Lotus Engineering Company was founded by Colin Chapman in 1952. He had a fondness for trials racing, so his first car was a formula type called the Mark VII, now referred to as the Seven. The Seven was barely suitable for road use; its main purpose was racing. The Seven needed development and Chapman needed money to race, so he designed a production car, the Elite. The first Elite was a gorgeous two-seat sports car, with flowing compound curves everywhere. Its body was fiberglass, setting a standard for Lotus. Production ended in 1963; these cars are prized in the market. In 1974, the Elite nameplate was recycled, this time on a shooting brake four-seater with a hatchback. This Elite was a front-engine layout using Lotus’ venerable two-liter, sixteen valve inline four-cylinder type 907 engine. The motor was good for 140 bhp and handling was superb. The wedge styling was controversial, which has kept pricing in a reasonable range. If cheap performance in a 1970’s wrapper is of interest, here on craigslist is a 1978 Lotus Elite project for sale, priced at $8,500 or trade, located in Dade City, Florida. Thanks to Pat L. for the tip!
The ad title confuses the Eclat with the Elite. The Eclat is very similar but has a boot (trunk lid); this car is indeed an Elite. The owner states that the car ran last year, and he guesses the mileage to be about 100,000. A parts manual is offered with the car. The panels are straight. The wheels are original to the car. The vacuum system that operates the headlights on this car is probably leaking, thus the perpetually raised position.
Under the bonnet, Webers replace the factory Zenith Stromberg carburetors. The original air cleaner is missing. The car is a five-speed manual – much better than the automatics equipping some Elites. The knock on this car from the get-go was its tendency to break at the slightest provocation. My experience with a Lotus Europa has been hit and miss, mostly miss. Water pumps fail, fuel pumps fail, overheating is rampant, and the brakes failed spectacularly. It’s one thing for my fifty-year-old car to mount a tow truck regularly; it’s another thing for one straight from the factory to break, but break they did. So when you tackle this engine bay, think ‘replace’ rather than ‘reuse’.
The velour that Lotus used never held up well so this entire interior needs replacing, but in this case, I’ll view that as an opportunity – to match the colors. What’s with olive green and two shades of beige, anyway? If 1970’s style is your thing, would you bargain for this one?
Not Webers. Dell’Orto carbs. They came stock from Lotus. I have an Elite with the same carbs. Horrible engines, though. Extremely difficult to do a valve adjustment, and valves stems bend easily because they are too thin. When you do a valve adjustment and you take the cam cover off, the exhaust cam leaks oil all over the exhaust manifold.
I was working at an import specialist as a mechanic when these came out, and the owner took Lotus on as a dealership. These were so bad when new that they required multiple mods to the engines before they could be considered ready for sale, even by the rather lax standards of the day.
So infuriatingly bad, that I quit & became a postman.
The car here will probably also have electrical issues judging by photos & corrosion of the chassis was pretty common on Loti of the period. Price is laughable –
And yes I have owned lotus cars; two Elans.
This is the first Lotus Elite that I have seen. Pretty cool looking car. That sure is one expensive parts manual.
It’s better to run your money through a paper shredder, then to buy this thing. Lotus made some fine racing cars. IMHO, Their street cars were garbage.
Big C,
You speak like you’ve had experience owning Lotus street cars – do you? I’ve owned (and driven) an Elan, a Europa, and and Elise. My experience is the exact opposite of your.
bt
BT,
You will find all kinds of experts out here that have never owned what they complain about.
It happens constantly.
I had a 74 Elite that I bought new. I’ve had more than my share of cars over the past 50+ years, and the Elite may be my favorite. The Elite broke nearly every time I drove it, but the cornering ability was amazing. Back then someone sold a kit for installing an Olds F85 215CID alum V8. I was all for it, but the Lotus dealer ultimately talked me out of it. He was a bit of a purist. I consider buying another Elite, but I think I’d have trouble getting out of the thing at my age. Maybe Hoyer has a lift I could integrate…
Listen to PaulG. There are usually 2 or 3 Lotus trolls that post on every car that comes down with the same old trite comments. it may even just be one person posting under different names. It’s a bit childish and certainly comical that they post on a BARNFINDS site that there is a car that needs restoring. Clearly they have a bone to pick for some reason. But as most of us should know their are lemon cars and lemon owners….
