Car O'Clock

My early impressions

When I say Lotus Elan, I mean the original 1960s model, not the later FWD version that came out nearly 30 years later. For me, it has been one of those iconic sports cars I’ve always hankered after since I first saw them racing (and usually winning) at Brands Hatch when I was a schoolboy.

I also remember frequently visiting the well known Surrey-based Lotus dealer, Bell & Colvill, who were located not far from the family home. As a car-mad teenager, I would persuade my father to stop by whenever we drove past so I could inspect their impressive stock – see image above. Even though I wasn’t old enough to hold a driving license, I would dream about what colour ‘my’ Elan might be when I was old enough to buy one of my own.

My first Elan experience came some years later (in the 1970s) when a work colleague borrowed a Lotus Elan Sprint that belonged to his girlfriend (!). He took me for a wild ride around the back streets of London. He drove like a complete lunatic and it was probably only the Elan’s brilliant handling and road-holding that saved us from having an accident that day.

Many years later

Fast forward to Australia in the 1990s and by then I’d owned 40 plus cars, yet somehow Elan ownership had still passed me by. At that time I fancied trying my hand at historic racing and an Elan seemed like a natural choice, with lots of tuning potential and, back then, with prices ranging from $25-35,000, it was still relatively affordable.

Consequently, I started meeting people who raced them and began checking out various examples that were up for sale. I met a keen historic racer who was in the process of having two examples professionally restored for race/road use and he offered one of them to me. This seemed an ideal opportunity to have an Elan prepared to my specification – perfect! Unfortunately, after a couple of months, the deal fell through because he had already apparently promised the car to someone else. Another opportunity missed.

By now I had by then inspected and driven quite a number of Lotus Elan’s, from a tidy Series 1 example, through to late production Sprint models and I always found a reason not to actually buy any of them. Did I want an early one? Or a later model? A fixed head coupe or convertible? Or, was there some other reason that I wasn’t admitting to myself?

Coming to terms with head and my heart

My heart said they were just my sort of car – quick, great handling, with excellent steering, brakes, and ride. What’s more, they’ve always looked just right to my eye, in a neat, fit-for-purpose kind of way, rather than strikingly beautiful.

Despite these undeniable positive points, my head kept on niggling at me about other aspects of Elan ownership that really bothered me, misgivings that my heart had successfully chosen to ignore for years.

It’s not the car, it’s me!

It almost hurts me to write this because I have to confess I just don’t qualify as an old Lotus kind of car guy, Here are the real reasons I’m not destined to buy one of my favourite classic sports cars:

Strike one – build quality

As most car fans know, the Elan was originally available in kit-form, so those wishing to save money could choose to assemble the major components themselves. So, it inevitably the overall fit and finish are not comparable with a typical production steel-bodied car or even many other fiberglass-bodied cars like, say, a Corvette. The glass fibre body is a bit wavy, panel gaps are variable, the doors never fit properly, and everything has a slightly flimsy feel somehow. The paint finish rarely looks good for long either because of the inevitable gel coat cracks that develop in the bodywork. 

Inside, the polished walnut dash looks like something out of an old Humber or Rover and is strangely at odds with the minimalist, pure-bred sports car appeal of the Elan. Curiously, the earlier Elite had an elegant and functional fascia that would have worked equally well in the Elan. 

Now, I’m all too aware that most Elan owners could care less about such details – it was designed to be light, efficient, and fast – a proper driving machine, not a car for polishing and parading.

Perhaps I’m just too obsessive/compulsive to ever really be totally happy with the Elan’s imperfections. To me, a poor-fitting door is like seeing a picture hanging askew on the wall, something I’d find constantly annoying and would never be happy to live with. Strike one against me.

Strike two — reliability and maintenance

Every Elan owner scoffs at the old Lotus cliche: Lotus – ‘Lots Of Trouble Usually Serious.’ Amusingly, they will tell you how reliable their own cars are, thanks to the many ‘improvements’ they’ve made to improve the reliability…

I’m sure they can be reliable with constant care and attention, so some decent DIY skills are part and parcel of Elan ownership. It just isn’t one of those cars you just leave to a local specialist to take care of.

Unfortunately, I’m not a DIY guy. My limited mechanical skills are simply not up to the task of keeping an Elan reliable and roadworthy.  So that’s strike two. 

Strike three – safety

When I was much younger, I didn’t think much about safety standards of the cars I owned. If I did, I think I’d have driven a lot slower! Now, rather older and a little wiser, I’m more concerned about not just my own safety but also my wife who is often sitting in the car beside me, not to mention our dog, Dexter, who is always safely belted in place behind us (not in an Elan though, there’s no room in the back for a dog).

Unfortunately, safety in another area in which the Elan lags woefully behind not just modern standards or even those of many of its contemporaries. While the legendary steel backbone chassis is light, clever and cheap to produce, it offers just about zero side-impact protection – the only thing between you and a Kenworth truck is a thin fibreglass door. Something few people thought about when the Elan was launched back in 1962.

This factor has always bothered me and while I might decide that I could live with this, the possibility of my passenger being hurt or killed an accident isn’t something I could happily live with. Consequently, I have always spent time looking at adding a roll cage with side and foot impact protection. It’s a big and fairly expensive job that might help a bit, but those side impact bars in an Elan look just too low to convince me of their worth. Place them higher though and you’d struggle to get into, or out of the car.

Most proper Elan owners don’t seem to think too much about this issue though. When I’ve raised the subject of safety with them they would just shrug,’ it’s an old car, what do you expect?’ Or they say, ‘don’t add a roll cage, that just adds more weight!’ That’s proper Lotus thinking for you.

Sadly, that’s strike three. 

One last chance

Despite all this evidence, I foolishly went to check out an Elan once more about a year ago and, funnily enough, it turned out to be the very car I nearly bought and then lost many years ago – the car I originally hoped would be built to my requirements.

I’d never seen it finished before and it was a lovely example, with many 26R upgrades, so quick enough to compete in motorsport events and reliable enough for the then owner to commute through Sydney traffic on a regular basis. Probably the best Elan for me I’d found.

In my mind, I was halfway to buying it as I walked away saying I’d ‘think about it.’ I was sorely tempted.

I told my wife how I could sell my old 911 and buy the Elan with enough change left over to buy a good everyday car for her… “it wouldn’t take up much space in the garage, it only needed a little tidying up, etc.” On and on I prattled as we drove away from the vendor’s home…

…I looked across at my wife sitting beside me and I could tell she wasn’t buying it, and neither was I. When it comes to old Lotus Elan’s, I just don’t measure up – with three strikes against me, I have to face the fact that I’m just not worthy of owning one.

Footnote: after writing this I came across this article written by the respected Road & Track writer, and British sports car enthusiast, Peter Egan. His experience of Elan ownership confirms much of what I’ve written here – Elans are wonderful and woeful in equal measure:

tps://www.roadandtrack.com/car-culture/classic-cars/news/a21126/the-allure-of-the-lotus-elan/

I’ve also provided a link to a video by Harry Metcalf (EVO magazine founder), who clearly loves his Elan, although he doesn’t mention anything about reliability or maintenance. Mind you, he has at least a dozen other classics to choose from, so maybe it’s not much of an issue for him: