1991 'Galileo' (Lotus Carlton) - 2006 to 2019

Indeed - nice thing about them all is they sail under the radar for most non petrolheads



14 years of ownership - some considerable time getting it right mechanically - cosmetically it's not perfect yet and mechanically it's getting near where I want it to be.

It does one thing really well it's an awesome intercontinental ballistic missile - European road trips are brilliant

It's not a great track car - the bills for tyres and brakes when you track it hard are frankly horrific and dwarf the fuel costs - it doesn't help that I'm not the sort of person who likes to bimble round a track for fear of breaking something or in fear of the consequential brakes and tyre bill - it's why I built my track day car (oh and rolling that probably meant that the Carlton was saved that fate)

It's docile enough to be used everyday but insurance cost spiral as an everyday car so classic policies with limited miles make it bearable but my current policy is SD&P but prohibits T&FW so it's a weekend/evening car

It needs garaging in winter and I really like to spend the winter months on projects and my garage space (like most peoples) is limited

I don't do enough of what it's really good at to justify keeping the car much longer

So I had a spare head lining out of gewy scrap car - this got re-covered and then has spent several months in the safety of the spare bed





Nice overlap





Main issue with fitting it is that it's a big old lump with not a lot of rigidity - you can get them in and out thro the back door if you remove all the interior but it's much easier to put them thro the front windscreen aperture - of course the front screen is bonded so it's not exactly an easy job to pull a screen out so most people resort to interior out and a bit of bending......I needed a new screen for the MOT so a plan was hatched

Yesterday I spent most of the day carefully removing all the interior fixings and fittings that hold the old roof lining to the roof. Carefully because it's easy to break fittings and I don't have spares for all of them.... and yes I did break one bit but I do have a spare for that in gewy car - I think

I also removed the windscreen wipers and front scuttle cover to make it easier as a trade off just in case it took me a little longer than planned to get the headlining in and secure.

The old head lining came out via the back door and a little fold - it really was a bit of a mess - the bit that was annoying me was in front of the sun visors but once removed it was clear that the fabric was separating from the backing foam everywhere so long overdue.

The Autoglass techinican turned up and removed the old cracked screen (It was no surprise they couldn't source a new rubber trim and I guess they intended to re-use the old one)

That was not going to happen for two reasons

1. Because bodieanddoyle had managed to get a new one for me years ago and it's been in my spares stash ever since (spares stashes are to be used right?)

2. The old one had a nasty habit of popping out at higher speeds and as a result was stretched and damaged from the numerous times that I'd squeezed it back in again and tried to stick it to the glass.

Really impressed with the Autoglass technique - carbon string and a clever little contraption that cuts out the sealant without potentially damaging the paint like the old wire saws they used to use.

Similar method here on this Youtube video

While the screen was out and the fitter was preparing the new one I got on with putting the headlining back in without any creases.

The new screen was fitted and a lovely job he did too

All I need to do is fit the rest of the roof furniture back in but as I'm cleaning each piece fully first this is taking longer than I'd planned

Pictures when it's all done

the interior light shattered!!!

Everything else survived!!

Planning to go in the LC - still putting trim back in (still I can always carry on doing that while it's parked!!!)

Still it's been to several Snet Evenings and no-one has noticed it was missing it's A pillar trims!!!

This week I've been mainly removing wishbones on the LC and doing nothing on the Mongrel.....

The front end handling has been a bit off recently - it's been reacting much worse than normal to lorry tramlines up to 60-70mph it's OK but doesn't feel planted like it should above that and it becomes a bit of a fairground ride which isn't fun.

I started checking bushes and steering for play and fairly soon identified the wishbones bushes as possibly being past their best (3-5mm of movement in the horizontal and the verticals didn't look very clever)

Now it was due to have an MOT on the 30th June so that got cancelled - it might have passed as the bushes and wishbones are captive - ie nothing can fall apart but that's not the point - it's not right and it needs fixing so fix and then MOT

Now Lotus uprated both bushes and they are NLS, so normal option is fit Carlton GSI bushes but they are a lot softer and they get knocked out fairly quickly so as I'd already poly bushed the rear I thought might as well do the front.

The issue is no-one lists poly bushes for the front of a GSI Carlton let alone an LC

I remembered a club member did his using Calibra bushes and some spacers on the verticals - the horizontals apparently were a curse word to fit but did drop straight in.

He used PFF80-401 and PFF80-402

So I purchased a set

Roll Bar at the front needs to come out and I got the passenger side wishbone out last night

The horizontal one was kippered - the metal core almost fell out on it's own - sliced off the excess rubber of one end (and the end of my finger......) and the bush came out with a socket a small length of scaffold pole and a bench vice.