Lotus is simply a different kind of sports car. Not wrong or right. They had few resources, but were able to build very successful race cars (world car construction champions several times and Formula 1 championship cars multiple times). Lotus made many ingenious contributions to car design (some that were outlawed as “unfair”). Lotus cars from the early 60s are still tearing up tracks across the world. Go to any vintage race and see how they fare (23B!).
Let’s call the street cars what they are – they are lightweight, small run relatively inexpensive sports cars that used many “bins” parts to keep the price down. Lotus could not afford to design and build street cars from the ground up. The results in regards to handling performance were stunning. However, that handling came at a price. Chapman (Lotus founder) only prized winning and traded lightness for reliability and maintainability. This also appears in the street cars, so they do not necessarily age gracefully. Having said that, the cars are remarkably simple and very rewarding to own and drive. I’ve long since sold my 911s and other Porsches, but never intend to sell my Lotus cars. You can have great fun just taking a couple of curvy backroads to get the groceries. Lots of fun had at double digit speeds….
I think the Lotus 7 sums up Lotus cars the best. How many copies and variants have been made of that original design….. you can buy a new one today if you like. What other car can make that claim from a 50s design that was created by one or two people in a simple garage.
It’s worth checking out Jay Leno’s garage to see what he thinks of Lotus and more importantly what Jim Hall thinks of Lotus. Also Lotus cars reside at the famous Barber Motorsports museum.
Finally, there is a 200k+ mile Lotus Europa owner on the Lotus Europa forum, so nothing is in stone….
fin
Yeah Billy, they’re real fine motorcars. Do you know what “IMHO” means?
Big C. Yes I know what IMO means. Yours is uninformed in this case, and makes a generalization that makes it less than useful.
Cheers
Bt
I’ve never seen a lotus on the road,but I know where several are sitting.
As always with Lotus listings, the uninformed opinions keep the prices down. That’s good. Some of us who have owned, fixed, driven, and enjoyed know……
Despise these trailer pictures and the “I believer it to be” statements. Just say you stole it from the estate sale and that your flipping the fluck out of it. Stop being a shyster and try to be an honest good souled human.
Buy it, take the hoat anchor motor out and stick any appropriate american engine in it instead and drive the snot out of it.
Years ago i had a red 77 Elite and a Europa, had my fun and sold them, this is really a good deal. I hope it gets back on the road.
Have a good friend who owned (but seldom drove) a Lotus. He sold it to a guy who flew into Philadelphia, bought the car and drove it home to the Pittsburgh area. He called my friend and told him it had a shimmy at 65mph, but went away at 90!
The biggest problem with Lotus cars when new is that “WANT TO BE RACERS” were largely the customer base and they neither cared or could afford to keep up with a complex car. This is also a problem with Jag’s and Alfa’s of various types.
I have a Europa and an Esprit and while both have broken down on me the Esprit was an electrical sensor on the fuel injection system and the Europa was a defective bolt that had an inner void and even it lasted almost 75,000 miles before failure. The Europa when I stoped driving it to restore it had aprox. 200,000 miles and I have owned it for 40 years. Simple but very high stressed machines. More like a helicopter than a typical car. This is a very good one and a good buy. However from those that I know that have owned them the electrical system could use a great deal of improvement.
These cars need frequent attention to keep them on the road and in top shape. You want something simple get a Toyota but do not expect it to perform like a Lotus except for the ones that had lotus consulting like the Supra.
I had a 76 Elite. It had the Dell carb conversion. Look at the picture of the engine closely as the carbs will either drip gas or backfires fumes over the starter motor directly below it. Will cause a fire. Mine did and burnt the car. My car had been in great shape and only had 24K miles. A shame.
My lotus experience was not happy. It’s. A fun car to drive but not for the faint hearted.
“…ad title confuses the…”
signs ofa “1960’s TV star”
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057748/
Took 15 posts to say it esp last sentence. “Typical” not “All” american drivers/owners…
TonyWa,
Agree with you completely. When the Europa first came out Road & Track magazine said it was the best handling car that they had ever tested.
Like most Little British Cars they need TLC often. That’s what makes the LBC hobby so much fun, in spite of Lucas electronics!