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News and Letters
Queen's Birthday Parliamentary Classic Car Run
I managed to raise twice the average sponsorship per car - £270 - thanks to HLR and other I hope to get one or two official photos of the car plus HRH Duke of Gloucester, as well as the
Next to us was John Mead (Chairman of Club Elite) with an Elite representing 1957, and there were two Elans, I think an Esprit, an Exige and a 1998 Caterham.
Normande Racing and the Lotus 23 - from Sonny Rajah Wonder if you have any information on the company Normande Racing or contacts of anyone Anyone able to help may e-mail Peter Ross and I will forward your messages Lotus 23 - From Howard Robinson, South Africa, 2nd February The ongoing question of Lotus 23s. I must say upfront that I made contact with Vic The argument that the 23 issue is clouded by replicas is totally specious in my opinion. The very Regards. Lotus 23 - Jim Paul, California, USA - 26th January As an original owner of a Lotus 23 in 1963 and a current owner of a Lotus 20/22 for vintage I then
sold the car (wish I still had it!), bought a McLaren Mk 2 (wish I still had it!) and raced and Track Day in Joliet, Illinois on Monday, June 5 2006 - Lotus Ltd. Track Day Coordinator - Mark Pfeffer Fellow Track Junkies: I hope everyone had a nice holiday season and Santa delivered lots of fun Elise related gifts. The 3rd annual (we took a hiatus in 2005) Lotus Ltd.(www.LotusCarClub.org) track day at the For those of you worried about hotel accommodations, we've blocked 15 rooms at the Fairfield Upon receipt of your application and check, I'll forward a track day packet to you with all the If you have questions or would like a registration form, contact me at (314) 889-0572 or e-mail Happy Lotusing!!! Mark Pfeffer - Lotus Ltd. Track Day Coordiantor Lotus 23 - Reply to letter from Nick Adams by Mike Marsden HLR Chairman Nick, Letter from Nick Adams 3rd January 2006 I write to you in response to a request on the HLR website for Lotus 23 owners to put forward their point of view with regard to the HLR running a register for the 23. My name is Nick Adams and I have worked at Lotus for the last 20 years, currently as the vehicle development manager for the Elise and it’s variants. As well as a Series 4 Elan I own a Lotus 23 which I am currently restoring with the intention of running it in the Gentleman drivers series amongst other events. I spent a long time looking for a suitable car at a suitable price and once a car had been found did as much research as possible before parting with the money. I enlisted the help of Don Schaeffer of the 23 Users Group, by chance he lives within a hour or so of where I found the car in Connecticut USA and it was therefore possible for him to look at the car in person. Reference to photocopies of the original build cards in the possession of the Lotus 23 Users Group showed the car to have matching numbers for chassis and gearbox as well as a number of correct features, and Don and I were pretty sure the car was real. The history of the car is incomplete but I am gradually closing the gap. As far as I can tell the car is original; the strip down has uncovered more evidence that it is, but I guess I will never know 100% for sure. Since I started looking for cars I have kept a brief personal register of 23s and currently have about 20 cars on the list, with several already claiming the same chassis number, plus a significant number with either no chassis number or something that doesn’t fit in with the normally recognised 23-S-XX sequence. Although I recognise the problem with the large number of disputed or uncertain 23s out there, I do believe that a properly run register under the HLR’s control can only help to prevent the problem getting worse. How about co-running a register with the 23 Users Group, combining their records, which seem to be mostly USA orientated with a new register run by the HLR? The register need not necessarily confirm the authenticity of the cars, but could be used to record their movements, current history and other factors. This would at least act as a useful source of info to owners and would be owners, and should help to prevent further proliferation of fake cars. Obviously, cars with immaculate history and provenance can be noted as being genuine, while cars with incomplete or questionable history such as mine can be recorded as such, while clear replicas (which the FIA rulings may well promote) can also be registered as such to help to avoid them acquiring an identity at some stage in the future. It may be an idea for any notes alongside a car's entry to remain in the register for ever more, so even if additional history is later uncovered it can be seen when and how this happened. I keep threatening to join the HLR, but to date have always failed to do so. If you were to agree to running a register for the 23 I would certainly join, and would be prepared to try to help with the register if needed. Many Thanks, Nick Adams Letter from HLR member Andres B Sta. Maria, Manila, Philippines Open letter to the HISTORIC LOTUS REGISTER Body