Well, I was doing research on the Lotus a couple of days ago to design my 3 wheeler frame and front end, and ran across this car for sale in Charlotte, which was a mighty tempting toy:
I talked to my friend Landers, and to people at the Barber Museum, and things looked pretty good, especially if I could get the price down. It is not actually a full blooded Lotus, but a 1986 Winfield kit that was bought around 1990 and finished by a father/son team in the 90's. But unlike later Westfields, it has the aluminum body like the Caterhams, which I much prefer to fiberglass.
Well, things went pretty fast, I went to look at it, made a low offer, it was accepted, and I almost unexpectedly found myself the proud owner of a very Vintage looking Super 7. I want to be clear, this is not a "real" pre 1972 Lotus, but rather what is known as a "PreLit" Westfield. "PreLit" refers to the litigation that took place in the late 80's when Caterham threatened to sue Westfield for making kits too close to the original Lotus design, and won. PreLit Westfields are almost identical to the original Lotus Super 7 as designed by Colin Chapman in 1961, with aluminum body and hood. Even better, the body was never paint
"Post Lit" 1990 Westfields are using fiberglass panels, and for a "plastic hater" like me, that was a really big deal:
The original car had a 1340cc Ford engine. This ones is supposed to have a 2 Liter Toyota 3T engine, with a 5 speed Toyota transmission. It was in a Vintage Cars Showroom in Mooresville, just North of Charlotte:
We had to spend the night in Mooresville because to the rain, but the next day was beautiful, and I rode the car back home all the way from North Carolina in one day. That was a little rough, but really not that bad. We stopped in Asheville for lunch, and Charles even managed to sneak it into Biltmore Estate to shoot some pictures:
Well, things went pretty fast, I went to look at it, made a low offer, it was accepted, and I almost unexpectedly found myself the proud owner of a very Vintage looking Super 7. I want to be clear, this is not a "real" pre 1972 Lotus, but rather what is known as a "PreLit" Westfield. "PreLit" refers to the litigation that took place in the late 80's when Caterham threatened to sue Westfield for making kits too close to the original Lotus design, and won. PreLit Westfields are almost identical to the original Lotus Super 7 as designed by Colin Chapman in 1961, with aluminum body and hood. Even better, the body was never paint
"Post Lit" 1990 Westfields are using fiberglass panels, and for a "plastic hater" like me, that was a really big deal:
The original car had a 1340cc Ford engine. This ones is supposed to have a 2 Liter Toyota 3T engine, with a 5 speed Toyota transmission. It was in a Vintage Cars Showroom in Mooresville, just North of Charlotte:
We had to spend the night in Mooresville because to the rain, but the next day was beautiful, and I rode the car back home all the way from North Carolina in one day. That was a little rough, but really not that bad. We stopped in Asheville for lunch, and Charles even managed to sneak it into Biltmore Estate to shoot some pictures:
The car is a perfect fit for me: 6ft, 180lbs, size 34 waist, size 10 shoes. Shorter people will have a hard time reaching the closely spaced tiny pedals, taller people will be cramped, and bigger feet will hit two pedals together. Actually, I have to wear very narrow driving shoes.
It is very easy to drive, at least for people used to stick shift. The wheel is tiny, but yet easy to turn, the steering is very precise, the shifting smooth, the car almost perfectly balanced , with easily handled oversteering. There is no real need for double clutching, but I do it anyway because it sounds good...
It corners like a demon, especially since I replaced the old dried up Yokohama tires with a set of much stickier Uniroyals. I put semi synthetic oil in the motor to flush out whatever was in there, and will go to the best full synthetic next week.
It's a blast!
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