From: David Martin <david.mar…@…net>
To: Undisclosed recipients
Subject: Meet the neighbors (!)

Dear friends,

The other night, my son Brooks and I took the old Lotus out for a test drive. Here are two versions of what happened.

THE SHORT VERSION

The car was having some intermittent electrical irregularities, and we wanted to see if our attempts at repair had been successful. While we were out, the throttle cable broke. I phoned Holly, and she brought us some tools and a flashlight. I reattached the throttle cable to the carburetor linkage, and we drove back home.

THE VERSION WITH THE MISSING DETAILS

After a l-o-n-g span of inactivity, the Lotus is running again. Since it doesn’t have an inspection sticker yet, we’ve been doing most of our testing and evaluation under cover of darkness. It’s just about ready for the safety inspection, BUT…the Lotus has developed the unfortunate habit of honking the horn at random intervals and without any human intervention–not good when you’re driving an ultra-unusual, racy vehicle through the streets and it’s screaming, “BEEP! BEEP! Hey! Look at me! I’m a Lotus and I’m LOUD! And I haven’t been inspected in nearly ten years!”

The honking seems to have something to do with the steering wheel position—-turn the wheel a smidge to the right, and it honks. Flick it back to the left a bit, and the honking stops…for a few seconds. The only problem is that the steering is so responsive that “smidges” and “flicks” have you swerving all over the road.

I had fiddled with some of the connections, and we thought maybe it would fix the problem. So about 9:30 the other night, we launched out on another nocturnal excursion. Sneaking slowly down our alley, all seems well. Then, a slight buzzing sound escalates to a muffled “bee-ee-ee-EEP!” Dang. I jerk the wheel, and it stops. We turn out onto the street, and the little car proudly announces its presence with a coughing “BEE- ee-uuu-mmm-EEE-ee-EEEP!”

We keep driving, and after a few more sonic outbursts (from the car, not me) I _think_ I’ve determined that pulling back on the steering wheel stops the horn from honking. I’m willing to test it further, but we need to get off of these quiet neighborhood streets. We pull out onto the major thoroughfare. Hey, so far my theory is working. Well, it doesn’t completely eliminate the problem, but it helps. So we keep driving.

Ah, there’s nothing like driving a responsive sports car on a beautiful night. Accelerating up through the gears is a concert of mechanical music: “rrrRRRRRRR-nnn-RRRRRRRRR-nnnbeeep-RRRRRRRR- rrBEEEPBEEP-RRRRRR” OK, it’s a concert with a spastic trumpet player jumping in.

Suddenly, all the music stops, and the gas pedal drops to the floor. Man, I didn’t need this! We coast to the next side street and pull off, stopping under a street light on a quiet neighborhood corner. We raise the engine cover, and yep, the throttle cable is broken. And we’ve violated the cardinal rule of driving old British sports cars and left the house without tools and a torch (that’s a flashlight for you Yanks). I call my wife Holly, and in a few minutes, she arrives in our Nissan with an assortment of hand tools and a flashlight in a pink Merle Norman sack.

With a screwdriver, I loosen the cable bracket from the carburetor and immediately drop it into the darkness below. Aided by the flashlight and the Nissan’s headlights, we eventually find it hiding in an obscure nook on the engine. We repeat the whole process when the set screw and washer fall out. I’m mumbling and muttering vague suggestions about the car’s lineage, and it suddenly dawns on Holly that it’s 10:45 p.m. and we’re not even trying to keep our voices down as we overhaul this strange automobile a scant 20 feet from two darkened houses. She tells us we should try to be quiet.

I finally got the remaining part of the cable reconnected. But to do it, I had to pull the linkage up to make up for the broken-off part of the cable. I warn Holly and Brooks that when I restart the car it will be idling faster than normal. We pick up the tools, close the engine cover, and Brooks and I get back in the Lotus. Holly prepares to follow us as we gingerly limp home in case we need any more assistance.

I turn the key, and the Lotus engine springs to life–at 5,000 r.p.m.! I decided we’d better get moving, and soon! I had planned on doing a U-turn to head back the way we came, but with the car basically floorboarding itself, I couldn’t turn sharp enough. So I slam on the brakes and quickly do a three-point turn in the middle of the street, engine roaring, tires squealing, and throughout the whole thing that stupid little British horn going BEEE-eee-EEEP!

Holly falls back into the Nissan, laughing hysterically. I stop the Lotus briefly at the stop sign, then let it blast itself back onto the thoroughfare. By riding the brakes, I can manage to keep its speed down to about 50 m.p.h. Holly later said we just vanished down the road, the only traces being our tail lights weaving erratically in the distance–and the roaring engine, and the diminishing ” bee—eep…”

Back in the cockpit, I begin to wonder if, in all this wild acceleration and stopping and turning, we may have knocked the garage door opener off of the console. I ask Brooks if he’s got it. He looks at me wild-eyed, and I quickly explain to him that no, I’m not planning on pulling into the garage at 50 m.p.h.

With horn honking and engine revving, I manage to downshift and make the final turns into our neighborhood. I pull into the driveway and shut the key off. The silence is deafening. I’m still breathing hard when Holly pulls up, still laughing. “It’s not funny!” I said. “Yes it is!” she giggled. We push the Lotus into the garage before anybody calls the cops.

So, the point of all of this is: do any of you have a throttle cable for a 1971 Lotus?

David