Esprit

Brad, The TPS is definitely dead (It's my old car BTW). In the E30 the TPS is more of a switch. It switches one way at low-throttle and idle, switches nothing through the midrange and then switches the other way when you near full throttle. I had a circuit tester on it and it's functioning fine at full throttle, but I'm getting no signal near idle. That's also why you can't access the diagnostic mode on the ECU because it's not registering the throttle presses that you need to do to put the car into diagnostic display. When I bridged out the connector to fake the idle signal on the TPS, the idle smoothed right out and returned to normal. So yeah, first step would be to definitely replace the TPS and go from there

Hope she does as well for you Brad as she has done for us. It's nice to see it go to an enthusiastic owner rather than to someone that's going to learn to drive in it or hack it to bits to modify it. It's a good straight shell and a good basis for modifying in future. Maybe in future I'll see you out at a trackday with Jack and I'll take you for a skid in the Exige.

Hi all, I'm selling my folks' long-serving 1990 E30 320i Sedan. The good: - Low KMs (~160,000) - Completely rust-free - Drives well, very smooth - Current reg/wof - Interior mint apart from cracked dash and wear on driver's seat The bad: - Running rich on idle/light throttle thanks to dead throttle position sensor - Paint a little oxidised on roof/bootlid, although being silver it hides this nicely. - Worn driveshaft doughnut, slight vibration at 60km/h or so. - Electric aerial and right rear electric window non-functional - Aircon needs regassing as no longer blows cold - Odometer no longer works (stopped dead at 136,000km about 2 years ago) - Right front guard has some small dents It's a good, solid car that my mother has used for the last 10 years or so for running around down to the shops and suchlike. Drives very well, and could benefit from a bit of TLC and a tune-up but would make a great daily driver / runabout for someone. I'd spend some time/money on it myself if I didn't already have one too many project cars. Got it on TM as $1 reserve, $1500 buy now. Will happily look at offers off here if they're reasonable, otherwise bid on the auction and you might pick yourself up a bargain. Message me through here or e-mail me on lotus_esprit_350 at hotmail dot com George. TM Link: http://www.trademe.co.nz/Browse/Listing.aspx?id=389451674 Pics:

Thing is, this happening for me without there being a "threaded" in the URL. I can get it back to linear by visiting a specific thread in linear, but EVERY time I do a forum search, it reverts back to threaded. Any way you can just turn the threaded option off? NOBODY uses it anyway!

Been following this project from afar It's starting to look good I don't suppose the car originally had a towbar on it did it? I'm looking at buying an early 6er as a daily but need tow capacity.

Awesome thanks Glenn, I'll pop in during lunch and pick them up

Oh and just to add a public thanks to Glenn who's been sorting me out... MASSIVE thanks to him for going well above and beyond the call to sort me out with the bits I need.

Haha Tom... the sad thing is that when your car is built from bits of a million different manufacturers you need to be omnipresent on forums to keep the whole show running! And Jed, Thanks! It's the very definition of something that's snowballed out of control but it'll be worth it when done, as I'm basically building one of my dream cars to my dream spec... something I'm very lucky to be able to do. I've been offered silly sums of money to sell the car and could have turned a VERY tidy profit on it, but it's not for sale* and I'll be keeping this one for the long term. * of course everything has its price, but you'd have to be insane to offer me a price I'd consider selling at.

Aah Josh, I recognise you from Antiform And yeah, I cross-post the blog on a few forums. A couple local, a couple international I'm a long-timer lurker around these parts

Thanks again Glenn, was good to talk to you. Many thanks for all your efforts! I've pasted below a link to the rebuild blog I'm doing on the car (it's been in the build for 2.5 years now, was only supposed to be a 6-month clean-up!). If you zip across to the most recent progress on the last few pages you'll see the work I've done around the gearbox oil cooler for the Quaife motorsport 6-speed gearbox I'm now running. Between this connector and the ECU multi-pin connector I thieved off an old, broken E36 DME ECU, this forum has proven quite helpful to me in securing those little BMW parts-bin bits that'll help me finish the job Lotus Exige S1 Rebuild

Glenn! You, sir, are a gentleman and a scholar! How do I go about ordering these? I'm assuming you're in parts at BMW NZ? I'm based in Auckland so can come in and pick them up and pay when I come in, else I can organise to pay by VISA and you can have them sent to me. So stoked... was fearing that this'd be one of those impossible-to-find bits and I'd have to improvise somewhat! *EDIT* Just seen your phone number, will give you a call today. Muchos Gracias!

