Whit

Thanks for the info and encouragement! If you have links to the 2.3 forums I'd appreciate them, I've been down a lot of rabbit holes this past week. I'm hoping to repurpose as much of the motor as possible while detuning it just a bit. Seems to me I don't need a lot of bottom end torque considering how light the car is, but drivability is important too.

That saved a thousand words! Do you lift the front or rear first? Or work your way up to what looks like full lift on those stands? I appreciate the assistance.

Thanks for the info, I believe the structure is very similar, though a little wider and longer. There's lots of structure around the front suspension and a couple spots that could possibly be used to place the stands but the rear structure is hidden by aluminum panels. I crawled around last night looking for signs of previous jack stand locations, found nothing obvious, except for the bottom of the differential looks like it was the lifting point...

Howdy, I recently bought my first seven, a 1990 Rotus 7, thru BAT. From what I read in the documents supplied, the original owner had the car built by Chris Custer to accept a Ford 2.3L Lima "Pinto" motor. He then built a motor using a lot of Esslinger/Ford Racing (circa 1990) go-fast parts and went racing, apparently holding class track records at various tracks in the NE. Just about every part/function has been focused to track duty, but it's licensed and registered for street use. The previous owner bought it from an auction a couple years ago and put about 1000 miles on it. Thus begins the challenge. I'll start with what I know... 1990 Rotus, originally built to accept 2.3L Lima motor and T5 transmission ~1989 Ford 2.3L Turbo block (I found notes suggesting 12-12.75:1 compression) Esslinger Aluminum head Esslinger intake manifolds Esslinger 'Oval-Track' cam 2x Weber DCO sidedrafts Header w/1.75" primary tubes Electromotive HPV-1 ignition Super Trapp exhaust Ford T5 5-speed ~1980 Toyota Live axle w/LSD Carrerra Coilovers Tilton Master cylinders - Front, Rear & Clutch Tilton Brake bias adjuster Wilwood calipers Heim Joints on steering and front ball joints (another note suggests the front A-arms were lengthened by 3" each) 10 gal fuel cell 215/50-15 Front & 245/50-15 Rear with mfg dates of 2003 & 2005 I assumed I was getting a 1990 Rotus with a hotted up "Pinto" street motor, instead it seems I got a full-on 30 year old race car. Not that there's anything wrong with that, it's just means a steeper learning curve than I anticipated. So my plan is to check the basics, replace the tires, then add some octane booster and give it a spin and see what it needs. I'm hoping for a fun sunday morning drive through the country car, plus autocross and track days.

Greetings, I just took delivery of my first Seven, a 1990 Rotus, that apparently spent a lot of time on the track in the NE in the '90's. It's a beautiful car, but the motor appears to be a highly tuned race engine. So I've got a lot of learning ahead of me... Starting with the basics, I want to pull the wheels off to bleed the brakes and take a closer look a things, where are the preferred lift points and jack stand locations?

Well, I went to check the plugs and apparently it's a 3/4" hex, and I don't have a deep 3/4 or 19mm. Good point on the booster, I haven't bought that stuff in ~30 years. I should probably start a new thread.

Thanks, I was expecting it to sell for more also. PO said he was using 93 octane, I'm hoping the motor has been de-tuned since its racecar days because I don't think that's enough. It does have an Electromotive distributor-less ignition which fires a ton of voltage on both the compression and exhaust strokes, it's said to reduce detonation. <fingerscrossed> I'm not going to start it again until I can get an idea what's what, and find some 98 octane fuel. I'm hoping I can talk with someone at Esslinger about the possibility of 'civilizing' this motor a little, that might be less expensive than finding a different powerplant. I found some info on the original owner from his racing days, this car held a few lap records at various tracks in the NE back in the 1990's

Greetings, first post here, I may be hanging around a bit, figured I'd say Hi. I spent the last 23 years as a mechanical designer in the plastics industry, before that I spent ~8 years at a local "Import Auto Parts" store, back when European and Japanese cars were still "foreign" and people actually did their own tune-ups. I've always been a car guy, but never owned anything particularly noteworthy, until now. A few months ago I began hankering for a simple 'classic' car with a standard transmission, pre-computer stuff. I looked at BMW 2002's, Datsun 510's, Austin Minis and a few other lightweight 4 cylinder cars but the ones that were in decent condition were commanding more that I remembered from 25 years ago, funny how that works. Well, one day recently I was perusing BAT I stumbled across a Rotus 7... Ding! I've always loved the Lotus 7, I've pondered building a LoCost but I'm not *that* handy. I found this and it checked all the boxes. I bid and won it. <insert happy dance> It arrived today, it's amazing, I love it, but I think I got a lot more than I bargained for. It included 8 large boxes of spare parts (springs, shocks, clutch, differential, etc, etc), 3 notebooks full of original owner notes, specs, measurements, about 50 pages worth. I've only scratched the surface but the motor appears to be quite a specimen... it's a 2.3"L Ford 'pinto' motor with a bunch of period 1990's Esslinger parts - aluminum cylinder head, dual sidedraft webers, large pipe header, "oval track" cam, one note said 'current compression 12.75:1' ... yikes!... I'm kinda floored! It appears the original owner was a man named Frank who lived in Mass. I have several letters from Chris Custer to Frank while the car was being built discussing all manner of options and decisions. It was built to accept the 2.3L Ford and a T5 transmission with an early Toyota Supra LSD live axle. Apparently he raced it at NHIS in the 90's(?) looks like it was originally yellow and red. Somehow it turned up at and auction in Ohio a couple years ago and was purchased by the guy I bought it from, he put ~1000 miles on it and it shows 77xx miles on the odo. It appears to be in really good condition, a little play in the suspension, a coupe oil leaks, lots of questions. I intend to spend a little time going over the car and learning what I can, and see what obviously needs attention, then get a shop that's more familiar with "track cars" to look it over. That's after I find some hi-test ethyl. This is going to be interesting! Whit Just south of the Austin City Limits