The vertical - well that did not want to play and stripped the thread on my bush removal tool

So took it into to work and stuck the wishbone in a 50T press

Well the press succeeded in pushing out the centre shaft and the bulk of the rubber - great!!

The outside steel casing moved by a mm before the rubber let go - pretty sure it had already had some issues with rubber break away to decision to replace both is the right one

So once home I used a junior hacksaw to relieve the pressure and provide an area that I can use a cold chisel at to remove the casing from the wishbone

The vertical poly bush slipped in great just needed a little assistance with the vice to push all the way thro

So flushed with sucess I removed the other wishbone tonight and popped into work to use the press - the vertical on the Drivers side was worse than the passenger side so to make sure I didn't push just the rubber out of the steel casing I turned up a 59mm diameter pusher on my lathe - OK I don't have a lathe but I do have some handy bits of steel tube and it was 61mm OD so an angry grinder and a flap wheel got it down to size.

And success was watching the bush explode out of the wishbone (the horizontal put up less of a fight than the Pass side one and that side ran away.......)

So then fit the horizontal polys - I swear these are possessed by the devil, losing count of the number of times they have self ejected..... It's easy to understand why, normal practice is insert poly halves on each side and then press in the steel bearing.

The wishbone hasn't got a round hole, due to the sandwich construction of the wishbones it's elliptical so until you have the pin fully home in both halves it's a self propelled weapon of mass destruction......

First wishbone back in, thank heavens for cable ties, ratchet straps and a 3 ton floor jack, the horizontals take some fitting......

Tomorrows mission spacers

25mm OD 16mm ID and 6mm thick x 4

Well that's my guestimate.

Poly bush is 58mm in length
Rubber bush is 70mm in length

So I'm 12mm short of length

Poly sits 35mm above the wishbone
Rubber one sits 41mm above the wishbone

So 6mm needed at top
12mm clearance to fill so another 6mm at the bottom

Well that makes sense to me.....

Oh and Billing is This weekend and the MOT is booked for 3pm Friday - nothing like a bit of work to get you focused!!!

Yeah I got that - at least you have a good source of OE and aftermarket parts that hasn't been dried up since 2003 when the 10 years of having to support was up. Vauxhall stuck two fingers up at the fools who'd bought an LC or LO and stopped any attempt at trying to support them parts wise (That was after 2 years of having parts on back order with some hope of them arriving one day) the only reason I've owned it for so long is because of the support of the "Autobahnstormers club and the membership who have resolved issues and supported alternative parts manufacture or fabrication/modification of weak points.

It's one of the main reasons I would never buy a new or newer Vauxhall or Opel despite an now having an addiction to the brands older stuff. I have a BMW that's 1998 manufactured and 17 years on I've yet to find anything I wanted that is NLS for it.

A friend gewy has an old Porsche 944 and he's the same - still excellent spares support

It's ironic that Vauxhall have to ask the Autobahnstormers club for support in keeping their "heritage car" on the road - /gets off soap box



Yeah I'll take that in bucket loads - still at least this year emissions won't be an issue

Whoops, sorry if I touched a nerve there!

I didn't realise that they'd left you completely in the lurch in that way, parts-wise. Sounds like a bean-counter special.

I must admit that when you read threads with "...got NOS here" and "...cheaper from the dealer" you tend to take it for granted that bits are still get-able for a motor of this age and yes, we're lucky with Land Rovers that parts are generally not an issue, certainly for mechanicals at least. Trim bits can be a challenge sometimes, but at least they are out there. Somewhere

That made me chuckle but I don't believe that for a min......



I do love my cats but unfortunately they are headstrong animals - they had access to the room before so expected continued access to their empire even if only to check the area for potential threats - this means their daily patrols were quadrupled in order to try and get access when the bridge was down.

I got away with 4 muddy paw prints and a bit of cat hair where one had decided to rest it's eyes for a little.

What I was concerned for was one of them using it as a nice new scratching pad. Neither of them did - more luck than training.....

Yep that's one way to save a Carlton - not everything swaps but most does



Handy when GM shared the platform

In other news

Car is all back together and the handing and ride is back to how it should be - in fact it's probably better - even the brakes feel nicer

MOT today was a pass (one verbal advisory to replace the handbrake cable as one section has a couple of wires starting to fray - works fine but just something to do before the next one)

My indicators arrived today from Germany - survived one broken

Billing this weekend so I'll complain next week......