30 Hour Repair? Lotus Evora Clutch Replacement

Today we take a look at what it takes to replace the clutch in a Lotus Evora. As you can see it is a somewhat involved process. To get the transmission separated from the engine you have to remove Toyota v6 from the Lotus. To remove the engine you have to take the entire clamshell off.
Just a quick look at what goes into it.
www.TheLostCauseRanch.com

[@badonkadonkey16]

Awesome vid. Would love to see more Lotus content. Anyway, might have missed it, but what was the mileage on the clutch? Thanks!

[@LostCauseRanch]

This one has a little bit of an interesting clutch history. The early Evora's had some premature clutch failures and they came out with updated clutch and clutch hydraulics. This one originally failed at 11k miles. That was 4 or 5 years ago, it hasn't had many miles put on it since then and recently failed again (obviously by the video). We did a little more investigating the second time around, the owner is fairly tall and the Evora doesn't have a dead pedal space. It appears that the clutch pedal has been partially depressed while driving because they don't have enough room to comfortably keep their foot off the pedal. The pedal arm is polished where their shoe sat against it. The clutch disc got pretty hot.

[@robpeabo509]

One aspect of any design & engineering brief is maintainability, and not JUST maintainability, but cost effective maintainability. This Lotus fails on the cost effective part of the equation. As you say, it nearly fits through the bottom. They could have designed it so it would.

[@LostCauseRanch]

Seems like the serviceability is usually lacking on most low production stuff like this. I’m guessing the additional engineering cost isn’t feasible when you can’t spread it across more vehicles.

[@johnedwards1685]

Gracious Lord! 10-15 thousand for a clutch? Mind you, here in England its just hit the news that a guy who bought a second hand electric Mercedes has just found out it needs a new battery and has been quoted £15,000 ($20,000) not including labour. The car is worth £12,850 ($17,200). What on earth is going to happen to all these “green electric” cars when they lose their newness? They’ll be worthless.

[@LostCauseRanch]

That is going to be the downfall of electric stuff until there is some sort of cost effective reman battery setup available. And unlike an internal combustion engine going bad and getting a used one from a breaker, I’m guessing the used battery market won’t be as accessible and economical.

[@likezdislike]

How much the labor cost to do that job?

[@jb828films]

Step 1) remove back of car. About to tackle this job myself, wish me luck and thanks for the video 🫡

[@Bobby82568]

Nice!! Looks like fun lol 😂.

[@LostCauseRanch]

Loads of fun haha. I mean it’s really not all that bad, just a lot.

[@Bobby82568]

Yeah they seem pretty easy to take apart. Btw how’s the LS rover running?

[@LostCauseRanch]

Good l. I love that thing. I’ll have the final close out video on the install up Monday.

[@Bobby82568]

Nice! Almost ready to drop mine in, do you by chance know who you bought your ecm from?

[@SavoyPrimeable]

**Really important question for you** My mechanic is estimating 40 hours of labor for my 2013 LR4 timing chains (primary, secondary, and auxiliary)... he’s saying the auxiliary chain requires complete oil pan/engine removal. Does 40 hours seem accurate to a LR expert like yourself? He is also doing a cam shaft alignment and 8 new fuel injectors. Thank you in advance!

[@LostCauseRanch]

40 hours is probably pretty close on book time to pull the oil pan and do the chains. We typically do not do the oil pump chain unless there is a problem with it as it adds significant cost to the job as you are aware. There shouldn’t be any additional labor for the injectors as those are pulled to do the chain job anyways. I’ll check when I get to the shop what the actual book time calls for, it is probably in that range, chances are it won’t take them that long if they are familiar with them, but typically you still pay book time at most shops since they shouldn’t be punished for their expertise if they can do a quality job ahead of book time. But some (including us when we were open to the public) will cut somewhat of a break on labor if we beat book time by a fair bit, I wouldn’t call that typical though. By the book it calls for the body to be lifted off the chassis for engine removal on these. So it is a significant job.

