Is the 1987 lotus excel a reliable and safe car?

Snrub said:

TravisTheHuman said:

SV reX said:

Is this a canoe?  I think several of us have fallen for it. 

This happens quite a bit lately.

Care to speculate the purpose of it in this case? 

Drives traffic and post counts to other sites. 

Snrub said:

TravisTheHuman said:

SV reX said:

Is this a canoe?  I think several of us have fallen for it. 

This happens quite a bit lately.

Care to speculate the purpose of it in this case? 

I got the generated by AI vibes immediately from the original post. The way the original post appeared reminded me of other things I have seen written by AI.

As to why; by interacting with it, we are literally teaching it how to interact for the developers and making it better in the process.

Which is also why i am being vague as to why I got the generated by AI vibes. I don't want to teach it how I know.

AI does have some positives and definitely has a place, but i'm not here to teach it. 

In reply to drsmooth :

Thing is, it also reads like a 16 year old. 

In reply to drsmooth :

Thing is, it also reads like a 16 year old wrote it. 
 

If the forum's response is to offer good advice, I don't see a problem :)

In reply to drsmooth :

don't worry i'm not ai ;) i'm just interested in classic cars and i don't know who to ask for advice

I think it's a cool car, but the chassis doesn't inspire confidence when it comes to impact safety. It reminds me of how the Esprit of that era was put together. Maybe they're similar?

Before you decide, go watch this series by Soup Classic Motoring. It's his Lotus Esprit rebuild. The guy's a genius with the camera and a brilliant story teller. Storyteller. Story-teller?  His words are good. You will probably learn a bit about the Excel by watching a series showing how they built other cars of that era.

Remember: fiberglass was the composite material of the future... 70 years ago.

I don't think it's a good idea to go buy this thing and use it as your daily driver. You should buy something fun, but more reliable and safe like (and I can't believe I'm saying this after using the word "safe") a Miata. But, this is a forum full of racers and general-purpose car enthusiasts. If we all stuck to good ideas, we'd all be driving hybrid Toyotas.

If you get the car, I suspect you'll be chasing issues with it throughout your ownership experience. But I suspect that chasing these issues will make you into a pretty darn good mechanic in pretty short order. And since it's a cool sports car from the 1980s, and not some 5-previous-owner-rental-fleet Cobalt, you'll actually care enough to dig into it instead of just abandoning it in a field and torching it. Go for it. Just... wear a helmet. And maybe get something safer to drive around... like a motorcycle? Or a more modern junky car, like a BMW. 

Here's what I think you'll probably run into just buying that old of a car (not Lotus specific here):

Leaky gaskets everywhere. The engine will probably want to be resealed at a minimum, but a refresh by sending it to a machine shop at some point wouldn't hurt down the line. Expect oil drips from the engine, transmission, and differential.

Failing wiring leading to random shorts. This is not an English car thing--all cars can succumb to this. Doors and hatches with wiring in them opening and closing flexes wires over and over again, eventually breaking the wires. Ask 2000s era VW and Audi guys about their door jamb wiring. ;)

Worn out suspension components. This is easy enough to fix, but you will probably want to invest in a hydraulic press and learn to replace bushings because you may not be able to buy new control arms with the parts installed already. If it's like the Esprit, pay attention to that Soup Classic build series and make sure you pay attention to his mistakes and hard-learned lessons. It's doable, but it can be tricky.

Unreliable fuel delivery. Fuel pumps, fuel lines, and fuel injection (or carburetion) systems all clog, gum up, disintegrate, and fail over time. You may need to replace the fuel tank, a pump, or any of these systems. The good news is that the car is just old enough that these things might have already failed and been replaced in the last decade or so.

Difficulty finding parts. You probably won't be able to waltz into an Advance Auto, kick over the rack displaying the clearance items, jump on top of the parts counter, and demand a clutch for your significantly-older-than-you Lotus Excel like I regularly do for my still-kind-of-old-but-not-that-old Audi. I don't even know how you'll find brake pads. Look into that. Make sure you can find parts.

You should start a spreadsheet in a program like Microsoft Excel or Lotus Notes. Just... you know. Had to get that in there.

In reply to harmonicafly :

My apologies, there were several tells I picked up on that are usually an indicator of AI generation. Apparently I was incorrect : )

I'd buy an E30 BMW over a Lotus. Any Lotus.  Unless it was going to be a third or fourth car.  Heck, I have friends WITH Lotuses and they are their third or fourth cars.  (One Exige, one pre-intercooled fuel injected Esprit Turbo, unless he's sold it)

Given where I think you are, I'd look for the nicest Ford Sierra or Peugeot 205 that I could find.  We didn't really get those here and one always wants what they can't have.

Ooh, or a 106 Rallye.

In reply to Pete. (l33t FS) :

I used to hang out with the Lotus Club Of Eastern Ontario in the late 90s. This was pre-Exige so all Lotuses were old Lotuses at that time - Elans, Europas, maybe an Esprit. I think every single one of them had a second Lotus in the garage that didn't run. The president hadn't driven hers in 5 years. When they went on a road trip, everyone had some sort of breakdown. And this is when the cars were 25 years newer than they are now...