Lotus Elise / Lotus Exige. Manual - part 26

Page 12

 

 

Lotus Service Notes   

 

 

    Section DH

8.  Tighten the turnbuckle locknuts to 45 Nm whilst holding the adjacent adaptor lug, and then tighten the 

engine steady mountings to 45 Nm.

9.  Adjust rear wheel alignment 

only at mid-laden ride height of 130mm to 1.5mm toe-in each side (± 

0.3mm) and tighten the toe-link ball joint locknuts to 45 Nm.  Ensure ball joints are phased at 90° to each 

other to allow maximum joint articulation.

10.  Refit undertray and diffuser.

Section A thro' lower 

link inboard fixing

 

                                            Heatshield

  Lower wishbone 

  rear bush                                          Adaptor lug

                                                    Pivot bolt

                                                    New spherical joint

  Self-locking nut

                                   

                                      Special spacer washer                 

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                          Welded insert

Toe-link                  Adaptor lug     Turnbuckle      Adjustable type cross-brace tube

                                New spherical                  Brace to

                                joint                        chassis

                                                                      

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FRONT

FRONT

Viewed from below

Page 13

 

 

Lotus Service Notes   

 

 

    Section DH

Section B thro' steady mounting attachment

(adjustable type crossbrace)                                Engine steady mounting

                                                  Cross-brace 

                                                  welded bracket

      Chassis

                                                  Cross-brace tube

                                                                   

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FRONT

General view

                        Cross-brace fixing          Adaptor lug

                        to subframe

                                          Turnbuckle

                              Cross-brace                             

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Page 14

 

 

Lotus Service Notes   

 

 

    Section DH

DH.6 - SUPER SPORT SUSPENSION

To provide customers for 6-speed Elise/Exige with a track optimised suspension choice, a 'Super Sport' 

suspension specification was introduced in early 2006 as a factory build option package comprising:

- 

Bilstein dampers with thread adjustable spring platforms and 10 position combined damping adjustment.  

Remote reservoirs on front dampers.

 

Note: For 'Cup' and supercharged cars fitted with Ohlins spring/damper units, refer to Exige S/C supple-

ment.

- 

Road springs (Elise: 42.5/60 N/mm front/rear, Exige 47.5/65 N/mm front/rear) upgraded to dual rate speci-

fication; Front: 31.6/47.5 N/mm, Rear: 46.6/65 N/mm.

- 

Front anti-roll bar gains 5-hole adjustment and hard plastic mountings.

- 

Rear suspension chassis brace kit (recommended for track use and/or A048 tyres)

- 

Lightweight forged wheels, 6.5J x 16 front, 7.5J x 17 rear.

- 

Yokohama A048 tyres (standard fit on Exige), 195/50 R16 front, 225/45 R17 rear.

Ride Height

Cars factory built with Super Sport suspension are set at 130/130 ride height as standard cars, to provide 

adequate road going ground clearance and ramp angles.  To optimise the car for track use, it is recommended 

to reduce ride height to 120/120mm.

To adjust the height, first load the car to the mid-laden condition with a full fuel tank and two 75 kg (12 

stone) passengers.  Then use the 'C' spanners supplied with the car to screw the spring collars upwards on 

the damper body and drop the ride height as measured beneath the front and rear ends of each chassis main 

siderail.  To speed the attainment of this setting, the spring collars should be adjusted from the standard dimen-

sion of 110 mm front and rear, to an initial revised position of 104 mm front, and 102 mm rear as shown in the 

illustration:

       

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  After setting the ride height, the front wheel alignment should then be adjusted back to zero (tolerance 

+0.7 to -0.5mm toe-in total).  All other settings should remain within specification (see below).

Damper Adjustment

Note that the front dampers are equipped with remote gas reservoirs secured to the front face of the body 

side panels and are protected by the wheelarch liners.  Damper adjustment is common to front and rear damp-

ers, and comprises a single knurled ring below the spring lower platform, with printed numbers 1 to 10 to be 

viewed from outboard against an orange alignment dot on the damper body.  1 is fully soft, 10 fully stiff.  Turn 

the front wheels to full lock to view the front damper setting.  

   

                                          Rear shown.  Front similar

                                      Std. front: 110 mm.  Lowered: 104 mm

                                     

                                      Std. rear: 110 mm.  Lowered: 102 mm 

    Locking ring

                                                     

    Spring seat                                          

                                       

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Lotus Service Notes   

 

 

    Section DH

Recommended settings are as follows:

Road use:   Front 3    Rear 2

Track use:   Front 8    Rear 7

       

 

 

Anti-Roll Bar

An anti-roll bar with 5-hole adjustment is used, with cars built before August '06 using an uprated bar and 

early type re-positioned hard mountings, whereas later cars use a yellow painted standard rate bar with revised 

hard mountings in a position common with standard cars.  Refer to sub-section CI.3.

Use the foremost hole P1 (shortest lever arm) for maximum stiffness and rearmost P5 for minimum.  In-

creasing front roll stiffness will tend to promote understeer.  Recommended position for road and track use is 

central P3.

Chassis Rear Brace Kit

The chassis brace kit is fully described in sub-section DH.5 but is reduced in complexity for this application 

by the use of a simple tubular brace to link the rear ends of the toe-link inboard fixing bolts.  In this configura-

tion, a flat washer A120W4199F (7/16 x 7/8) must be used between the head of the toe link pivot bolt and the 

crossbrace tube.

Forged Wheels

The lightweight forged wheels offer a saving of 14.4 kg/car on Elise and 20.4 kg/car for Exige, and feature 

a wider front rim width of 6.5J.  Insets are unchanged.

Yokohama A048 Tyres

The Yokohama A048 tyres have been developed jointly by Lotus and Yokohama to suit the requirements 

of the performance driver, with special emphasis on track use.  Compared with the standard tyre, the front tyre 

width is increased and the profile reduced from 175/55 to 195/50.  The tyre tread design is directional, such that 

each wheel/tyre assembly is dedicated to a single vehicle corner.  Tyre pressures are unchanged.

The Lotus specific construction is identified by the letters 'LTS' moulded on the tyre sidewall.  Ensure 

that any replacement tyre is so marked.  Note that an edging strip is applied around both front wheelarches to 

provide the necessary tyre coverage. 

Geometry

Front 

Mid-laden ride height (reference height for geometry check)

        - front                   120 mm below front end of chassis siderail          

        - rear                    120 mm below rear end of chassis siderail 

Castor    - optimum                + 3.8°

        - tolerance range            + 3.5° to + 4.1°; max. side/side 0.35°

Camber    - optimum                - 0.2°

        - tolerance range            + 0.1° to - 0.3°; max. side/side 0.2°

                                                           

Knurled 

ring

                    Rear Shown

Alignment

dot

                                                                   

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