Caterham 170 experience

   (above: replacement nylon dome nut and 3D printed washer) TL;DR don't wait and just thighten those As I've seen 3 or 4 cars with missing sidescreen latches or door straps attached with random nuts, it seems this issue is a common occurence. So I lost a nut and washer. At that point I was just a month in, and it had a been few days that the rear strap on the driver-side sidescreen was a bit loose. I'm lucky I just lost the fasteners. The straps are attached with M5 screws that go through the doors. On the exterior are allen heads, and on the inside are 8mm dome nuts in zinc-nickel with 12mm washers. Do yourself a favor and thighten those 4 sets of fasteners for good. Even finger-tight is a good improvement, but an allen key and 8mm wrench would obviously be best. As I just wanted to get on with it, I ordered a pack of 20 black nylon M5 dome nuts from Amazon , and quickly designed then 3D-printed some 12mm dia, 2mm thick washers.   (original fasteners)   (makes...

Hiding your documents below the passenger seat is not a good idea they told me. They were right.  It gets quite wet down there with the water ingress in the passenger footwell. I still have to find where it comes from. Thankfully the only valuable document in there was my proof of registration and it's so plasticky that it would probably survive a cycle in the washing machine. The insurance and MOT-equivalent were laser printed on quality paper and just needed drying with paper towel on the window sill. Inkjet printed sheets such as the copy of the certificate of conformity issued by Caterham France (with the original kept safely at home) and the road legal certification for the Philips Ultinon LEDs were just a messy block but could be re-printed anytime. Other than that, this 10€ allegedly water and fire proof document holder is rather nice. I'm sure it wouldn't let any rain or splash get in. But no zipper could tackle full-on immersion for days.

  A few weeks after after I got the 170, I was sent an email about a track day organised by We Love Curves and House of Speed. While I had no intention to drive on the track, a day at Spa-Francorchamps is always something great to do on a weekend.  Just as I was reaching the heights of Spa, I came across some sleet. So much for the Agile SCX that was supposed to establish a reference time with a professional driver.  Arrived at the circuit gates, it didn't need much talking to get the security guard to let me in, he was more than happy to let the Caterham go in the paddock area although I was just a spectator. The Caterham and Lotus drivers were sharing the booth with We Love Curves and House of Speed. The only running Caterham would be the 420R from the garage. The yellow SV 340R was brought on display. A handful of Lotus Elise were there, and made the most of the open pit lane. A pair of Agile SCX were also present : the blue one driven by its owner, the green one by a ...

  Don't misunderstand me, I have no issue with advertising House of Speed on the back of my car. I'm really pleased with all the interactions I've had with the whole team and highly recommend them. What I didn't like was the yellow lettering on my very yellow car. The branding is on the licence plate holder anyway. So I replaced the garage sticker with a more personal one. The source of the design is a graffiti written with a white paint marker on a shop entrance made of belgian blue stone, of which I took a picture on Nov 1st 2010. The meaning can be translated as FUCK GREY ! - The hell with grey as a color, as a symbol of everything boring, and bad weather as well for good measure. The irony is that my greying hair and my firstname lead to people ask me if it's my new nickname. A bit like Gandalf the Grey. The design was vectorized and cut by my friend Laurent, owner of La Buche Design . We opted for silver as an extra ironic touch, and to match the SEVEN 170 S ...

TL;DR the valve should be able to open and close fully With warmer weather coming up, it became apparent that something was off with the heater cable. It seemed impossible to close the heater valve fully. As one customer tip says in the assembly guide : "You’ll know when you have adjusted the cable correctly as the valve will be able to reach both the fully open and fully closed positions. - Chris B" On mine, the cable had been secured about 1 cm too short and needed to be adjusted a bit. That's all and well, but a hell of job to do as the screw is against the fan compartment, very hard to access behind the battery. The battery had to be removed, and the imperial spanner set put to good use. Lucky me, I come from over 20 years with a classic Mini Cooper, I'm not stranger to imperial tools. As the clamp screw is not accessible with a philips screwdriver, a 1/4" spanner is the best option. Once the outer sheath if freed, the valve is fully closed by actioning it ...

    A first round of modifications of the Lego 620R model.    -    You will find part I here I got it second-hand parly disassembled, and did rebuild it with the exhaust, steering wheel and pedals on the left side to match my car. The wheels were flipped inside-out. The LEGO Technic figures were already in my possession, but I got an extra one all in white, as a Stig figure. Custom licence plates were ordered from our Dutch neighbours from https://bedrukjeblokje.nl/ it's nice that they offer belgian plates besides the 3 versions of dutch ones. An order was placed to the online LEGO shop, where each piece was carefully selected : Yellow front arches A 5th wheel and support to put it on the back as a spare wheel The missing handbrake part A new steering wheel as the provided one was quite loose. The addition of the spare wheel did free the 2x4 yellow flat piece with the double stripes, that I have repurposed to modifty the front of the hood to ge...

  As I use the Caterham almost as a daily, it happens that I need to get in or out at night or in underground garages. Mostly at work when I come in early and only limited lighting is turned on. The solution to that very specific problem is a "UTV Dome light" built for some kind of all-terrain buggies and readily available for cheap. I got the "smoked" version with a tinted lens. It's powered by 3 AA batteries and strapped to the roll bar in seconds. Illumination is really good. You can see it on most of the pictures of the car when the roof is off.

Yes, that's an old joke. Here we are after 2 weeks of ownership and a 1500km trip to France and back. The rear LED light module on the left side is filled with water. And not happy. It is a sealed unit, and Caterham did replaced it under the 2 years manufacturer warranty. It took about 6 weeks but got there alright. Update Feb 22nd 2025 : It filled with water again, but was still working. With the approval of House of Speed, I drilled a pair of 2 mm holes at the bottom of each tail light. Once the left unit had been emptied, they were both dried as much as possible with a hairdryer while applying vacuum through one drain hole. Those Sanube units are part of their customized rear lamps program . Update March 8th 2025 : I've installed silicone rubber caps to prevent water and dirt contamination.      

TL;DR velcro is ok Day 10 of ownership, the fuse box cover just fell off. At this point the car is just over a year old, and weather is freezing a bit at night. I did spot that the adhesive velcro was not in top condition when installing the dashcam power supply. Trying to re-fit it in place lasted the week-end - good enough. As I did have some white TESA adhesive velcro, I did replace what needed to be. I've also used some length of the "loops" side of the velcro provided with the SoftBits' tunnel pocket. It's likely that I had to install new "hooks" velcro side on the firewall (I cannot really remember). I've also added "loops" adhesive to the long edge that slides under the dashboard. Anyway, that's how the assembly guide says it should be done :

Just a week in, and with some preparation, we went to Normandy. Motorways were avoided as they're no fun in the Caterham. With the hood on you feel like you are camping with your tent in a 130 kph constant wind. Plus cruising for 7 hours straight with the engine continuously at 5000 RPM is as pleasant as it sounds. Backpacks were fine for a 3 days escape, and fitted easily in the boot - having the roof up made that all too easy. That trip was a good opportunity to get accustomed to the gasoline gauge, and what kind of range we can expect with a full tank.  Driving to and on the beach in true beach buggy fashion (roof off, no doors) with 4°C outside was quite the experience. We quickly understood what a godsend the opening rear window really is. It's basically always open when I drive with the full roof on, unless it's raining really hard. Open or not, it can get quite hot in there if you really want to. But the heater temperature is adjustable and there are 3 settings for t...