Before I went away on holiday, the decision to remove the Head from the Lotus Elan had been made. The simple reason for this was that one of the threaded spark plug ports had at some point been stripped ( soft aluminium head- these things happen).

At some point the new helicoil insert that had been fitted had come adrift and so come out with the spark plug. Although for a trial start up we were able to screw the plug and insert combination back in, we were unable to separate the two and the only solution was to remove the head and get a new insert fitted. Whilst the head was in it made good sense to get it looked over and any other work done at the same time.

On the last day before I went away the head was dropped off at the engineers and by co-incidence, we received a call yesterday to say that it was ready for collection.

Sadie had noticed that there was evidence that the head gasket was blowing when she stripped it down so it's not surprising that one of the jobs done was to skim the head flat. As well as this and the new insert, the valves were cleaned up and the seats re-cut. The engineers had also given the combustion chamber a de-coke. Valve clearances were also shimmed and ,due to previous slightly dubious repairs, new exhaust studs were fitted ( two originals snapped on the way out apparently ).

The head is now ready to go back in later on this week.