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And of course, Wilson is correct.  I posted the crop in B&W rather than the original BRG.  This one is a '62, and one of eh more appealing coupe's I've seen.   Your turn.

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Stuart, 

you would not like them much if you ever had to work on one. Many of the components are mounted on bobbins, which are poorly fibreglassed to the fibreglass shell. As the bolts often corrode into the metal inserts in the bobbins, when you try and undo the bolt, the whole bobbin then shears off, with lots of razor sharp bits of fibreglass sticking out. As the shell does not conduct electricity, everything has to have its own earth, so electrical problems are endemic. Lovely car when working well and the Climax FWE engine is a little gem, especially in stage 5 tune. Sadly working well unless very expensively restored, is a rare occurrence. 

No interesting cars to photograph in Valencia, so open to anyone who would like to post. 

Wilson

PS The Élite bodyshells were contracted out but I cannot recall to whom. Lotus initially tried to make them but they did not pass even their sloppy QC.  

Edited by wlaidlaw
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17 minutes ago, jk356 said:

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Fun photos, but not what we're looking for in this thread.  In this thread we post a mystery car, or part of one, and other members must guess what it is.  Whoever guesses correctly gets to post the next mystery car.  Have a look back at a few pages of this thread.

Unless of course you want us to identify the 911 Targa and 356.

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The 356 cars are hugely improved by fitting a Rennshift (James West engineering) fast gear change. On the original gear change like our 356 Cab B, with a 2.4 OHC Emory engine, third gear was in a different zip code from second. My brother drove my 1977 911 RSR with its Rennshift change and went straight online to get the equivalent for his 356. I think Emory now fits them as standard on his conversions. On the 911 Rennshift change for the 915C box, the gear-lever is now spring loaded, with adjustable tension to the 3/4 plane and has a choice of automatic or manual reverse lock out (I always leave mine in manual). It reduces the chance of wrong slotting to near zero. 

Wilson

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On 10/20/2023 at 8:42 PM, wlaidlaw said:

PS The Élite bodyshells were contracted out but I cannot recall to whom. Lotus initially tried to make them but they did not pass even their sloppy QC.  

The first prototype shells were made apparently in-house by Lotus then subbed out to Maximar Boats (who had never made a car body before) whose work was sub-par (AFAIK they had to meet a weight limit per shell and variously "thinned" areas to meet the spec which lead to problems with rigidity.) but the number of car shells  Lotus made themselves for the initial prototype series seems hard to pin down. 

Maximar were commissioned for 250 cars but as per the Lotus clubs register the actual number is a bit vague given the "Leica - style" overlap in production  re chassis numbers where later numbers were bodied  EMs (ie Elite Maximar) rather than "younger" chassis number bodied  EBs (Elite Bristol).

What is known is that the cars were competitive at Le Mans at the time and several cars were rebuilt to reuse chassis, engines or bodies after events to further confuse things.

The second series was commissioned with Bristol Aeroplane Company (sometimes online in the US referred to as Bristol Aeroplane Plastics!) with reinforcement in the critical areas - though AFAIK some metal fittings still needed to be incorporated into the fibreglass shell for anchoring points.

It is definitely a 'cherished' car for me, though with a somewhat vague timeline, but it seems very sad that given its innovative design/construction/performance that only c 1000 were built AFAIK and it remained outside the mainstream design credo for a very long time to "add lightness"...

it seems astonishing to me that in a world of energy efficiency that Chapman's  credo is no longer a factor when designing  supposedly "efficient" EVs...

 

 

Edited by NigelG
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Well, here's another, a bit more obscure than the lovely Elite.  All the usuals:

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On 10/21/2023 at 1:35 PM, jk356 said:

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Apologies for crashing in on Stuart's post and I'm rather late to the party being on Hols with family but, just for fun (and as I simply couldn't resist), I think the previous Mystery Car is a c. 1970 - 1973 Porsche 914-4 in Signal Orange and fitted with 'Appearance Group' trim but, rather oddly, missing its lower rear valence?

:lol:

Anyhow; let's get back on track (although I believe Wilson's comment posted above is correct).

Philip.

Edited by pippy
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I'll assume Wilson and Philip are correct.  Here it is below - a '35 Adler Trumph Junior.  BTW:  Trumph is Donald Trump's real ancestral name.

Anyone else want to step in?  If not, I have another car ready.

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In 1935-40, Adler built a magnificent 8 wheeler saloon car, with the two pairs of front wheels turning together like an 8 wheeler truck and the rear pairs also in tandem. I am not sure if any of these survived the war. Some were delivered during the war with armoured bodywork. I am surprised AH did not use one, it would suit his ego. Below is a publicity photo from 1935. 

Wilson

 

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