Lotus Elan and Lotus Elan Plus 2 Forums

Hi,

I have just bought a pre-airflow 1966 Elan serial number 5548 for restoration, will ty to ad pictures later.
This was one of few sold new in Sweden.
Is there someone how has an idea of how many pre-airflow that was sold from the beginning and how many that still excist.
Regards Mikael

Welcome to the forum! Check out the Elan register and do not forget to register your car too!

http://elanregistry.org/index.php

Congratulations, Mikael, on purchasing an Elan in a colder country than England.

According to the book by Robinson and Ross, on page 109, the original Coupe was produced in September 1965, and the S3 version, which included Airflow ventilation, was introduced in June 1966. They were both type 36 but unfortunately Lotus did not keep their serial numbers separate from the type 26 and 45 roadsters.

The Elan Register mentioned above is probably your best chance of estimating the number of existing cars and other forum members may have the data on original builds.

Here's how to add pictures to your posting, one at a time:

Click on "Upload attachment" then "Browse" to select your picture in the normal Explorer way. Then click on "Add the File" and wait for a new box "Posted attachments" to appears. You can add a title here, if you want. Place your cursor in the text where you want the picture to appear, by default it will appear at the end of all the text, and then click "Place inline".


Click "Preview" to see how it all appears and add or remove spaces in the editable area, previewing again until satisfied. It works for me!

Good luck with the search and the rebuild. We look forward to pictures and history.

Mikail

Welcome and well done on acquiring your Elan.

Unit no 5548 was fitted with engine no LP5486 and left the factory production line on 4 May 1966. You may get a little additional information by emailing the Lotus archivist at [email protected]

No-one will ever be able to definitively put a number on pre-airflow coupes that were produced, such records were not kept at the time. It is also pretty impossible to know how many still exist. However, in principle Elans have survived well, given that they were only ever produced in small numbers. From my own records on extant Sprints a fair guestimate is that the survival rate is probably around the 50% figure. Whether they are on the road, being restored or laid up is another point altogether!

Tim

Welcome Mikeal from across the pond. Your new acquisition is 22 units after mine. These coupes were built while they were still building S2 roadsters. The type 45s didn't arrive until a few hundred units later. Elans seem to have been built in batches, say 10 or so coupes followed by 20 roadsters. Makes sense since the components probably arrived on the line in batches.

Roger

Just checked the number on engine and it`s the correct one. In all it is a real nice project with most of the original part in place (i have the steering wheel as well).

/Mikael

Hi Mikael

Well done on finding your S3 and it being a pre airflow one. IMHO, they are the prettiest Elans of them all but that is just my opinion.

I had a quick tally up on the ?lan registry and got to around 50 cars. Obviously, there are still a few to be found and even then, placed on the registry.

I would have a wild stab in the dark and say around 100 cars. Hopefully now someone will come out and give us all a better answer than that!

Good luck with the car.

Adam