512BB wrote:There is a completely different mindset with regard to replacement chassis on old Lotus cars versus other manufacturers. You cannot compare values of a standard road going Elan with say an E type or a Ferrari of the same period. They are not remotely seen in the same light, and never will be, and values reflect that. Lotus Elans, +2s, Europas, even Elites, will ALWAYS been seen as horrible little unreliable plastic kit cars, by many in the motoring world, and anyone with a view, and that will never change.
That is the reason why it makes very little / no difference to a Lotus' value if it retains its original chassis or not. Indeed, if a restored Elan was offered for sale at say ?45k, and it retained its original chassis, that would almost certainly be seen as a negative for the car, it not having a new galvanised one. The perceived thought being that the chassis will have to be replaced at some point.
Back in the day, it was not uncommon for a chassis on an Elan to have to be replaced after as little as 4 years from new, due to rusting of the front uprights, they were so poorly protected against rust, and original chassis on cars today must be in the tens rather than hundreds.
Leslie
Yes i've heard that before but the world i live in that would just make a numbers matching car even more valuable because of its rarity. I completely understand why given the choice of having it repaired for ?600 and a new Galv chassis for ?1200 considering the amount of work to remove / refit it may well be tempting to fit the Galv one that you would never need to revisit but seems the lazy route (No offense meant)
Thing is i can't think of another GRP bodied car that the chassis is swapped as a matter of course? but then next to many other GRP cars of the day the Lotus chassis is very simple and there for cheap.
As for comparing Jags and Ferraris etc i get what your saying but it doesn't have to be big money cars, we recently restored a Jenson 451, Scimitar se5a and a Tuscan. they where all on there original chassis.
But as you say maybe Lotus cars are just looked at differently.