Lotus 35

[KDW]

Paul,
I was recently told of a Lotus 44 in S France fitted with F2 BRM still in RH-TL colours. I was asked casually what I thought it was worth, sight unseen. But have not heard anything since.
Kevin

[KDW]

Paul,
re Martin engines. There was an interesting article by Ted Martin in Autosport regarding his problems with FJ 105E engines. The next week Cosworth replied with engine component pics, to say in effect they were ahead of the game.
Kevin

[KDW]

Chris,
It was between a Lotus 41 and the 35 as to which car to buy!
Now I have had to remove the engine and gearbox to enable me to reach the starter motor, one can see why the F3 continental circus went for space frame cars !
I have also borrowed a load of 41 pics from Ted Walker. Lovely car, and some one needs to sort out the detail.

I must express an interest here. As part of my enthusisam I publish a bi monthly mag, "Lotus Single Seaters", which I hope will go someway to offsetting the cost of my racing !

Kevin

[Roger H]

Hello KDW,
Tell us more about 'Lotus Single Seaters' please, ie how do we subscribe etc. By the way on the Lola T60 series cars in F3 trim it was necessary to undo the engine mounts etc and lift the engine to remove the distributor! Oh happy days!!!!!

[Bryan Miller]

Chris.
I notice you have been buried in takers for your Lotus 41's.
The problem with any of these cars is that they contain a goodly percentage of F3's , and ch.no. for them are seldom reported.

Ken Smith in N.Z. had one in period which according to Vercoe was the Charles Lucas Championship winning car of 1967.
We have one here ex. S.E.Asia , but am unable to advise previous owners at the moment , it has been here since circa 1970 , Frame no is 41-7., which may or may not be ch.no. as well.
Steve Holland ran one at Macau in 1967.
A. Laurel also in 1967. This was the car he died in in a horrific accident. His full name was Arsenio , with the nickname of Dodgie, terrible photo in Colour and noise.

On the for sale's at this moment are 41C-FL-58 , race-cars .com
Len Selby's site has 41-FL-29 and 41C-FL-38

Bryan.

[KDW]

Lotus Single Seaters mag is A5 size 24 pages, colour laser printed on 120 gram quality paper. I have just sent out No 8.
Len Terry, Clive Chapman, Graham Arnold, Club Lotus, John Oakley, HLR are among subscribers.
Deals with 18 to 69 non F1 cars. Period writing and photos, plus new writing and modern photos. For owners, racers, restorers and enthusiasts of these great cars.
Free advertising for subscribers.

Of those who have responded to 'what do you own' we have 88 racers listed.
Cost, UK £20 pa, Europe £23. Rest of World £27 pa Paypal.com is good way to pay.

Kevin

[KDW]

Brian,
the 41 with TC in France FL29, was fitted with 1500 ATS F1 motor at one time the owner told me (L Sufryn)
Kevin

[KDW]

Sorry, Forgot to say
Lotus Single Seaters magazine is every other month, ie 6 issues a year.
Kevin

[KDW]

Bryan,
I have checked 1965 Motor Racing magazine
Peter Sellers Racing had as no 1 driver Barrie Hart.

Kevin

[Chris Townsend]

Lotus 35s
In 1969 the ex Peter Sellers Racing 35 is being raced in F3 by Tony Birchenough.

Lotus 41s:
The earliest known chassis no. that I have is 41-F3-6 advertised by Malcolm Payne at the end of 66 as 'two races only' [which were at the start of the season]
F3-8-E is advertised by a "Jennings" in Autosport in 1967. Any ideas who he?
Most of the other early season cars were F3s, going to Derek Bell, Tony Dean and Melvyn Long.

