Tuesday 4th November 2003

Heritage takes Lotuses

Caterham lend historic cars to Motor Museum

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The Heritage Motor Centre at Gaydon, Warwickshire has taken custody of a selection of unusual Lotus Seven sports cars. The cars are owned by Caterham Cars of Surrey and have been loaned to the museum by Graham Nearn, chairman and founder of Caterham Cars.

The cars range from an early (1953) Lotus Mark VI which was the first production sports car made by Colin Chapman who had recently formed the Lotus Car Company; to a more recent (1992) Caterham Super Seven, which won the Nelson Ledges 24-hour race.

The cars tell their own story of how Colin Chapman made his dream come true and provided an affordable sports car in kit form for the DIY car enthusiast. The production costs were kept low, as most of the parts were sourced locally. Initially the chassis came from a factory a few doors up from the Lotus factory and the aluminium body was from a body shop in the same street.

Caterham Cars was one of the original Lotus service centres. They took over the production of Lotus Sevens in 1973 and have recently celebrated their 30^th anniversary with the production of 30 special edition Caterham Cars.

Colin Chapman was the pioneer of economical lightweight sports cars, in kit form. By manufacturing in this form he saved the buyer the expense of hefty Purchase Tax, therefore making them far more affordable. He used specially selected and cost-effective components, including Ford engines and Progress Chassis.

Stephen Laing, curator of the museum said: "The cars have been carefully preserved by Caterham Cars and are a wonderful example of the progress made by a small sportscar manufacturer over the years. They will certainly add another dimension to our extensive collection of historic British cars ."

The display in the museum at the Heritage Motor Centre is open to the public every day (except 24 to 26 Dec inclusive) from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Admission charges are adults £8 concession £7, children under 5 years FREE; children 5-16 years £6.00; Family tickets (2 adults & 3 children) £25.

Visit the website at www.heritage-motor-centre.co.uk

[RichB]

I visited the Heritage Centre at Gaydon last year and whilst impressed by the number of cars on display I was surprised not to see any TVRs, so I contacted the curator. He explained that originally the museum was established with funding from BL (or whatever they were called at the time!) so all the cars in their care were Austin/Morris/MG/BMC/BL/Rover etc.
<p>Since then the trust has been taken over by Ford and is, I believe, starting to display a proper cross section of British cars from all manufacturers. Clearly Jaguar, Aston Martin, TVR, lotus, Morgan, Bristol, AC etc. should all be represented.
<p> What a wonderful place Gaydon would be to display those "special" TVRs that PW has no interest in such as the Speed 12, Trident, Griffith Speed 6 etc. What do you think? Rich...


>>> Edited by RichB on Wednesday 5th November 12:14