Lotus Twincam, Ford Lotus Twincam or Lotus Ford Twincam?

[jono]

....which one is it then?

I think it's a Lotus Twincam, because:

It was conceived by Lotus
It was built by Lotus
The 'trick bits' are pure Lotus

Jon

[Elanintheforest]

Ford used to describe the engine as ' a Ford engine modified by Lotus' or 'Lotus Modified Cortina engine'. They always had to get the 'Ford' bit in.

But everyone calls it the Lotus Twincam, and that's what is on the cover of Miles Wilkins' book of the engine, so that's good enough for me!

Mark

[gerrym]

Someone not got something better to do than start a semantics thread?

Anyway, I guess Ford have a pretty strong connection and therefore "rights" to be named considering Ford Crankcase, Ford crankshaft, and most of the other bits have FoMoCo on them even the jackshaft with its redundant lobes.

By the way, any signs of Lotus remanufacturing those 701 blocks, or is that Ford again

Regards
Gerry

[bcmc33]

By the way, any signs of Lotus remanufacturing those 701 blocks, or is that Ford again

Ford Racing I'm glad to say. Here's a link http://www.iveyengines.com/FordRacing.htm
A thread was started on this some time ago elan-mods-f31/ford-kent-engine-back-production-t19684.html

In the UK, Power Torque Engineering in Coventry can supply both 701M & 711M blocks at ?995 + VAT.

My 711M block is being bored and decked this week.

[garyeanderson]

:D

[Elanintheforest]

You've re-written history, Gary!

Harry Mundy did the overall design for the head in early '61, and Richard Ansdale the detail stuff in summer '61. Steve Sanville and Bob Dance selected the 109E (Consul Classic) block as a likely candidate to support their head in September '61, and by Oct '61 the first engine was running.

Early in 1962 an Anglia was fitted with a twincam engine and covered 20,000 miles testing the concept. In May '62 Ford announced the 5 bearing 1500 block, and one was acquired by Lotus and fitted up with the twincam head. In May Jim Clark raced a 23 with one of these engines fitted.

It was not until a couple of months later, mid '62, that Ford became involved. They had seen what Lotus was doing using one of their blocks, and wanted a Cortina capable of winning on the track. Lotus did all the development and testing work with Ford just as a supplier upto and including the engine going into production.

Definitely a Lotus Twincam!!
Mark

[jono]

....they saved us in WWII as well, ...and then there's Enigma

[Elanintheforest]

I came across this writeup by Hugh Haskell in one of the Classic magazines, and had to put it on my website. It gives a great insight into how Lotus did things then, and how the 'worked' with Ford. Or rather, how they informed Ford of what they were doing several weeks after they had done it!

http://www.lotuscortinainfo.com/?page_id=771

Mark

[elanmac]

When the twin cam engine was moved from JAP in London to The Villiers Engineering Co Ltd in Wolverhampton, I was working as an assembler on the JAP industrial engines at the Villiers. I asked the foreman Mr John McRobie if I could go onto the Lotus/Ford line as it looked interesting. I was told sorry, but Ford has stipulated that all assembly personel on the Lotus/Ford line had to be time served fitters. A few weeks later I was talking to one of the directors who was one of my fathers wine shop customers. Knowing that I worked in No5 works he enquired if I was working on the Lotus/Ford engines. I replied in the negative and told him the reason. I thought no more about it but the following week the foreman asked me who I knew on the board, after telling him, he showed me a letter he had recieved.It was signed by the director and said he would class it as a personal favour if I could be found a job on the line. Mr Mc Robie was more than happy at this request as someone was needed for recification on engines after test. There was quite a lot of work for me.
Mac

[GrUmPyBoDgEr]

Hey Mark,

That was a very enlightening read, a mass of early information!

