The Lotus elan has become a sports car legend in it’s own right, it is a sports car well known for it’s performance & incredible handling dynamics, due mainly to its well designed chassis layout. Lotus became famous for it’s Formula One World Championship successes. The elan was designed and built in the UK during the nineteen sixties by the late Colin Chapman of Lotus Cars. Chapman was a brilliant aeronautical engineer, and applied the knowledge to build high performance lightweight sports cars.

The fabrication techniques involved the use of tubular space frame, or fabricated sheet metal for a torsionally rigid chassis, which sat on softly sprung, independent suspension, a combination which provided razor sharp handling, and excellent stopping power via the four wheel disc brakes, rapid acceleration was provided by the highly tuned twin cam 1.5 litre engine, and the ultra close ratio four-speed gearbox.

The elan is the type of sports car that was meant to be driven in a spirited fashion, the steering was a delight, and the gear box was snicked from gear to gear with a quick flick of the wrist. Instant revs were on tap from the responsive twin Weber carburetor fed twin cam engine. Driving the elan was “like piloting a small aeroplane”, requiring only small corrections on the steering wheel to keep it pointed in the required direction. Read the rest of this entry »