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Seats.....I must have measured the seats in at least a dozen cars before I gave up trying to find seats that were narrow enough to sit inside the car. The driver's seat needed to be smaller than 19" and the passenger's seat smaller than 18". So we purchased seats (needing re-upholstering) from Bug-eyed Sprites on the Internet. When they arrived, I stripped the seats down to bare frames, sliced them down the middle (they were about 20" wide), overlapped them, and welded them back together. Now we had bare seats that fit into the area. Unfortunately, I cannot find my pictures of the seat frames.
But, we stumbled upon an ideal way to inexpensively upholster seats. The way is to contact a boat re-furbishing company in the middle of winter, when things are slow, and have the seats re-upholstered. We did, and I chose tan for my seats, and my brother chose red (since the original green Loti used red seats).

Andrew,
Thanks for the kind comments. We have found that building two at the time really has many advantages...one set of jigs and one set of patterns, and the fabricating the second set of parts seems to take maybe one-third of the time as the original parts. But, some things do take twice as long...cleaning, sanding, and painting.
Tom

Rather than cut a hole in the top of the bonnet (hood to us Yanks), we decided to go with sidedraft carbs. My brother chose Webers and I found a pair of used DellOrtos. Making the throttle linkage was a challenge, but we finally got it right.

Building the bonnets was another challenge. I attacked it by first cutting the parts slightly larger than necessary, and then gradually trimming back the excess. It worked.

Creating the bonnet (Hood to us Yanks)

Then we managed to locate a hot-rod shop that pressed louvers. I marked them out on the inner side, and the louver pressman did the rest. We were very pleased with his accuracy.

We both wanted clamshell fenders, partly because they reminded us of our first car, an MG-TD, and also because we hope they will cut down some of the wind buffeting. It remains to be seen how effective they are. In the meantime, I am also building a set of plexiglass windwings for both cars.

One car attracts a lot of attention, 2 will bring a crowd Nice work and you're going to have a ton of fun with them.

Many times when I was struggling to wire in fuel injection etc. I wished that I'd stuck with good old carbs.

I built both wind deflectors and side curtains for mine. I much prefer the wind deflectors. They don't reduce the buffeting as much as the side curtains but they are a huge improvement.

Ron

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They say a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. By the time you finish the car it'll feel like you've done it on your knees.

I agree with Ron's comments But would add that using half doors is probably the best compromise. I have side curtains, and almost never use them, but the half doors are on 90% of the time unless it is really hot. A plus for half doors is that they will fit in the boot. Dave W

One day last week I placed my nosecone (Yellow) on my brother's car. Since his car is BRG with a red interior, I realized I had almost created a replica of KAR 120C which appeared on the British TV series "The Prisoner." So, to complete the image, I removed the "7" from the grill and replaced it with the proper letters. So here is my version of KAR 120C.
Still having fun in retirement.
Tom Bartlett

Last tuesday, Nov. 17th, was a great day. My brother and I had previously made applications for an inspection and title for our vehicles, so on Monday, I got a call from the State Inspector that she (!) would arrive on Tueday before lunch to inspect both vehicles. We both waited apprehensively until she arrived. Although she was all business, double-checking the engine numbers with a tiny flashlight and verifying all our documents, the inspection went smoothly and in the end she pop-riveted VIN number plates to both vehicles! She explained that the VIN number is required to be visible from the outside (without removing the hood), so we had her rivet the plate to the top of the cowl on the driver's side. I am attaching pictures of the joyous day.
Looking back on the process of obtaining a title and VIN plate, thank goodness I kept a 3-ring binder of our progress, and included every receipt (most, anyway) and pictures of the build process through the frame table to the painting to installing the upholstery. We have thoroughly enjoyed the adventure and look forward to driving on the public roads now.

That's pretty sweet. You have problems finding 3tc stuff these days? That engine has been out of production since the early 80s right?

Not yet. I was able to get replacement water pumps (I think they were $27.00!) and fuel pumps at the local NAPA, and there is a large group of 3TC racers who play with turbos and hop-up accessories. And, apparently because of the rear-wheel drive, the original donor car has become popular as a cheap drift racer. This has led to resurgence in popularity. For the future, the later 4AGE (DOHC) will bolt right up to the T50 transmission. But all of this was purely luck, since we didn’t have any idea of the underground popularity of the engine when we started. We were just looking for Toyota reliability and cheap donor cars.

Congratulations to the Bartlett brothers! A great pair of Locosts. I started reading your log on the second page and got down about 2/3 of the way and was confused as to why you changed the paint scheme from yellow to green then realized there were two cars. That will teach me to start on page one.

Good job to both of you. Where are you located in the US?

Cheers,
Roy

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Build log http://www.locostusa.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=16510

Thanks for the kind words. We are located in Alabama, just north of Birmingham. As I have mentioned elsewhere on the forum, we are fortunate to be located close to the Barbers Motorsports Museum and his fantastic Lotus collection. When I have old Air Force buddies visit, I escort them to Barbers as an excuse to go back to the museum again. Every time I have been there, the Lotus exhibit has been enlarged and changed. In addition, they regularly exercise the cars during the historic sports car race weekend. During the last visit, I was puzzled by the Lotus Eleven display on the wall, and only later (when I was despairing over my poor out-of-focus picture) did I realize that the display was meant to depict a giant-scale model Lotus and even included the molding sprues! Really creative.

Hey Tom,

You mind mentioning the shop that did the louvers? Ive looked in the atlanta area and havnt been able to find anyone. If they are in birmingham, that would be a doable day trip.

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