[@SavoyPrimeable]

@@LostCauseRanch I really appreciate the thorough response! What system do you use to figure the book time? Apparently ALLDATA does not give a specific labor time for engine removal/auxiliary timing chain replacement on the LR4.

[@LostCauseRanch]

We normally use Alldata. I’ll see what I can piece together on what my thoughts timewise are.

[@SavoyPrimeable]

@@LostCauseRanch You’re a rockstar! I really appreciate the help. This $8,000 repair has me absolutely torn.

[@LostCauseRanch]

Are they replacing all the timing components? $8000 with new oem timing components, oil pump chain and 8 new injectors is not crazy. Alldata calls for 16.9 to remove/replace engine. 18.4 to do timing chains. There is a fair amount of overlap on the chain hours if you have engine out. So subtract some time and add a little to drop the pan and change the pump chain. I would personally quote this at 35 hours and roll back from there a little if it went quick. My guess is it will be a 30 hour job. But as long as they are being upfront with you I think they are going about it fairly. I think 40 hours is a little stiff but they are doing the job not me so in the end it’s their call. Big thing is, do you trust them? If you do and have a good experience with them they probably are not out to screw you over.

[@mikepaul396]

too bad. with a little engineering for thought. like you said drop the engine or was there in cut to metal/replaced panel to get to clutch/belhousing and throw-out bearing

[@andrewpolasek5524]

Looks like a pain, but so is 30k service on many Ferraris

[@LostCauseRanch]

For sure. It’s not a terrible job to do, just time consuming. We have the engine out of a 308 at the moment too.

[@andrewpolasek5524]

@@LostCauseRanch 10 4, just changing the front spark plugs on a 308 is a pain.

[@Dedmuus]

It really doesn't look that bad.

[@LostCauseRanch]

It’s not terrible, just nuts and bolts. A lot of them though.

[@reppirc1977]

She’s chooched

[@LostCauseRanch]

Definitely chooched.

[@AudiophileStooge]

Nooooo spankuuuuuuu. I'll take a vintage elise or Esprit over this nightmare.

[@LostCauseRanch]

It is a lot to do, not terribly hard. But a lot.

[@roverron7509]

L lots O of T trouble U usually S serious

[@LostCauseRanch]

Love it

[@1manmanythings144]

Smells alittle clutchy in here.........................................you came in clutch with that joke

[@LostCauseRanch]

I was hoping the joke would be engaging.

[@1manmanythings144]

Make sure you guys have the proper gear and take your time by installing that in shifts.

[@indianapwn3s]

Those clutches are reliable unless they are abused or if the clutch master cylinder began to fail and was ignored. You shouldn't be replacing clutches under 100k miles

[@LostCauseRanch]

Agreed, this one has a bit of a interesting history. We replaced it at 11k miles, it is a 2011 and had the early clutch hydraulics that were prone to cause issues. So we updated the hydraulics and clutch 4 years ago. It went out again without many miles put on it. We did a little investigating. The owner is fairly tall and without any dead pedal space to keep his foot off the clutch it appears by the polished wear on the clutch pedal arm that the pedal has been partially depressed while driving and lead to premature failure.

[@indianapwn3s]

@@LostCauseRanch remind him to put his foot behind the clutch pedal while cruising along. 😆 the lack of dead pedal is annoying, one of the reasons I went with a 400.

[@TigerWoodsOffical]

@@LostCauseRanch Thank you for providing all this detail as someone looking to purchase one of these in the next 60 days this was helpful in setting correct expectations. gained a follower for this one

[@jfeliciano2687]

That's not intimidating at all lol

[@LostCauseRanch]

It’s just nuts and bolts haha.

[@jfeliciano2687]

@@LostCauseRanch I'm actually glad I found this. Been wondering what it would take to pull the engine and do a swap on an Evora and this pretty much explained everything I was curious about. Thanks for sharing.