than a Steve Butts kit).

The lotus kit has a ride height of about 130 (I measured 125), which is fine as the car doesn't go back to beach buggy mode looks wise and gains a lot of usefull suspension travel.

Just had a few days to run the dampers in (they get smoother with some miles on the clock) and get used to the car again and it's a revelation . . . on anything apart from billiard table smooth corners the softer suspension generates more and more consistent grip, the increased droop travel (especially at the rear) means you need to be far less mindfull about the back of the car under power on yumps/jumps/etc . . .

All in all a great improvement I think, for a road car this has to be the choice I think, or a Steve Butts variant . . . however . . . his kits seem to change the front damper mounting brackets on the chassis, whereas the Lotus supplied kit changes the rears and leaves the fronts alone . . . perhaps Lotus have done something with the spring rates, or something, but clearly the kits are not the same . . .

As part of a large overhaul process on the car I also replaced the rear toe link balljoint inners - now clonk free when hot . . . but it's worth saying that the bolt threads (of the part that goes through the chassis and wishbone end) on the new type of balljoints are different from those on the original parts, so . . . if anybody is changing there parts then the new thread is M10x1 (fine pitch - must be to increase clamping pressure I think) rather than the more usual M10x1.5 (as per the originals), worth knowing as without a nyloc of that pitch you won't be able to re-assemble the car (and the balljoints don't come with that bolt fitted) . . . as I found out at 0130 the other night . . . I didn't fit a uniball kit as I'm unconvinced over the durability of the rose joints over the standard, totally sealed, balljoints - apart from the clonking the balljoints on my car still show no wear after 85K miles . . .

Fd

Good write up FD. Interesting to note the superiority of the Billies over the nitrons on the road for everyday use, something that had crossed my mind. What did you (generally?) have the nirtons set at, and what spring rates did you use?

Both of the toe-link ball joints i've bought recently (one inner & one outer) have been supplied as the lastest servive bulletin standard and have come supplied with a nyloc nut of the corret thread, as this was a concern of mine.

The nitrons were 300 (350?)/400 spring rates with the damping set to my preference for that spring rate probably lower 1/3rd of the range ish . . .

I've been thrashing the caterham this year a fair bit in anger and have always been surprised at the suspension compliance - it is well damped but there is a lot of usable suspension travel - like the S2 kit . . . and something that was missing from my Nitron install . . . the caterham is a terrible road car, but I now think that is a feature of a couple of things, 1. the geo setup is hugely camber steer sensitive, 2. what I thought was 60 on the speedo is actually 90 . . .

I also wonder if the Nitrons prevent the car fron rolling enough to allow the car to generate grip at sane road speeds . . . this year I've learned that you need roll to create grip . . . and overly sprung or damped suspension prevents roll . . . and thus reduces grip at sane speeds . . . the caterham rolls a lot and grips like a limpet . . . this new kit on the Elise is certainly grippier at road speed range . . .

Fd