of Registrars LOTUS 23 I have enjoyed the HLR newsletter in its many forms over the last several years. Since I live so far from England, the magazine has been my only participation in the HLR's activities. I look forward to receiving it and hope only there will be more frequent issues in the future. Because there are no current magazines that discuss the older Lotuses, the newsletter fills the gap quite nicely, and I thank the HLR for this. My only complaint is the non-coverage of the Lotus 23 (highlighted by the questionnaire sent by HLR earlier this year), in spite of the fact that the single-seater version of it - the 22 - is covered. We 23-owners are beginning to feel highly unwanted! I wrote an article for the Winter 1998 magazine (Issue 23, pages 14-16), that argued for the grant of "historic" status for the 23, at least for HLR's purposes. The 23 is after all the last tube-framed Lotus sports racer and, with its skirted rear wheels and wobbly webs, does identify quite strongly with its older brethren. It was also the car that so vividly introduced the Lotus twin-cam. I started to look at cars in the late 1950s and early 1960s. My first sports car was a Triumph TR4, and that was followed by a few other sports cars of that era, including a Lotus Elan (which I still have). The sports racer to aspire to then was the Lotus 23, and perhaps people of my generation will concur in this. The image of Jim Clark at Nurburgring was just so powerful! Having said that, I would dearly love to have an Eleven. I was told that the problem with having the 23 in the HLR is that there are so many replicas. I do not know whether this is true or whether that is a fair reason. Certainly, a register will be helpful in identifying the true Lotuses and prevent the unscrupulous appropriation of chassis numbers. When I began to think about a sports racer, I was very attracted to a Westfield Eleven that a friend imported into Manila in the mid-1980s. I thought I should build a replica 23 and corresponded with SJ Sports Cars in England, which made them at that time. However, all told, the price for a replica with the correct engine and gearbox was just a little less that the least expensive 23 selling then (about US$55,000). Accordingly, I decided to look for a real 23. Ultimately, the good examples exceeded that price by a fair margin, but at that point I was already committed. If the problem has been a registrar for the model, Bill Steagall (a founder and the Secretary of the Lotus 23 Users Group) would be eminently suitable and, as of last correspondence, was willing to take on the job. He and Don Schaeffer, who is President of the Lotus 23 Users Group, are credited with reviving and sustaining interest in the 23. The support that they and the Lotus 23 Users Group provided have been invaluable to those who restore and campaign the model. If Bill is too busy, there are I am sure many members of the HLR that are qualified. In any event, I feel it will be good to liase and build a good relationship with the Lotus 23 Users Group. Bill produced for the Lotus 23 Users Group a wonderful newsletter which has been immensely useful and edifying for me and I am sure many others. (Click here to see a page from the first issue). Bill also set up an email group (on Yahoo), which has been quite successful. Bill maintains the 23 register, the contents of which he has kept confidential so that the chassis numbers of the missing 23s are not known to all! I do hope that the situation with the 23 will be rectified. There must be quite a number of 23 owners in England and of course elsewhere, and they (and the 23) should not be abandoned. With warm regards and my best wishes for the continued success of the HLR. Merry Christmas to all. Andres B. Sta. Maria 23/S/64 Manila
Michael joined the HLR in 2004. He recently reported the addition of a GRD Formula 2 car to his stable. I wrote asking him to tell me more about this car, and here is his reply. He will be at the Annual Dinner again this year. Peter, The Group Racing Developments "GRD" Formula 2 car is not a Lotus but was designed and built in 1972 at Griston, Norfolk by Dave Baldwin, Jo Marquart, Gordon Huckle, Derek Wild, and Mike Warner (to name a few ), all of them ex-Lotus Racing personnel. The car is going to Peter Denty (who also worked at GRD for it's entire time) for restoration this winter and I hope to run it next year in the monoposto class here in North America. The car has a nice Canadian history, being owned by Jacques Couture (60's Racer and husband of Jim Russell's daughter), and driven by Montreal racer Dave McConnell in the Tasman series (as a F3) and European events, then N.A. So it'll be nice to have a "historic" Canadian car with a little international history. Plus GRD's are relatively rare. My Lotus 19’s (?) quest for history is moving slowly. I was told by a person in England that the chassis #965 (that I see marked on the chassis in a couple of places) was owned by Mecom Racing in the 1962-1964 period. Now all John Mecom's cars were painted the same color: 1959 Cadillac metallic medium blue. Below the dark