Lotus Elan and Lotus Elan Plus 2 Forums

This Sunday night (May 26th) at 8:00pm on the Velocity channel (U.S.), Chip Foose "overhauls" a 1972 Lotus Europa for a friend of Jay Leno, Part 1. It's not an Elan, and it's not going to be brought back to stock for sure, but it should be an "interesting experiment"... hopefully done in a tasteful manner.

Monaco GP, Indy 500, and a Lotus "overhaul" all in the same day. The lawn will have to wait.

Gary
'71 Sprint FHC
Miami, Florida

Well, it was a Renault-engined Europa, not a twin-cam, so not a '72 as advertised. They dropped an Elise engine in it, provided by Lotus. In fact, a Lotus rep was on-site. Lots of fiberglass work, including a GT-40 type dropped hood and side vents behind the doors for engine cooling. Chip Foose also shortened the nose by 4 inches. The paint job will be a Gold Leaf knockoff, except the gold accents will be 7-UP green, as the owner was a 7-UP delivery man for the soda machine at Jay Leno's garage.

A very professional, workman-like job, even if one doesn't agree with the idea of modifying a classic Europa. Part II of this episode is next Sunday night at 8:00pm. We'll reserve judgement, but I think it should look pretty interesting... although I question the Porsche instrument cluster. The crashpad on the dash is gone and a new rounded fiberglass dash panel was fabricated.

http://velocity.discovery.com/tv-shows/overhaulin/videos/jay-leno-schemes.htm

Gary
'71 Sprint FHC
Miami, Florida

It was an interesting show. The show kept referring to it as a modern design of the Europa. The mods were pretty extreme.

The whole remake of the front end with the 993 headlights, gt-40 dropped hood and shortened nose was fun to watch. I forget how easy it is to modify a glassfibre car. (not that I would do it to mine.)

I did cringe when they started hacking away at the chassis to put in the motor from the Elise with a Porsche Boxster gearbox unit. An Europa with 200bhp would be an interesting drive.

The one item I found interesting was the part about building up the floor and fire wall. They added a honeycomb panel to the floorboards and glassed it in to add strength.

Made me think about how the seats are attached in the Elan.

200bhp Europas are common stuff over here Jeff, and you don't have to hack anything around.

http://www.spydercars.co.uk/lotus-europa-zetec-conversion/



Must watch that show now, it sounds interesting., thanks for posting the link Gary.

Car never started. Never saw electrical working, never saw it driven. 2 episodeson one car, bit off more than could chew? Like the car but was surprised by any evidence car really completed. New owner did not even fit in the car. An Overhauling first?

I don't think it's running yet, it seems like they're going through something that sounds like H&S checks, presumably because of the major re-design they made on the car. If you're interested in the tale and want to know some of the background, "7up John" contributes to the Europa forum and keeps posting the odd snippet about the progress.

topic here;

http://www.lotuseuropa.org/LotusForum/index.php?topic=338.0

Brian

Thanks, very cool car, hope it is a good handling upgrade. I always like the look of the old stuff a bit updated.

Richard Winter of "Europa Engineering" has been building & also racing Europas with very powerful Vauxhaul/Opel 2 liter 4 valve engines mated to Renault 5 speed gearboxes for many years.
He also makes a lovely Aluminium sheet clad tubular chassis & his own special rear suspension with disk brakes.
The story doesn't end there; he can provide his own version of 47R &62R bodies & practically every other part you may need & the quality literally shouts at you

No connection; just a fan
Cheers
John