# Famous Lotus Cars: From the Seven to the Esprit and Evija

The Lotus cars everyone should know: the Seven, Elan, Esprit of James Bond fame, the Lotus Carlton, the championship-winning 25, 49, 72 and 79, and more.

Source: https://lotustrails.com/guides/famous-lotus-cars/

The Elise did not appear from nowhere. It is the latest in a line of cars built on the same idea, and knowing them explains a lot about why it is the way it is.

## Road cars

### Seven (1957 to 1973)

Four wheels, two seats, an engine and very little else. The Seven was sold mainly as a kit and raced by its owners at weekends. Caterham Cars bought the design in 1973 and has built it continuously ever since. It also became famous as the car in the title sequence of the television series The Prisoner.

### Elite, Type 14 (1957 to 1963)

The first production car with a glass-fibre monocoque, with no separate chassis at all. It was exquisitely light and won its class at Le Mans six times. It was also expensive to build and lost money on every car.

### Elan (1962 to 1973)

A steel backbone chassis, a twin-cam engine and a body weighing next to nothing. The Elan's ride and handling were so good that Gordon Murray, designer of the McLaren F1, said his only disappointment with that car was that he could not give it the steering of the Elan. Mazda took it as the template for the MX-5.

### Lotus Cortina (1963 to 1970)

Ford asked Lotus to turn its family saloon into a racing car. Lotus fitted the twin-cam engine and revised the suspension, and the white car with the green side flash won touring car championships across Europe.

### Europa (1966 to 1975)

One of the first affordable mid-engined road cars, with a backbone chassis and a Renault, later Lotus, engine. Its name was revived on the Elise-based [Europa S](/models/europa-s/).

### Esprit (1976 to 2004)

Styled by Giorgetto Giugiaro as a sharp-edged wedge, the Esprit carried Lotus for 28 years, gaining a turbocharger in 1980 and a V8 in 1996. A white S1 drove off a jetty and turned into a submarine in the 1977 James Bond film The Spy Who Loved Me. The actual submersible prop was bought at auction in 2013 by Elon Musk. A Turbo followed in For Your Eyes Only, and an Esprit SE had a memorable role in Pretty Woman.

### Lotus Carlton (1990 to 1992)

Lotus took the Vauxhall Carlton and Opel Omega saloon, enlarged the straight six to 3.6 litres and added two turbochargers for 377 bhp. With a top speed of around 176 mph it was the fastest four-door car in the world, and the subject of questions in Parliament about whether it should be allowed.

### Elise (1996 to 2021)

The car this site is about. See the [model guides](/models/).

### Evija (2020 onwards)

An electric hypercar with around 2,000 horsepower from four motors, limited to 130 cars. It is the opposite of an Elise in almost every measurable way, though Lotus points to its weight, low for a car of its kind, as evidence that the old thinking survives.

## Racing cars

### Type 25 (1962)

The first Formula 1 car with a fully stressed monocoque, replacing the tubular space frame. It was stiffer, lighter and narrower than anything else on the grid. Jim Clark won the 1963 championship in it.

### Type 38 (1965)

Clark's Indianapolis 500 winner, which ended the era of front-engined roadsters at the Speedway.

### Type 49 (1967)

Designed around the new Ford Cosworth DFV, with the engine bolted to the back of the monocoque as a load-bearing member. It won its first race. The DFV went on to win 155 Grands Prix.

### Type 72 (1970)

The wedge. Radiators in the sidepods, inboard brakes and torsion bar suspension. It won three constructors' championships and raced for six seasons.

### Type 79 (1978)

The first car designed from the outset around ground effect, with venturi tunnels under the sidepods sealed by sliding skirts. Mario Andretti called it "painted to the road". It won six races in 1978 and, together with the two early-season wins of the Type 78, delivered both titles.

### Type 88 (1981)

The twin-chassis car, with a separate aerodynamic body mounted over the sprung chassis. It was banned before it ever raced, to Chapman's fury.

### Type 108 (1992)

Not a car at all. Lotus Engineering built the carbon monocoque bicycle on which Chris Boardman won the individual pursuit at the Barcelona Olympics.

## Elise relatives worth knowing

- **Vauxhall VX220 and Opel Speedster.** Built at Hethel for General Motors. See the [guide](/models/vx220-opel-speedster/).
- **Tesla Roadster (2008 to 2012).** Lotus supplied the chassis technology and assembled the cars at Hethel, without powertrains, for Tesla to complete.
- **Hennessey Venom GT.** An American hypercar that began with Exige body and chassis components and reached 270 mph.
- **Lotus 340R, 2-Eleven and 3-Eleven.** The stripped-out track specials: [340R](/models/340r/), [2-Eleven](/models/2-eleven/), [3-Eleven](/models/3-eleven/).

For the people who drove and designed them, see [famous Lotus drivers](/guides/famous-lotus-drivers/) and the [history of Lotus](/guides/lotus-history/).