green paint on my aluminum lower center panel it is metallic blue, exactly the same as Mecom racing's color. So I'm trying to follow that lead. The car had a Ford Cosworth pre-crossflow MAE fitted when I bought it, as it was made to look like an early Lotus 23, with the 23/22 type rear suspension. Judging by the engine # it may have come out of a 22 or 23 as it matches the sequence of other mid-1961 Lotus 22 engines i.e. '610713 B', which some tell me is the date 1961/July/13. Bob Dance did not know although he said he would try and find out, and Mike Costin said he didn't know who put the # on. Clive Chapman said he looked through the build sheets he had and could not find the engine # listed, although many were not recorded. I was told that Lotus 19, #965 was sold originally without a motor to someone in New York State. John Mecom Racing, I understand, ran it with a 2.5 litre Coventry Climax early, then a Chevy V8. So the quest continues. I am not doing much to it until I have a clearer history. Regards, Lotus Museum Planned 19th August 2005 A former racing driver is drafting a planning application to establish a museum at the London premises where the UK road and racing car company Lotus Cars was originally established in the 1950s. John Scott-Davies, who raced Lotus cars in the 1960s and is now a chartered housing manager in Croydon, plans to open a museum at number seven Tottenham Lane, Hornsey where Lotus Cars founder Colin Chapman built his first cars Scott-Davies said, "Colin Chapman put motor racing on the map in the 50s and 60s. We want to get the old works opened as a museum and an education centre for the community. We hope to promote some tourism as well. We thought we would look to try and achieve a rolling section of programs that would be of interest to the community." Scott-Davies hopes to have about 10 classic cars in the museum with information on them and educational material. (Source: Muswell Hill Journal) From Gerard “Jabby” Crombac 6th July 2005 Writing from Cogolin the south of France, and after explaining that he is now in poor health and has spent four months in hospital, Jabby continues: In “Historic Lotus” No 36 there is mention of a “GT Eleven”. I have in the past written to explain that an Eleven with a roof may have been a Grand Touring car (GT) for British club events but it certainly was not on the FIA list of homologated GT cars for the simple reason that it was the standard Eleven that was homologated! I know because I organised the homologation for Colin. The reason was that the French daily paper l’Equipe, which was organising the Tour de France, wanted this rally to become “the revenge of Le Mans” They were pushing for the disappearance of sports cars in favour of Grand Touring cars. L’Equipe was powerful enough to prompt the major organisers into such a move. Trouble is that in the GT class there was really only the Ferrari 250GT in the 3 litre class, Porsche and Abarth in the 2 litre class, and Giulietta Alfa in the 1300cc class, not very exciting for the public and the organisers were looking to bring some variety. This was especially the case with Pau whose short circuit forced them to run a special (3 hours) race for the 1300cc class. So the organiser, Georges Charaudeau, came to me and asked “How many Lotus Elevens have been built?” I said “Over 100”, and he replied “In that case you can homologate it as a GT car because the only criterion is the production of 100 cars in 12 months.” I spent a few hours with Mike Costin, filling the forms during the 1958 Monte-Carlo GP and, sure enough, three or four Elevens were entered for the Pau race on Whit-Monday and Nano de Silva Ramos won the 3 hours race, on Vidilles Eleven. Actually this was a fiddle because the specifications had to be similar for all cars. Suspension changes were allowed but you could not touch the wheelbase and we were racing series 2 cars with a different wheelbase to the series 1 swing axle cars. I am now resting in my flat on the gulf of Saint Tropez and I should be back in Paris early October. Cheers E-mail from Ian Grant <ian@lightninglooms.co.uk> 27 June 2005 Lightning Looms LTD, manufacturers of the Bright6 Warning Light Module, have now acquired Ashmead gets Lotus Mk IX crossed up The three Lotus Mark IX cars were racing in Class 5 1954-55 2000cc and below. All were enterd by HLR members. Richard Ashmead and co-driver Peter Colborn-Baber (No 55) did well to finish 23rd overall and third in their class, beaten only by a 2 litre Frazer Nash and a 1.5 litre MGA. Pierre Pinelli/Pierre Broullard (No. 48) finished 6th in class behind another MGA and a Cooper T39 Bobtail with 1.5 litre motor (?), and Malcolm Ricketts (No. 56) was 8th. We have received some excellent photos from HLR member and SELOC organiser Pat Crew, one of which is shown here. Also featured in the photo is XPE6, the actual Lotus Mark IX driven at Le Mans in 1955, which took part in the Classic Cavalcade driven by HLR member Charles Levy with his son Benjamin as passenger. A detailed account of his race by Richard Ashmead appeared in "Historic Lotus" No. 42 - Summer 2005.
