Forester STI – Wales Road Trip and EVO Triangle

We thought we should do a road trip in the Forester. Wales is somehwere we hadn’t really driven round much before plus it’s where the famous ‘EVO Triangle’ is, so we figured we’d better go stay there for a week and check it out. After a good clean the day before, we packed our stuff […]

Forester STI – Pre Road Trip Clean and Detail

We planned a week away for a bit of driving on some nice roads but before we could go anywhere the Forester would have to look it’s best. While I had it up on the lift for a general, pre road trip, check over I gave the Genome exhaust a polish. Then out the garage […]

Forester STI – Fitting New Front Door Speakers

The speakers in the Forester sounded pretty rubbish. I assumed they were just old and were never that great but when I pulled a door card off to take a look I found it was worse than that. They had fallen apart. Time for an upgrade then. I removed the speaker to measure what space […]

S1 Elise – Engine Cover / Boot Release Cable Repair

Clearly there had been some kind of failure of the cable or what holds the handle end in place at some point in the Elise’s life and there had been a bit of a bodge repair made to it. It looked awful! There’s no way a horrible mess like that was going to remain on […]

S1 Elise – Removing the Side Scoops

Well this wasn’t something I’d planned on doing but after driving home from work one day I got out the car to find the right hand side scoop was missing. It was there when I left work so had obviously just fallen off. They had been fitted by or for a previous owner and I […]

S1 Elise – Diffuser Spacers

Spacing out the diffuser where it mounts to the rear of the clam is not an uncommon modification to an S1 Elise or Exige. It’s usually done as an aid to keeping engine bay temperatures down. Engine bay temperatures aren’t much of a concern with my Elise though as I’m not tracking or racing it […]

S1 Elise – Gearbox Oil Change

While I had the Elise up on the lift and was working in the area with the induction setup and clutch slave cylinder bracket I thought it was a good opportunity to do a quick gearbox oil change. Apparently this is the stuff to use in the PG1 gearbox. Motul Gear 300 75W90. The drain […]

S1 Elise – Clutch Slave Cylinder Support Bracket

When I was buying all the suspension refresh bits, for some reason I decided to buy one of these. An Elise Parts clutch slave cylinder support bracket. Apparently the original bracket can be a bit weak and bendy. I figured I’d may as well fit it while I had the air filter out the way. […]

S1 Elise – ITG Air Filter and Carbon Fibre Air Box Part 1

To me, one of the most important parts to enjoying a car is the noise it makes, particularly induction noise. Having owned a few Rover K-Series powered cars in my time and run a modified K-Series in my Classic Mini, I know they are capable of making a really nice induction howl. The Elise just […]