For many – and not just fans of The Prisoner – the S2 with its reshaped nose and shortened rear undertray is the prettiest Seven and it is hard to dispute when you set eyes upon this car. Neat touches include only the rev counter being in front of the driver, speed apparently being a concern for the passenger alone, and the steel-hubcapped wheels, but it is the overall balance of the shape that impresses most. Likewise on the road. The chassis responds to hard driving so differently to the S1: in some circumstances you feel it flex that bit more due to the lightening and removal of some chassis tubes, but in others you feel that the area surrounding the pilot at least is considerably more solid thanks to the riveted inner panels and dashboard.
By the end of the S2 (and certainly with the late 1600cc Kent crossflow models) the Seven had truly come of age as a clubmans racing car, but it was only with the 1968-on S3 that it achieved the same goal as a road car. Ford’s 225E Kent engine had made its debut in the run-out 1968 cars known as S2½s, but, barring the rare Twin Cam SS and one-off Holbay-tuned and specced-up 7S press car (left), it was the engine of choice in the S3 in either 1297cc or 1598cc capacities. The extra power negated the car’s increased weight and, with a Ford Escort Mexico rear axle under the back, the wings had to be modified so the shape changed slightly. Luxuries included standard carpets – an indication that Lotus was addressing the need for the Seven to be as usable on the road as it was on the track.
Some 40 years on, this example feels as if it might have left the factory a matter of weeks ago and, unmodified and rebuilt to Lotus spec, it is a revelation. It has a sensuous tactility that smoothes away the rougher edges of previous cars, the fingertip steering as precise as it is light, the performance perky and the handling, while perhaps a bit more skittish than the sublime S2 on the limit, is rewarding and ultimately flattering, its cornering tantrums docile and easily quenched. Of the cars here, this is the one that, when required, most feels like a normal sports car, the one that the driver can most relax in when he isn’t wringing all of the performance from it. It doesn’t have the punch of the Holbay S3 or the Twin Cam SS (both of which Vincent Haydon brought on our shoot), but neither do you have to work as hard to extract its best.
For some people the story ends there, they would prefer to mentally obliterate what came from Lotus after the run of 340 S3s came to an end in 1969 – or leap forward to when Graham Nearn’s Caterham revived the S3 shape in 1974. More fool them, because the radical S4, always viewed as the ugly duckling and underdog in the Seven series, is in some ways the most accomplished. It may lack the delicate styling of the 1950s-originated design – it was meant to be a car for the ’70s after all – and its body might be all glassfibre with steel panels used in the frame, but in other ways it is a great improvement. For the first time, driver and passenger can enjoy proper seats rather than a padded bench and, while the S4 may actually be marginally narrower than its predecessor, wedged down between transmission tunnel and sill it seems roomier and the driver feels more part of the car. It is the extra length – nigh-on a foot – that makes the biggest difference and opens up the world of Sevens to drivers of substantially greater than Chapman’s 5ft 7in proportions. The appointment is more cosseting throughout and the S4 doesn’t give much away in performance either.
In fact, as time passes and all-things ’70s are viewed as more cool and less kitsch, as people appreciate the S4 as a true Lotus – and recognise that possibly of them all it best and most practically bridges the Seven’s road and track intents – then surely it cannot continue to languish at half or even a third of the values of the other cars. After all, thanks to the enduring appeal of the model and present-day proliferation of clones, an S4 is easily the most distinguishable sight on the road and its comfort shames even the S3.