For full results of the Le Mans Legend race click here Letter from Gunnard Rubini - the first US Lotus owner Dear Mr Ross, Many thanks for your nice letter and the copy of your superb magazine. I am Sunday 5th June - Lotus cars do well at the Jaguar Wine Country Classic Vintage Car Races at the Infineon Raceway, Sonoma, California. Race 3 for 1955-1960 Sports cars was won by Don Orosco driving his Lotus 15 with veteran Pete Lovely in another Lotus in 3rd place. Richard Goldsmith was 6th in his Lotus, and HLR member Thor Johnson 9th in his S2 Lotus Eleven. Race 6 was for 1957-1963 Formula cars in which Tom Claridge finished 2nd and Chris Locke 3rd, with Tupper Robinson 10th in their Lotuses. For full results click here From Steven Lines, winner of the HLR Website Competition, on 30th May 2005 Dear Peter,
From Octane magazine 21st April 2005
I want to offer your members an opportunity to advertise their cars for sale free in an Please inform your members of this free service and ask them to send the classified
advertisements to me direct. All I need is a car description and an
image ? if one is available, once I have this I will add it to the other cars for sale to go in a future
issue of Octane classified section free of charge. This is a free service and no sales calls Madeleine Lillywhite, Commercial Manager, Octane Magazine, Tel No: ++44 (0)1733 392893/5
From the widow of Richard Andrew who joined the HLR in 1976 and was the Technical Services Correspondent With reference to your letter to Richard Andrew, unfortunately my husband died in 1997. He sold his Mk. 6 in about 1983 and bought a Mallock Clubmans racing car as he said he could not be competitive enough in the Six. Here is a photo of him sitting on the grid at Donington in the Six, on the first race meeting of the newly re-opened circuit in 1976, with Colin Chapman looking at the car, the oldest in the race.
My elder son has inherited Richard's love of cars. Here is another picture of Richard in his Six on the move, I cannot remember where but I have always liked this shot.
Regards to Charles Helps, Vic Thomas and anyone who remembers Richard. Regards. Resemary Bannister From the Wolverhampton “Express & Star” 22nd March £50,000 Lotus race car damaged in fire A Cradley Heath businessman who races historic cars has been overtaken by bad luck after his £50,000 Lotus Formula Junior car was badly damaged in a blaze. Fire broke out at the luxury detached home of Martin Walford in Chaddesley Corbett on Saturday while he was using oxy-acetylene welding equipment. A stray spark is thought to have started the fire but the cause has not yet been determined. The fire quickly spread from a shed to the roof of the garage and resulted in severe smoke damage to an en-suite bedroom. At the height of the blaze about 25 fire-fighters were at the scene and next-door neighbour Bill Bellerby, aged 50, also helped Mr Walford and his wife Yvonne, both aged 52, fight the blaze with a hosepipe until crews arrived. They managed to get a Morgan car out of the garage as flames spread but his prized Lotus was badly damaged. Since buying the car in 1997 Mr Walford, a director of general engineering company T & A Engineering at Cradley Heath, has raced it at circuits across Europe The car was driven by Peter Arundel in 1962 when he won the Formula Junior championship. Mr Walford has pledged to restore it and get it back on the tracks. He is already booked to race at Silverstone on April 23 driving a 1934 MG K3 for Dean Butler, of Droitwich but the Lotus may be out of action until later in the year. "I hope to restore and have the Lotus back on the race circuit later this year and to drive it at a revival meeting at Goodwood in September," he said. "It's not the end of the world and the car will rise like a phoenix from the ashes." Although not an HLR Member, I have sent him a "get well soon" message from us all - PTR. E-mail from Dave Kelsey on 2nd March I always enjoy messages from Dave Kelsey, who as you all know was partner with John Teychenne in the Progress Chassis Company that made all the early Lotus chassis frames. This is part of a correspondence with Pat Dennis in the USA about how the first Mk VI was found to have the steering reversed. This message is too good not to share with you all. Dear Peter, I do remember that the Austin Seven box on John Teych's car - the David Harvey car - would I had an Eight, but they were similar in their steering arangements [to the Mk. VI]. Not that I
remember much I used an Austin box on my Kelsey GT 2/4, but the radius arms prevented any untoward Didn't Colin have the same
problem with the early Le Mans cars, and didn't he get disqualified David Kelsey The Caravelle FJ which won the Goodwood Revival 2004 Chichester Cup Dear Peter, In your Autumn Edition [of the magazine Historic Lotus] in the section on the Goodwood Revival, In the spring of 1959 I bought a Lotus 12 (357) from the works and teamed up with Bob Hicks The Caravelle was originally designed around a Fiat 1100 engine and VW gearbox, but We tested the car at Brands Hatch at the beginning of August. Its first race was at Goodwood At the end of 1960 I left the Army and set to with Bob to build the Mk II. Since we no longer I dropped out of the sport in 1961 after my accident to concentrate on a Business I had just Bob brought the MK III out of retirement for the first Goodwood Revival driven by Mike I know this has nothing to do with Lotus except that the creators of the car were both owners Regards - Richard Utley
Photo of Jabby Crombac at Montlhery
Can someone tell me the names of the other people in the photo. I think the RH one is the journalist Bernard Cahier. 18th December 2006 Peter Ross. To send me an email message write to: peter(AT)historiclotusregister.co.uk and replace (AT) with @ when you address the message.
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