Slap bang in the middle of Lotus ownership!

[r055]

Just picked up my elise today from Sheffield and was given the warm Lotus welcome by it breaking down on my first journey home!
Drove for about 200 miles from full tank - majority of them on motorway at 70/80mph...

I was driving at 75mph then all of a sudden she had no accelleration at all. my peddle was at a steady angle then nothing. I pulled over onto hard shoulder, stopped (temperature was at 83deg), then the engine just cut out. I waited a few minutes then started up again - drove for a quarter mile, then same again.

I had a quick look in engine bay for any obvious signs of something wrong but nothing stood out.
Called the RAC to come out. Waited an hour and a half at side of road, then out of boredom, i tried to start it again. This time it ticked over fine for about 5 minutes, so I decided to chance it to the nearest petrol station 15 miles away.
I made it there ok, so chanced the remaining 35 miles home and it was fine.

Do these symptoms ring any bells to anyone? I have narrowed it down to 2 things ....

1. The plug that goes into the throttle body had a solder-repaired wire - possible the heat from engine broke the connection.

2. When i got tpo the garage it decided that while i was there i might as well fill up again. When i unscrewed the filler cap, it released an enormous amount of air - is this normal to be built up as much? Long journey - full tank to empty - 1 hour roadside wait to slowly release the vacuum?

[mckeann]

not sure what it could be. One of the technical bods will sort you out though i'm sure.

Number 2 is perfectly normal though, so you can ignore that.

[Victor Meldrew]

is there not a charcoal filter that can sometime give problems connected into the fuel breather system... he wouldnt be pulling a vacumn and starving fuel would he?

[Gareth]

Kinda of similiar to Matts problem.
Maybe try out some of the recommendations in that post:

http://www.scottishelises.com/phpbb/vie ... php?t=4345

[robin]

1. The plug that goes into the throttle body had a solder-repaired wire - possible the heat from engine broke the connection.

2. When i got tpo the garage it decided that while i was there i might as well fill up again. When i unscrewed the filler cap, it released an enormous amount of air - is this normal to be built up as much? Long journey - full tank to empty - 1 hour roadside wait to slowly release the vacuum?

The Throttle Position Sensor (TPS) wiring could be an issue depending on which of the three wires is broken, check that all the wires are firmly attached - don't be shy to pull them about a bit, a gentle tug is OK - they should be firmly crimped but I have experienced wire failure where it looks OK until you realise it's sheered inside the connector!

I have repaired these in the past - it's possible to do a reasonable job, but it's a bit fiddly.

As a short term work around you can also just remove the TPS plug (when the ignition is off) - once the ECU knows that the TPS is "gone" it will ignore it and use some other metrics for working out whether or not the throttle is open; it probably won't run well at full throttle and may engage limp home mode (i.e. reduced rev limiter, no VVC), but it should drive fine around town.

The pressure in the tank is normal; for emissions' sake it is completely sealed and pressure differentials to atmospheric can occur for various reasons (draining tank, expanding fuel vapour, ...).

Cheers,
Robin

[r055]

Thanks Robin.
I had it out for most of the day today and there were no problems at all. From memory, I think its the yellow wire...

I had the plug out and connections seem fine. The soldered joint seems sound too as its tinned all the way round and solid enough.

[r055]

Eventually happened again!

was out in the liz tonight and my mate phoned me (who incidently was stabbed on Friday night, but thats another story), so I pulled over into a bus stop and kept the engine running- 10/15 minutes later i pulled away from bus stop and I lost all power shortly after.

The revs died down and then the engine finally cut out. managed to coast it to a safe place to stop
The temp reading was between 86 and 88 deg

left it for about 30/35 mins and started ok so limped home so i wasn't stranded anywhere!

Thinking it might have something to do with the temperature as the car was sitting, but doesn't explain the first time it happened - between 70 and 75mph driving up the m74 - surely the airflow should have cooled the engine down enough?
What temp should the fan kick in?
What are the main things i should check?

[ed]

bad luck mate, hope you get it sorted soon!

[CSK_423]

Eventually happened again!

was out in the liz tonight and my mate phoned me (who incidently was stabbed on Friday night, but thats another story), so I pulled over into a bus stop and kept the engine running- 10/15 minutes later i pulled away from bus stop and I lost all power shortly after.

The revs died down and then the engine finally cut out. managed to coast it to a safe place to stop
The temp reading was between 86 and 88 deg

left it for about 30/35 mins and started ok so limped home so i wasn't stranded anywhere!

Thinking it might have something to do with the temperature as the car was sitting, but doesn't explain the first time it happened - between 70 and 75mph driving up the m74 - surely the airflow should have cooled the engine down enough?
What temp should the fan kick in?
What are the main things i should check?

fan kicks in at 103 ???

does it mis fire or just die ? I would have thought something like coil, plugs ?

[robin]

Thinking it might have something to do with the temperature as the car was sitting, but doesn't explain the first time it happened - between 70 and 75mph driving up the m74 - surely the airflow should have cooled the engine down enough?
What temp should the fan kick in?
What are the main things i should check?

Can I just check exactly what model elise this is?

The indicated temperature at which the fan kicks in varies from car to car because of tolerances in the temperature sensors; it's usual for it to kick in somewhere between 98 and 104 though.

TBH, I doubt it's heat related as the engine really doesn't get that much hotter idling than driving, especially not given the cold ambient we have at present.

You need to be prepared to do a bit of detective work next time it fails.

(1) When it has stalled on you, does turning the ignition key make it crank? If it doesn't then you have probably got an immobiliser cut out.

(2) If you switch off everything and wait 30 seconds, then disarm the immobiliser and turn on the ignition. You should hear the whine of the fuel pump running for 5-10s. You can make sure you know what this should sound like by practicing on your car while it's working. If you don't hear the pump when it's in a failed state, then you might have an immobiliser or wiring fault in the fuel pump circuit.

(3) While it won't start but is cranking and the fuel pump primed you don't have an immobiliser or fuel pump wiring fault (probably). Next question is whether or not it's sparking - you need to get a loose spark plug well earthed and connected to distributor (note: if you have S2 this will be a bit different) - pull the lid down to make it dark in the engine bay. Then get volunteer to crank the engine briefly and check you get a blue spark for every 4th chug of the starter motor (about once every second).

If it doesn't spark then you're either looking at basic ignition problems (like coil, distributor cap, rotor arm or leads) or a failed crank position sensor.

(4) If it cranks, fuel pump primes and it sparks while cranking then you're probably looking at wiring faults in the fuel injector system or fuel pressure related problems. TBH it's hard to diagnose these road side - you might want to see if you can feel the injectors opening - I have never tried this - but while it's working, if you grab hold of one of the injector bodies you might just feel a bit of clicking inside as the injector opens/closes. Assuming you can feel that then next time it fails, get a volunteer to crank and see if it is opening the injectors at all (it will only open them in bursts once every couple of revolutions I think).

Cheers,
Robin

[r055]

Thanks again Robin.
I'll hopefully get a chance on Saturday to try all of the above.

Its a 99 reg 111s.

Ross

[robin]

Thanks again Robin.
I'll hopefully get a chance on Saturday to try all of the above.

Its a 99 reg 111s.

Ross

In that case I would also check the inter-coil pack wire - there are two coils on a 111s one for 1+4 the other for 2+3 and the common live for the second coil is bridged from the first coil - we had a non-starter with Shug's motor that in part at least was caused by this very wire not being connected!

Cheers,
Robin

[Rag_It]

Same problem as Robin described in my VX - it's a rubbish feeling!