Central Valley Classic Cars

At this years, events, I found myself snapping pictures of engines this year. Had I put any thought into it a head of time, I would have gone out of my way to get important engines from each of the great marques. But I didn’t. So here’s a somewhat random collection of the expensive metal that was on the Moneterey Peninsula for the 2010 events.

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You could say that Project Lotus is all about correcting as many of the faults (or at least shortcomings) in my S2 Europa as I can. ‘As I can’ is the key phrase there as sometimes I find out that this or that is the way it is because of this other thing that can’t really be changed. Or it means that sometimes I try to reengineer something only to tape it back together the way it was because I’ve made it worse.

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I finally feel like a true Lotus owner. It happened when I started working on my car more than I drove it.

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When the dust settled from the massive war that was the jamming of the new engine in the Europa, the engine and transmission were left sitting an inch lower than they used to. That’s great for weight distribution but not so great for the alignment of the rear wheels.

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We’ve had another couple Saturdays spent on the engine swap now and the car has come to life, been reborn you might say.

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There’s a little automotive show that airs in Britain, where the hosts frequently try projects to see as they put it “how hard can it be?” Often they are forced to sum up their plans in the end as, “ambitious, but rubbish.” I think now I can safely say I identify more with them than I would prefer.

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The first question that you should be asking is what in heaven or earth (or somewhere more sinister) could have possessed me to buy a Europa?

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