Lotus 74

[studi53]

I am looking for both Lotus 74 F2 Texaco cars.
Is it true that Fittipaldi and Petersen with BDG engines are driven ?
Peter Studer

[Dan Rear]

Peter, the cars were out in 1973 only, not 74. Didn't they have one of Lotus' own engines fitted?

[Steve Wilkinson]

One was recently restored and was back out. I think there were two reasons for the lack of success - (1) not enough time to develop the car alongside the F1 programme, and (2) a rather poor engine that was never going to be powerful enough.

[James Murray]

Wasnt it the engine which was put in the Esprit/Sunbeam and other various Lotus sports cars from the early 70's onwards. Don't think they ever ran BDG.

[Alan Brown]

The Texaco Stars were first shown to the public at the Belgian GP at Zolder in May. The 16-valve racing version of the Lotus engine was developed by Novamotor (Gianni Pedrazzani) and it was claimed it would develop 275 bhp at 9200 rpm on Kugelfischer fuel injection. It debuted at Nivelles in June. According to MN 14-6-73 Ronnie Peterson had chassis number 1 and Emerson Fittipaldi number 2, the prototype, which was unnumbered, caught fire during early season testing at Snetterton (Emerson Fittipaldi escaped injury). Apparently they raced at Nivelles with wide front noses, but at their second race at Rouen with wedge noses (likened to the 72). The team did seven meetings with fifth places at Misano (EF) in a small field and at Karlskoga (RP) the best results. Many retirements occurred, the engine problems were many. Comments include AH in MN 30-8-73 “totally inadequate power” and MT in MN 18-9-73 saying that they had 240 bhp against the 270 bhp of the BMW engines. Emerson Fittipaldi only did three races, an injury at Zandvoort allowed him to avoid racing the unco9mpetitive car; David Morgan had a go in the last three races.

[Alan Brown]

In the MN Formula 2 Review of 1973 (8-11-73) each leading team manager sontributed a survey of their season. Here is the Texaco Star-Lotus one by Jim Endruweit:
"We started at Nivelles and it was obvious we had some sort of a disaster on our hands in mechanical terms. We had so many problems trying to keep the engines (Novamotor) together we didn't realise we had a power problem as well. It was some time before we got the message - because there were always these mechanical problems. It was never the same ones - always something different. We did seven races but a large part of the time was spent trying to last the distance. When at last we stood some hope of completing the race it became obvious we not only had the mechanical problems but also a lack of power. At Karlskoga Ronnie had a bit of a go while the engine was all in one piece and we saw what we could do; given 20 hp more we would have been there ... The rest of the car and the drivers had the capability and went very well - the car had a handling advantage over the opposition - but you can't win without power. In short it was a bad season. We started late and did a restricted season and we never did catch up, but it was a new car and it is not surprising that we didn't storm the opposition ... We have no firm answer yet on next season - or on what will happen with the cars - it is quite open. If we don't continue in Formula 2 it won't be because of what happened this year."

[Alan Brown]

In the MN Formula 2 Review of 1973 (8-11-73) each leading team manager contributed a survey of their season. Here is the Texaco Star-Lotus one by Jim Endruweit:
"We started at Nivelles and it was obvious we had some sort of a disaster on our hands in mechanical terms. We had so many problems trying to keep the engines (Novamotor) together we didn't realise we had a power problem as well. It was some time before we got the message - because there were always these mechanical problems. It was never the same ones - always something different. We did seven races but a large part of the time was spent trying to last the distance. When at last we stood some hope of completing the race it became obvious we not only had the mechanical problems but also a lack of power. At Karlskoga Ronnie had a bit of a go while the engine was all in one piece and we saw what we could do; given 20 hp more we would have been there ... The rest of the car and the drivers had the capability and went very well - the car had a handling advantage over the opposition - but you can't win without power. In short it was a bad season. We started late and did a restricted season and we never did catch up, but it was a new car and it is not surprising that we didn't storm the opposition ... We have no firm answer yet on next season - or on what will happen with the cars - it is quite open. If we don't continue in Formula 2 it won't be because of what happened this year."