Frequently Asked Questions

Fitting Instructions for SureShift 2

1. Fitting to a Lotus Elise IIIs
2. Fitting to a Caterham 7 K series

Fitting to a Lotus Elise IIIs

Submitted by Simon Hughes

This is based on my second attempt, as the first which took the +ve and -ve feeds from the respective feeds going to the STACK instrument panel seemed to cause a few problems. The sort of problems were that it seemed to work OK, until you tried to use the Main headlight beams, Indicator and the SureShift, at which time the indicator seemed to switch of or re-set the sureshift led's. Anyway I've been using the new wiring set-up for a few weeks and there don't seem to be any problems.

BTW, I am not a trained electrician and don't warranty that this will work on other models of Elises. My guess is that it probably will, as looking at the wiring diagrams for the various cars, there doesn't seem to be any difference in what goes into the STACK instruments.

The instructions are:

• Remove the top and bottom of the steering column cover (held on by self tapping screws)
• Unbolt the STACK instrument binnacle (one bolt either side of the steering column, a bit hard to see as they are tucked up under the binnacle).
• Detach the binnacle from the wiring harness (blue clips either side)
• To fit the Sureshift control box I removed the far rightmost switch-gear (it's on the dashboard, to the right of the instruments, next to the A-pillar. To release the switch, remove the surrounding fake carbon fibre (clipped into place and fixed with some non-cure glue), then pull out the switch). This switch is actually a dummy, so no hardship.
• Velcro the controller to the dash and feed the Sureshift loom (connected together by some flexi-wrap) through the whole left by the switch. The whole arrangement looks very neat. (If your interested I can get you a digital photo)
• Identify the Tacho feed wire (you may need to cut the cable tie and strip back the shrink wrap cover on the loom. On my car the wire was the white wire with a blue stripe that went into the A4 position in the loom connector)
• To make the connection I stripped back the insulation on the white/blue wire and then soldered the SureShift tacho wire to it, before covering with insulating tape. There loom is very short and space is restricted so there's not much else you can do.)
• I then took out the radio (this does assume you've got one fitted) and connected the Red and Black Sureshift wires to the matching radio feed wires (I did this by cutting the wires on the radio loom to connector side and fitting bullet connectors in a piggy back arrangement. The loom from the car to the connector is too short to do much).
• Re-fit the Radio and Fit the sureshift led's to the top of the Instrument Binnacle, before re-fitting the binnacle and Column covers and test.
• The whole job should take no more than a couple of hours first-time/doing it carefully and less than an hour when you know what you are doing.

Fitting to a Caterham 7 K series

Submitted by Tony Martyr

For any subscriber wishing to install a ACES SureShift light system into a Caterham with a 1600K series engine the following connections worked OK for me.

The control module was mounted on the nearside of the passenger compartment on the aluminimum flashing piece. This is sufficiently out of the way of passengers knees not to get damaged. I intend to use a second mounting on the vertical section which will be easier to operate on track days when there is no passenger to worry about and I want to interrogate the unit for peak revs etc.

The units are held in place by a sort of industrial strengh 'Velcro' believe me it does not let go without a fight but I have found a thin screwdriver slid between the section enables you to unplug.

I took power from the fused side of the heated window screen supply. The fused side in my car is the front of the two connections. I was told by Caterhams that the cables went into the fuse block via some sort of 'pull out' connector. I pulled and lost my nerve as the cable stretched. I cut into the cable and, using crimped cable connectors inserted a bayonet connector.

The earth point was a hole drilled into the aluminimum flashing sheet near the fuse box.

The speed signal comes from the black and white single cable connected into the dashboard tacho. There is a three pin plug with two blacks, two greens and the signal. Same technique of inserting a bayonet connector so the whole unit can be unplugged.

The set-up technique is decribed in the handbook and the number of cylinder settings is 4 (could be different if a wasted spark system was used). It works. I have put it no track setting but there are a number of profiles you can used so you could impress the natives at the traffic lights with sound and coloured lights as you blip the throttle.