Lotus Elan and Lotus Elan Plus 2 Forums

Did a search on the air flow - no air flow S2-S3 issue. Did not find a conciseness. Not going to loose any sleep one way or the other but just wondering what makes my car the same or different by name?

My 1967 car under the yellow paint was originally red. A very dark deep red not a light cherry red. I think it sounds like the jag color? Anyone know the color code I should obtain or try to match.

I have later lotus paint chip fan fold with carnival red but I don't think that is it.
TIA
Dave

Air flow or no airflow refers to if there are air vents in the B pillars. Airflow cars have them (same as +2). Very early coupes don't and are often refereed to as pre-airflow. The vents are there to improve airflow through the car, hence the name.

Could it be "regency red"?

The controversy seemed to be if the no air flow were S2 coupes or were they S3 coupes? and 36 was only distinguishing "coupe".regardless of flow type,,,?

My air flow would definitely be S3.
I'll look into regency red if a possible 67 color

My understanding is that the coupes were called just "Elan Coupe" when first introduced in the S3 / type 36 FHC body style in 1965. When the S2 / type 26 convertible was discontinued and replaced with the S3 / type 36 DHC the fixed head coupes were then call S3 FHC.

Some time later the airflow vents were introduced on the later S3 FHC in 1966 ?

cheers
Rohan

My Pre-airflow '66 Coupe was registered in the Spring ,(I think), so yes, sometime in 1966.

Steve,
Your / our Elan Pre-airflow left the factory 15th February 1966 in component form to a Mr B I Atkin on separate invoices for body and power train. (according to Andy Graham, Lotus Archives). Andy confirmed they became the S3 Coupe in June 1966. Ben

Thanks so far for the guidance. I found my hood/ bonnet which is still completely painted yellow with the original red underneath and original red overspray in hidden areas. I'm going to sand off a big section so I can bring it to a paint shop to scan the color. I laid the carnival red over it and it's not even close. Regency red? Carmine red?
Any other red candidates for 1967?

I'll post a pix in my introduction thread when it's prepared for scanning.
Thanks
.

Not that its directly relevant to an S2 or 3, but my S1 early 64 was delivered red with black hardtop. The workshop manual which was supplied with the car has colour noted in handwriting as Tinter Red.... the original factory invoice notes car as red.

My S2 26R was a deep red and when compared to the factory colours none are close.

cheers

Vaughan

I suspect Lotus used Tartan red, a BMC colour, which was also used on the Elite, but as we all know, for a fee, Lotus would paint the car whichever colour the customer wished.

Coupe wrote:Steve,
Your / our Elan Pre-airflow left the factory 15th February 1966 in component form to a Mr B I Atkin on separate invoices for body and power train. (according to Andy Graham, Lotus Archives). Andy confirmed they became the S3 Coupe in June 1966. Ben

Good to know Ben, thanks !

Color red?
I scraped my hood through the yellow to get a few significant patches of the original dark red on the hood like I have see in overspray all over the body headlight and doors, etc
How to match?
I started with a pix of my hood and put in my comp.
Then I found imagecolorpicker.com and pasted my hood pix in their sample box .
eye dropped a sample of clean pixels of my hood for analysis a few times.
get the RGB color HEX # 94161a and the RGB numbers

Then I went to paintref.com to look up all red car colors and started sampling them for similar color #.
After about 10 visual close matches I finally found one: Toyota 1974 fire opal
So now i have PPG/ditzler and dupont codes.
On my computer screen the red sure looks close to the toyota color unlike the Lotus carnival red color fob.

Interesting that I have beat up elan trunk lid that is a perfect carnival red...

Have you confirmed it's not "regency red"/"maroon"?

It certainly looks like roughly the right shade from the photos I've seen.

I bet that was specified by the customer. Maybe a BMC or Triumph colour.

Mazzini wrote:I suspect Lotus used Tartan red, a BMC colour, which was also used on the Elite, but as we all know, for a fee, Lotus would paint the car whichever colour the customer wished.

Mazzini
I think you win the prize. Regency red is out...
Besides the toyota color being in the range, I found:

Colors HEX RGB
36-7269 red 991618 153,22,24,255
96383f
94161a 148,22,26,255
931c1e
sampled several times and got slightly different results but
not a big difference so the toyota color is within the range.

toyota
fire opal or
vasuvius red 98191a 152, 25,26,255

BMC 64-67
tartan red #2 93131b 147,19,27,255
https://www.morrisminorforum.com/article/bmc-bl-paint-codes-and-colors.67

rover
tartan red RD9 9a2325 154,35,37,25
https://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=https%3A%2F%2Fpaintman.co.uk%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2020%2F08%2FRover-Group-Tartan-Red-RD9.jpg&imgrefurl=https%3A%2F%2Fpaintman.co.uk%2Fshop%2Frover-group-tartan-red-rd9%2F&tbnid=WITRrHe3jO5zcM&vet=12ahUKEwifu8GVo8bvAhW_wikDHQgCDWEQMygPegUIARDLAQ..i&docid=VNnQQyKfmDQ_MM&w=300&h=300&q=BMC%20tartan%20red&client=firefox-b-1-d&ved=2ahUKEwifu8GVo8bvAhW_wikDHQgCDWEQMygPegUIARDLAQ

I have omitted dozens that are not even close

Lotus did use Rolls Royce Regency Red on their Lotus 7 America.
FWIW