[David McKinney]

I can beat you by one, Chris
•41 F3 5 was the Frank Manning car raced by Chris Moore in 1966 F3. It would be logical to guess that the earlier numbers would have included the RHTL cars.
•I have ‘06’ as the 1966 Gunnar Carlsson car, which remained in Scandinavia to 1970, and was offered at auction in 1998. I suppose Malcolm Wayne could have advertised it at some stage, but it seems more likely that ‘06’ is not the same as 41 F3 6
•41 F3 8 was Mo Nunn’s 1966 mount. Jennings might have been hillclimber Bob Jennings, an associate of Mike MacDowel
•41 F3 12 was Derek Bell’s (at least at the beginning of 1966)
•Kenny Smith’s ex-Lucas car was 41 F3 14 and, last I heard (1998), was still in NZ
•41 F3 15 was the John Willment car 1966, driven by Tony Dean
•41 F3 19 was run by Motor Racing Stables for Tetsu Ikuzawa 1966
•There seem to have been three Charles Lucas cars in 1966, raced by Lucas, Courage and Pike. Lucas also raced his in 1967, while the ex-Courage car went to Steve Holland in Hong Kong
•Of the other Asian cars, Laurel had his late 1966. Other drivers included William Gray of Singapore in 1968, John Macdonald of Hong Kong the same year, Ricky Ohkubo of Japan in 1969, Tokomitsu Urushibara with Honda engine 1970 (possibly not a 41), A N Other in the 1971 Japanese GP (with Waggott engine) and T Tsutsumi at Macau in 1972
•Not a lot of people know this, but there was a second 41 in NZ. It arrived with a very shady history and under the name of Teal rather than Lotus, but I’m pretty sure it never raced beifore being converted to FF (and entered as a Lotus). I haven’t heard of this car since 1975, when it was still racing.
•Apparently 61 units (including 41Bs) were sold

41Bs
(F2/FB version)
•41B F 1 was the Team Lotus car driven by Jackie Oliver in late 1966 F3
•41B-FL-30 was the Lotus Components car which Oliver raced in F2 in 1967. Later a UK hillclimb car (Geoff Rollason, David Blankstone, Martyn Grifiths etc) into the 1970s.
•41B-FL-46 raced by Manfred Behnke mid 1968 (or do I mean 1988?)

41Cs
(1967 F3)
•FL-29 - the Midland RT car, driven mainly by Walter Habbegger 1967/68 (with twincam engine)
•Gus Hutchison raced one successfully in US FB 1967
•Geoff Rollason in UK hillclimbs once or twice in 1967

41X
•one-off F3 car built 1967

[allenbrown]

There's not much I can offer here except to say that Gus's team ran three "41C"s (were they really 41Bs?) in 1967. One of them is still active in vintage racing but I don't think anyone knows exactly which one it was.

Allen

[Chris Townsend]

David

That's pretty amazing record keeping! Allen can now put Kenny Smith's 41 properly in place in the Tasman records. This was the car in which Lucas won the 67 British GP support race, but from the race reports I always thought that it was a 1967 built car.

The Mo Nunn car is interesting too. He had a 41 for a long time and eventually sold it to Sid Watkins [I don't know if that's the Dr Sid Watkins] in 1969. David's chassis confirmation suggests that either he had two cars, with a new one in 1967, or perhaps Bob Jennings [who lived in the same part of the W.Midlands as Nunn] really owned the car and in the end it didn't sell. I think the first 41 on the hills was Geoff Rollason's FL-30, so Jennings didn't use it himself.

Given those chassis numbers here is some 1967 ownership based on contemporary updates of ownership and race reports:
F3-6 Manning for John Cardwell and John Kendall
F-12 [assuming it's the only car Bell uses] Felday for Mac Daghorn, then sold to Jo Tacquet, retained by Tacquet in 1968

Chris

[KDW]

Chris,
I have photos of Birchenough driving his car, so thats one more car / chassis no identified.
Kevin

[KDW]

I always understood that a number of 41's were sold by the factory well after they were new. Into the late 60's early 70's.

I chased up several 41's before buying the 35, so I'll check out owners/chassis numbers, plus the Ferret Fhotos captions, and post that tomorrow.
Kevin
PS I think there is a Registrar for the 41 in USA.

[David McKinney]

Originally posted by Chris Townsend
Allen can now put Kenny Smith's 41 properly in place in the Tasman records. This was the car in which Lucas won the 67 British GP support race, but from the race reports I always thought that it was a 1967 built car.

You might well be right. My original info would have come from KS at the time - or shortly after - he bought the car, and it's quite possible that he or I made an assumption regarding its 1966 use

[DaveM]

Here's the ex-Peter Sellers car at Croft in May 66 when raced by Bill Robson. It still has Peter Sellers Racing painted on the side, but has an interesting home made nose.