Hi all, Nearing the completion of the build now on my Lotus and I've bought in a VDO oil pump to circulate the gearbox / diff oil through a laminova cooler. The pump is a VDO #40504000100 which research tells me that VDO originally made exclusively for BMW Motorsport. I understand that this pump is used as a gearbox and/or diff cooler pump on some of the later M cars, although I've been unable to find out details. What I'm looking for however is the DC electrical connector that the pump uses to connect so that I can integrate it tidily with my loom. Hours of scouring automotive connector catalogues has yielded nothing so I'm at a dead end. I'm wondering whether any of you BMW tech buffs recognise this as being a BMW proprietary or common connector as used either on the M-cars in this application or whether it's a more garden-variety BMW connector used across the range. Obviously if anyone can supply me with a connector (either new, or snipped off a scrap loom with a suitable length fly-lead) I'm more than happy to pay.... right now any leads (pun intended) would be useful. I've attached an image of the connector on the pump (with the ubiquitous NZ$1 coin for size comparison) below. Thanks, George.

Well this is the connector I'm talking about. These are pics of my Exige ECU, which is shared with the Esprit V8 Twinturb. I'm after an ECU with the same connector on the ECU body, that I can butcher and make up an adaptor loom to allow me to plug my existing loom into my new ECU: Pics:

I'm pretty sure it's a Bosch connector so I'll say "bosch? I'll take a pic of the ECU and connector tonight so y'all can see what I'm talkin' bout

Heh... well when your car is cobbed together from parts nicked from other manufacturers you tend to have to shop around a bit for spares

Hi all, Does anyone know where I could get an ECU for an E36 320i? It does NOT need to be functional as I'm after one to butcher. I'm putting an Emerald ECU on my Lotus Exige S1 and the factory ECU (which is shared with the Esprit V8... don't get me started on Lotus Part bin stuff!) SUPPOSEDLY has the same connector as the E36 320. Basically I'm after a donor ECU to butcher and steal the connector off so that I can make up an adaptor loom without having to cut into my OEM loom. Cheaper is best, especially since I'm only going on hear-say as to whether it'll fit. Any idea whether the rest of the E36 range shares the same ECU/loom/connector? Hoping somebody out there has one that's being used for a paperweight that I can swap for beers or cash Cheers, George.

Yup, 'tis me (I lurk here occasionally). Firstly, Personalised Plates Ltd. (PPL) makes a KILLING. They are (I would imagine) the biggest dollar-value advertiser on NZ's largest radio station (Newstalk ZB) and right across the TRN stations (The Radio Network, which includes ZM, Hauraki, Radio Sport, Classic Hits etc.). Given that as a business they must have f*ck all overheads (considering they do NOTHING other than sync with the national database and order the plate from Licensys)... they're making a killing. Their markup is truly excessive. PPL DO have a govt-sanctioned monopoly and this is for good reason. It keeps NZ's plate system easy to manage and regulate from a point of view of restricting forgery. I do a lot of work for the plate manufacturer Licensys (who are nothing to do with PPL, merely another link in the official supply chain). In the end, it's not that people have a problem with the monopoly per-se... we can see there's a valid reason for having just the one accredited "vanity plate" supplier. What we DO have a problem with is the fact that while the number of suppliers are regulated, their pricing structure is not. The price jack-ups that have gone on over the past decade is ludicrous and needs to attract the attention of the commerce commission. In short they've been taking the piss. People would be HAPPY to pay $150 for a euro plate upgrade to their standard plate and maybe up to 450-500 for a euro personalised plate at the top end... but every time we check the plates.co.nz the price has gone up another $100. It's got to stop. As for sticker plates, yep they're illegal. Anything other than an issued plate is illegal. I've got a 50% scale stick on in the front and will keep it for no other reason than mounting a full size plate on mine legally (at the front and substantially vertical): a ) Will block, almost entirely, the radiator intake duct on my car, causing rapid overheating of the engine, causing ~$15k worth of damage. b ) Will, if hung lower, block the oil cooler intake, causing rapid overheating of the engine as above as well as possible risk of fire and total loss of the vehicle. Plate will also disappear at the first standard driveway entry. I'm happy to accept a $250 fine every couple of years as this is vastly cheaper than replacing an engine. The penalty does not attract demerits so I just see it as an extra tax. I’ve been let off by some cops after pleading my case to them (I’ve got a clean licence and don’t tend to get pulled over for speeding etc) with only one pinging me for it. She booked me with the excuse “I see what you mean sir, but if I ticket these boyracer idiots over with no front bumper on and no plate, I have to ticket you tooâ€.... to which my reply was a slightly more politely worded version of “No you don’t you dozy nazi bint, you have discretion to apply the law as you see fit and to waive a fine if you feel my reason for infringing is justifiedâ€. I’ve another plan for hopefully avoiding being pinged for this in future but I won’t publish it here in case I ever end up in court over it I’d like it that there’s not an internet-archived run-down of my legal defence that could potentially be used against me. In short though, unless you can afford the $250 fine or the time/money to fight it, then just fit a legit plate. Mind you, with the fine at $250, you can afford to get booked a couple of times rather than forking out PPL’s extortionate fees to be legit, especially since the offence does not attract demerits (yet, anyway).