I was amused when reading about Ford's Demand for Deviation notices, something which I was once heavily involved with.
Ford were intending to use BMW's very first Diesel engine; a 6 cylinder with 2,5 & 2,8 liter variants, the 2,8 being turbocharged.
Being the sole "Engl?nder" in the engine dev. dept. I was tasked with preparing those documents.
We weren't allowed to change a single thing during the development period without a Ford approved deviation.
I recall having prepared over 2500 Deviations; a load of work & burning of the midnight oil.
(And my departmental head had the cheek to ask why I wasn't designing more bits!!)
Eventually Ford didn't buy any engines, but their involvement paid all of the design & development costs; very handy for BMW but a bit soul destroying for me

A question about the early A-Frame pivot "which had proven so good in the past" but had to be replaced by more robust components.
Was it similar to the Elan's Trunnions?

Also a thought about the split prop-shaft.
In my 1964 Mk.1 Lotus Cortina I replaced the back axle & prop-shaft with parts from a GT Cortina.
The diff' never gave any trouble after that but neither did I notice any "whirling" problems with the one piece GT prop-shaft.

Thanks again for a great read.
Cheers
John

PS sorry for the big drift

[cabc26b]

You've re-written history, Gary!

Mark , are you sure ? Gary's info can be found in the same place as your's namely the Wilkins book on the Lotus Twin-Cam .

....they saved us in WWII as well

- Right , I distinctly recall the BEF hammering German Army Group A , thereby foiling operation Yellow and together with the soviet army to the east had the Germans contained within their treaty of Versailles borders in time for the Christmas holidays....

[Elanintheforest]

There are a couple of fundamental differences, George.

Ford weren?t involved until the twincam was up and running?Lotus had already made the decision to use the Ford block for the twincam engine for the Elan. Lotus were buying crate engines and single blocks from Aveley at the time to develop the twincam, and the engine had raced before Hayes and Chapman got together to come up with the Cortina modified by Lotus idea.

It was Detroit that sent out the instruction to all countries to come up with a strategy to promote their cars in their own market place. The Ford UK chose the Lotus / Cortina approach, following on from the success that was being gained by the venture between Austin / Morris with the Mini and Cooper.

Lotus was always broke, and for sure, building the Cortina probably helped them overcome one or two of the financial problems. Lotus got a couple of free transporters out of the deal, and Ford had to pick up all the warentee claims !!

Ford were incredibly old fashioned for the time, and were not praised for their inovation when the Anglia came out, then the Cortina, with their leaf spring suspension, drum brakes and worm and nut steering. The Mini had set new standards in the Brit motor world in the 1950s, and the initiative from Detroit was the kick up the backside that Ford UK needed to start to inovate, and give their product a bit of excitment. They were very slow to change though, and kept the horrible steering up until 1970, and still had cart spring suspension and drum brakes in the early 80s!

Motorsport did them a lot of good, but the seemed to drop out of it in the 90s, and now are just another mass-produced car again. It's a shame these guys can't learn from history.

Mark

[types26/36]

Regarding the TC Anglia I picked this up on another forum.

[cabc26b]

Mark,

Fundamentally I treat this subject and others like it on lotuselanDOTnet like the news and political cometary on the television or linear media distribution -


George

[trw99]

George

I understand your treatment of what you read on here. We are all entitled to our views and opinions and hope that is respected. However, in Mark's defence (and I know he's quite capable of standing up for himself!) I would say that he stated he uses contemporary reports and the words of people there at the time for his site and to back up his historical statements in this thread.

I happily acknowledge that when it comes to Lotus history we are often obliged to make intelligent assumptions. But that should not mean that we take original, contemporary comment to be opinion (unless stated as such) and thus to be treated as commentary. With sites like Mark's and my own, we attempt to get the facts right, as far as we are able to, like most historians do. That is also the case on this forum where, if we can, quoting contemporary records can help to bring perspective and attempt to get to the bottom of yet another Lotus conundrum.

Having said that, one of the pleasures of this forum is the lively debate that can ensue on any number of subjects. It will never happen, but one day it would be fun if we were all to meet up in person for a good natter, some banter and well meaning joshing - an Elan.net conference!

Tim