I?m new to this forum but have been into lotus cars for quite a while having owned a 1962 seven and most recently an elise.
I have been in love with the design of the +2 for many years and now I have finally bought myself a sample.
Its a 1967 50/0073 with UK registration MTO 120F. Its now yellow but was originally red and its in very good nick. It has been restored at some point and the engine number is not the original one (a newer engine is mounted).
The price was very good bearing in mind the PO didn?t know the history of the car or the engine.
However I was wondering if any of you knowledgeable people could spread some light on the history.
Its running on a spyder chassis with CV axles but other than that is very original. The interior is black and everything seems to work both mechanically and electrically.
You have bought a very early car and from what I remember of it at Donnington in 2006, a very good one.
Chassis 73, with original engine LP9600LBA, and was built on 17/11/67. You may have noticed that the rear lights are different to most Plus 2s. They are the correct Carello lights, fitted to the first 100 or so Plus 2 cars, and came originally from an Alfa Romeo Guilia 1750 / Sprint. It should also have the wide chrome front windscreen surround, again only fitted to the first 100 or so Plus 2 cars, and for some reason, the first of the Plus 2 ?S? cars. These were sourced from the 1962 Classic Capri, and are very hard to find.
The registration number is interesting, being a 120F. Lotus used 120 on many of their demonstrator cars from 1965 through to the early 70s. It seems that a few of the Lotus dealers obtained a 120F registration for their demonstrator Plus 2 cars when the cars were launched in October 1967. I am restoring chassis 24, which is MAE 120 F, but I?ve yet to research the history of it.
Your car is certainly a rare early survivor, with very few left in anything like original condition. The image of the Plus 2 has suffered over the past 10 or 15 years with many rough or poorly modified cars in existence as a proportion of the remaining cars. Many are still being broken for parts, which is of course good news if you need to obtain original or rare parts for yours. Your car deserves bringing up to a good original standard, and it?s nearly there.
Here are 3 120F cars?.. Colin Chapman with his, your car in 2006 at Donnington, and my chassis 24.
@ Dusty: Unfortunately I have sold my seven, it was registeret LOT7 and was assembled by Brian Luff(a Lotus project engineer), who assembled it from a scraped 7 racer. He used different elan parts i.e. the wheels in the resto and obtained the registration from a scrapped moped. The funny thing is that Brian Luff, to my knowlege, was in charge of the interior design on the +2. That kind of rounds things up for me.
@elanintheforest: I have tried to investigate the early history by Andy Graham at lotuscars and they can only see that it was sold to a R. Dawson on the 17th November 1967. They dont know if he was a Lotus employe.
I definately intend to keep the original look of it and keep it on twincam power. I expecially like the door handles with the integrated lock mechanism for a clean look as well as the clean front without the fog lights.
Your registration letters TO indicate that the car was first registered in Nottingham. Mark’s AE as he will know, indicate first registration in Bristol. I suspect Mark is right that some Lotus dealers matched the factory 120F numbers for their own demonstrators and some customer cars. I have seen that on several Elans and +2s over the years.
If I recall correctly, Graham Arnold in his Elan Buyers Guide lists most of the factory press car registrations.
I don’t know if the list referred to above is the same but there is a list of the press cars in the Robinshaw and Ross book “Authentic Lotus Elan and +2” - sadly your car isn’t in it, but the list does re-enforce the “120” numbering. The numbers listed are:
LPW120E (+2)
PAH120F (+2)
RPW444G (+2)
ABN222 (+2, Australian registration)
NAH120F (+2)
4E2215 (+2, USA registration)
MG267 (+2 Australian)
UVF102H (+2S)
VAH800H (+2S)
YPW400J (+2S, then converted to S130 spec)
AVF500J (+2S 130)
HPW358L (+2S 130/5)
NPW866M (+2S 130/5)
Quietly putting on my anorak , I’ve tried to find out how many of the UK registered cars above are still on the road in the UK by doing a DVLA check. It seems that of the above cars only one is still on the road - assuming that is that none of them have had a change of number plate. So of the UK press cars it seems that only 10% are left on the road - if you apply this to the number produced (say 4,500 ish) that means there could be only 450 left on the road…
But then 92% of statistics are made up on the spot… and it is long since time I did something less sad!
Peer
It looks like a great car, I was in contact with the owner back in the Summer but it was just outside
my price range, I did find a photo or two of the car from Stoneleigh 2007 on this forum
So I assume the chance of it being a presscar or demonstrator is small or not existing.
I would have hoped that some of you had knowledge about some PO and could tell me something about the history of the engine or when it was rebuild. The spyderchassis has no. SPY0486 if that will give a clue about when it was rebuilt.
A least I now know that it has been yellow at least from 2006, thanks
Peer - I’d echo one of the earlier posts about contacting the DVLA. You can download a form from the DVLA website to request a copy of all of the registration info that they have on the car. This should give you a list of the previous owners and their addresses etc and should also tell you when any colour or engine changes have happened. I’ve done this for my own car (and even found that the guy that owned it as a company car in the late 70’s/early 80’s was still living in the same place!).
