Electric Motor head Lamp Raise and Lower – Alternative Conversion.
Not sure if we can lay claim to the first ever electric head lamp raise and lower conversion on a Lotus elan. But just for the record, we did this conversion waaay back in 1983 during the total rebuild of an ex Aussie race Lotus elan S2.
On acquiring the car, the number of missing bits was truly astounding, and of course, this also included the bits to retract and raise the head lamps.
If your old enough, you’d of course realize that 1983 was a very long time before the internet changed life forever as well as to the sourcing of spare parts from anywhere in the world quite easy.
The writer, at the time, had no idea where to obtain the parts, so improvisation being the mother of invention, an alternative was sought, and it did not take very long to find a cheap second-hand electric head lamp motor from a Triumph TR7.
So then the fun began trying to make this thing work in the elan.
After an awful lot of stuffing around, and to the amazement of friends, we figured out how to make the motor raise and lower the headlights, and also to get them to have correct beam alignment when raised.
One of my friends was totally baffled how we built this conversion, with just one motor, plus some threaded rods and levers, and rose joints it took more than a few hours of trial and error to nut out… and it was all done without any smoke and mirror magic.
Because this conversion was done so long ago, the DIY details of the design are just a dim memory.
Today of course, you’d just grab a couple of MX5 head lamp motors, and I believe the twin motor set up is not that complex to do… so if you have leaking vacuum units, or a leaking vacuum tank (The front cross-member in the chassis) and if you are not a purist, toss the old vacuum units in the bin, and install the electric motor set up, they are so much more reliable and quicker in operation, and probably wont ever let you down, and say goodbye to droopy eyes… er, I mean headlights.
We also made a short video to show you how it all works, just to satay your curiosity, so hope you enjoy, and also learn that a little Aussie bleeder did this way back in the early 80’s.
Further to dealing with the elan headlamps we illustrate a hassle free method of fixing the headlamp bezel or rim for easy fitment and removal. Study the following photographs below to understand how this was achieved.
The rim assembled with the two countersunk screws (One each side). Easy to dismantle, easy to assemble, the complete operation can be done in a few minutes, there is no wrestling trying to un-clip the rim with a special tool.
The rear steel bowl of the head light assembly is secured to the fibreglass pod with socket head screws and two rivnuts/nutserts, what ever you wish to call them, only two required to hold things together. This is far better than using those pathetic self-tapping screws which eventually pull out of the F/glass anyway.
The lower green arrow indicates the dimpled hole in the rim for the countersunk head of the screw to locate in. Yes, you will need to machine up a small dimple, or belling tool to do this, but its not hard if you know how to use a lathe. The top arrow points out the small tab that has been gas welded to the outer rim of the steel bowl, the tab is a captive nut arrangement, there are two diametrically opposite each other.
There are only two screws required to hold the rim in place, to the casual onlooker, few would pick up on the modification, and it makes the job of removing and replacing the rims, and or the headlamp unit so much easier.
Note: This mod involves a bit of fiddly work. You’ll need to have gas or TIG welding and perhaps some machining skills, or know of someone who can help out there. The writer recently had cause to dismantle the right hand headlamp to repair a broken head lamp wire, the entire job was completed in about five minutes, no hassle, no swearing at the rim, which are often sods to work with.