Terrific 12 – Colin Chapman’s road cars

Chapman’s roadgoing heroes

Most of the Lotus models built during the lifetime of company founder Colin Chapman were intended primarily to be used in motorsport.

However, Lotus quickly became involved in supplying cars to customers who might well compete in them, but would generally drive them in normal road conditions, too. This would eventually include cars which had Lotus input but were assembled by other manufacturers.

Several of these are at least as famous as the company’s Formula One cars, for good or bad reasons. Here we salute all 12 of them.

1. Lotus Seven

Despite its name, this was not the seventh Lotus car, and it did not make its public debut until after the Lotus Eleven.

Be that as it may, the Seven was the company’s first big hit, dramatically successful both as an exciting road car and as a competition vehicle.

Previous models could also be road registered, but they were not dual-purpose in the way the Seven was.

Lotus Seven (cont.)

There were four generations of Seven from 1957 to 1973. The last, introduced in 1970, featured a boxy glassfibre body which is not highly regarded other than by staunch enthusiasts.

Keen to move on from one of its earliest models, Lotus sold the manufacturing rights to Caterham Cars, which still builds its own version of the Seven to this day.

2. Lotus Elite

Based on a design by Peter Kirwan-Taylor, the first-generation Elite was the first beautiful Lotus, and perhaps the best-looking car the company has ever built.

The two-seat sports coupé, powered by a 1.2-litre Coventry Climax engine, was much more of a road car than the Seven had been, but this did not prevent eager customers from racing it, as indeed Chapman himself did.

Lotus Elite (cont.)

Future F1 World Champion Jim Clark is pictured above competing in his own Elite at the Bo’ness hillclimb in 1959. On Boxing Day of the previous year, he had very nearly beaten Chapman in a similar car in a race at Brands Hatch.

That event, which might otherwise have been forgotten by now, was momentous. It brought Clark to Chapman’s attention, and led to what is widely regarded as the finest driver/constructor partnership in 1960s F1 racing.

3. Lotus Elan

Launched in 1962, the Elan had a steel backbone chassis and a non-structural glassfibre body, in contrast to the earlier Elite’s glassfibre monocoque.

It was also the first road car fitted with a Lotus derivative of the Ford Kent engine. Instead of one camshaft at the side of the cylinders, as intended by Ford, it had two up top, driving eight valves, and will feature again in this story.

Regardless of its engine, the Elan was described in contemporary reviews as being one of the finest-handling cars in existence.

Lotus Elan (cont.)

Chapman tried to insist that the Elan was unsuitable for motorsport, but that didn’t stop owners racing it anyway. Lotus responded by creating the competition-oriented 26R in 1964.

Other versions included the +2 of 1967, which was mechanically similar to the regular Elan but had enough space for two adults and two children.

Elan production continued until 1975. The model’s 13-year lifespan was exceptional for an early Lotus.

4. Ford Lotus Cortina Mk1

The first collaboration between Lotus and a major manufacturer resulted in the first-generation Lotus Cortina, introduced in 1963.

It was powered by the Lotus Twin Cam engine, in whose development both companies had played a part, and assembled by Lotus from bodyshells supplied by Ford.

Ford Lotus Cortina Mk1 (cont.)

In addition to being one of the most memorable high-performance saloons of the 1960s, the Lotus Cortina quickly found a home on race circuits and rally stages, and can still be seen on both even now.

Jim Clark won the British Saloon Car Championship in a Lotus Cortina in 1964, the year between his two F1 world titles, and was astonishingly competitive in another example in the 1966 RAC Rally until he crashed out of the event.

5. Lotus Europa

Lotus began manufacturing mid-engined racing cars in 1960, but did not adopt the layout for a road car until the Europa was introduced six years later.

To begin with, the Europa used the engine and gearbox from the Renault 16. The Lotus Twin Cam engine became available in 1971.

Lotus Europa (cont.)

Lotus also produced a Cosworth-powered Europa derivative called the Type 47 specifically for racing, but it proved to be one of the company’s less successful competition vehicles and was abandoned after the 1969 season.

The roadgoing Europa, by contrast, remained on sale until 1975.

And 31 years later, in the post-Chapman era, Lotus revived the name for the Elise-based Europa S.

6. Ford Lotus Cortina Mk2

Although this car is often referred to now as the second Lotus Cortina, Ford introduced it in 1967 as the Cortina Lotus.

In emphasising its own role in the car’s development over that of the much smaller manufacturer, Ford was making a fair point. The Mk2 shared the earlier car’s Lotus Twin Cam engine, but it was built by Ford in Dagenham, not by Lotus in Hethel.

In some markets, the Lotus name was removed entirely, and the car was known as the Cortina Twin Cam.