[DaveM]

Two 41's in this pic of the start of heat 2 at Oulton in October 67. John Miles leads in the Lotus Components car, which I captioned as a 41C, and the 6th placed 41 is driven by John Hine. The Miles car sported a periscope type air intake in the final.

[DaveM]

This is Mo Nunn in his 41 at Mallory in either late 67 or early 68.

Freddy Kottulinsky also drove a 41.

[DaveM]

Here is John Miles again, this time winning the F3 race at the Silverstone International Trophy meeting in April 68 in the 41X.

[Chris Townsend]

Re the Mo Nunn car [F3-8]. Autosport race report for the Lombank Tr race at Mallory in March '68, says it's still his 1966 car, so it may well be that the Jennings ad was the original owner trying to sell it. after Nunn had used it for a season or so.

Re 35's: a Paul Tucomb enters the 'ex Collomb' car for the Coupe de Vitesse at Albi in '68

Do we know how long Bill Robson had the ex-Sellers Racing car?

Chris

[KDW]

Re 35's
Brian Hart drove a 35 fitted with a non standard nose, it looked like the Protos, so I assume it was a low drag Costin nose.
41's
I was told by Stuart Rolt that there was more than one 41X was built.
One of my subscribers living in Italy has a 41X, and found it fitted with wings and Alfa engine. The car is due to be restored. The car starred in a Italian film along the lines of Grand Prix, but starring the motorcylist Agostini. I have tried to obtain a copy of the film and posted a request on the motogp board, but no response.
Kevin

[KDW]

Thanks guys,
I am building up some history for the 35's but there seem to be several cars that have never been noted.
I have a pic of T Birchenough in Aug 68 at Brands

I am also interested if any more cars survive now. We still seem to only know my car + Paul Matty+ John Dimmer. Thats just 3. There must be more than that.

Re 41's
From Ferret caption
May 69 C Palace M Watkins
68 Int Trophy 41X
6/67 Prescott G Rollason new 41B with TC on TJ injection and Ft2004/66
8/67 F3Snetterton Mo Nunn in a reddy brown car
67 Int Trophy C Lucas 41 with side draught carbs non crossflow. Also J Fenning, ditto side draught carbs.
9/69 Brands Ken Cook ditto
3/67 Silverstone Mac Daghorn side draft carbs. Also Mo Nunn Downdraught carb.
5/69 C Palace Mike Watkins down draught carb.
66 C-Mans Champs Tetsu Ikusawa. Wet race, side draught carbs. I last heard of him running a major motorcycle business back in Japan.

Kevin

[Bryan Miller]

Kevin et al .

Lotus 35 , in 1966 in Argentina in Jan. 3 cars appear as F3s , Jochen Neerpasch , Karl von Wendt and Walter Fluckiger.
Vallelunga 9-6-66, we have Scuderia Jolly Club for Salvatore Genovese.
Silverstone 18-6-66 as well as the already mentioned W.A Robson entry for Andy Wilkinson , we have C.Priddey in a 35.
At Rheims on 3-7-66 Neerpasch for von Wendt and Roland Binder for himself.
Apart from the above ,the 3 main users of 35s in1966 are Peter Sellers Racing for Brian Hart and Barrie Hart , and the BMW powered car of Freddy Kottulinsky.
All the above in F3 , which begs the question is Brian Hart running his last years F2 car converted to F3 specs,or is this a different car and Hart's car has gone elsewhere.

Lotus 41, I don't think this has been listed .
Team Lotus for Jack Oliver is 41B-F-1 at Brands 27-12-66.

Doug Nye calls out Lotus 55 as Formula 3 Lotus 41X for Gold Leaf Team Lotus use only , one off .
I wonder what the ch.pl. said ?????
Bryan.

[KDW]

Bryan,
There were two Lotus 35's sold to Lotus Switzerland dealer in 1965.
One is thought to be Karl Foitek who entered his in 1600cc form, TC?, at Hockenheim in Spring 65 for Swiss Champ Races there.
The second car was Walter Fluckiger who entered his F3 Lotus 35 in St-Ursanne les Rangier on 22/8/65.

Both my car and Paul Matty's came from Switzerland.
Now we both have TC's.
My Hewland is marked
LC 165 Mk6 8/65
H6296 725.

so was mine the F3 Lotus 35 ??
I think you are involved with Hewland, I have tried to ask them which car/when the 'box was sold, but no response to date.
Kevin