Ford Lotus Cortina Mk2 (cont.)

Although it was an exciting road car, and had some success in rallying, the second Lotus Cortina is not as fondly remembered as the first.

This is partly due to the arrival in 1968 of the Escort Twin Cam. The Escort was smaller and lighter, but equally powerful, and therefore faster and a better bet for motorsport.

The even more potent Escort RS1600 arrived in 1970, the same year that the Lotus Cortina was discontinued.
 

7. Lotus Elite

After a gap of 11 years, the Elite name was brought back for a semi-estate sports coupé introduced in 1974.

The new Elite was the first Lotus to be fitted with the company’s Type 907 2.0-litre engine, though it had been used earlier in the Jensen-Healey. A 2.2-litre version was used for the heavily revised Elite introduced in 1980.

Lotus Elite (cont.)

There was no question of this Elite being used for motorsport. It was a four-seater – or at least a 2+2 – and it had the option of automatic transmission, a feature which would have been unthinkable when the Seven was introduced only 17 years earlier.

Production ended in 1982. A 5.0-litre V8 engined petrol-electric hybrid with the Elite name was displayed at the 2010 Paris Motor Show, but nothing came of it.

8. Lotus Éclat

At the turn of the century, Lotus was comfortable with producing several cars from the same basic material. Hence the 340R and Exige, both of which were derivatives of the Elise.

In the Chapman era, this was unusual, but it happened in the case of the Éclat. Introduced in 1975, the Éclat was simply a second-generation Elite with a more obviously coupé-like shape.

Lotus Éclat (cont.)

The history of the Éclat exactly matched that of the Elite, except that it began one year later.

The 2.0-litre Type 907 engine once again provided the power until 1980, when it was replaced by a similar 2.2-litre motor as part of a general update.

9. Lotus Esprit

Manufactured between 1976 and 2004, the mid-engined Esprit easily holds the record for being the Lotus which remained in production for the longest period.

A submarine version of the Esprit was created for the 1977 James Bond film, The Spy Who Loved Me. This impossibly glamorous machine was given the notably unglamorous nickname Wet Nellie.
 

Lotus Esprit (cont.)

The Esprit started out with the 2.0-litre and later 2.2-litre four-cylinder engines used in the Elite and Éclat, too.

The 2.2 was also turbocharged in some later applications. A 3.5-litre V8 was added to the range in 1996, and also powered the Esprit GT1 race car of the same year.

10. Talbot Sunbeam Lotus

In a process very similar to the one which had led to the creation of the first Lotus Cortina a decade and a half earlier, Chrysler Europe commissioned Lotus to create a high-performance version of its Sunbeam hatchback.

Normally fitted with an engine of between 930cc and 1.6 litres, the Sunbeam now received the 2.2-litre Lotus engine and an appropriate ZF gearbox. The power output was 150bhp, half as much again as that of the next most powerful car in the range.

The Sunbeam Lotus went on sale after Chrysler Europe products were rebranded as Talbots in 1979.

Talbot Sunbeam Lotus (cont.)

The Sunbeam Lotus was a homologation special, built for public sale only so that it could be used in international motorsport.

In sporting terms, it was well worth the effort. Despite the arrival in the same year of the epoch-making Audi quattro, the rear-wheel drive Sunbeam earned Talbot the manufacturers’ title in the 1981 World Rally Championship.

11. De Lorean DMC-12

Originally known as the DMC-12, the De Lorean was manufactured from early 1981 to late 1982 in Northern Ireland and sold in the United States.

Lotus was brought in as an engineering consultant when the project was already under way. It’s unlikely that Chapman would have approved of mounting the 2.8-litre V6 engine behind the rear wheels if Lotus had started with a clean sheet.

De Lorean DMC-12 (cont.)

The De Lorean Motor Company collapsed amid financial and political scandal in 1982, shortly before Chapman’s own death in December of that year, at the age of 54.

Considering the circumstances surrounding it, the car is fondly remembered nowadays, though not for its own merits or those of anyone involved with it. It is best known for its role as the time machine in the Back to the Future film trilogy.

12. Lotus Excel

The Excel was the last roadgoing Lotus to enter production during the lifetime of Colin Chapman.

It was a development of the second-generation Elite and the Éclat, and replaced both in 1982. The only available engine was the 2.2-litre unit introduced for the earlier cars two years previously.

Some components, including the five-speed manual gearbox, were supplied by Toyota, for which Lotus had done some work on the first-generation Supra.

Lotus Excel (cont.)

Although there were some upgrades, the Excel was mechanically unchanged throughout its 10-year production life, apart from the addition of an automatic transmission option.

The car was discontinued in 1992, and not directly replaced. For a dozen years afterwards, the Esprit would be the last Chapman-era Lotus to remain on sale.