John D Lotus 40

Words and pictures by John Dilworth.

Made from a Classic fibreglass shell several -six, seven?- years ago now,and is a little 'race-distressed' these days. It's still one of my favourite cars to race round my home track because;

1; It's one of my all-time favourite cars, driven by my all-time favourite pilot.Even though it was one of the least successful cars Colin Chapman ever made, I think it looks fantastic on the track and really summons up an era for me.Anything in green with a yellow stripe does it for me.

2. I havn't seen many other models of this car

3. It's fast

I got the shell from Betta and drilled and reamed out everything I could, and found there was just enough room to squeeze in a standard Fly motor and sidewinder gear. The chassis is a very simple brass rod frame, the motor/rear axle/guide being one unit, which is mounted to the body behind the back axle with a hinge, so that it all falls away iso-fulcrum style. There's a Fly round magnet just ahead of the motor My track is very bumpy and needs some sort of drop arm arrangement to stay in the slot.

	Lotus 40 by John Dilworth.
Words and pictures by John Dilworth. Made from a Classic fibreglass shell several -six, seven?- years ago now,and is a little 'race-distressed' these days. It's still one of my favourite cars to race round my home track because; 1; It's one of my all-time favourite cars, driven by my all-time favourite pilot.Even though it was one of the least successful cars Colin Chapman ever made, I think it looks fantastic on the track and really summons up an era for me.Anything in green with a yellow stripe does it for me. 2. I havn't seen many other models of this car 3. It's fast I got the shell from Betta and drilled and reamed out everything I could, and found there was just enough room to squeeze in a standard Fly motor and sidewinder gear. The chassis is a very simple brass rod frame, the motor/rear axle/guide being one unit, which is mounted to the body behind the back axle with a hinge, so that it all falls away iso-fulcrum style. There's a Fly round magnet just ahead of the motor My track is very bumpy and needs some sort of drop arm arrangement to stay in the slot.
	The wheels are the old SCX chromed five-spokes painted up. They're a bit crude, but I like them- the size seems right and I like the chrome rims- gives it a bit of flash! I still use them a lot, if I can find them. The interior is very crude, made from black cardboard with very simple furniture and a Fly driver with the Classic head that came with the body shell. I drilled out the headlamps and glued in a pair of covers cut from some conveniently curved clear plastic packaging. The exhausts are made from the ferrules of old paintbrushes, the intake trumpets from bits of ali tube. The front air dam is just a piece of clear plastic sheet painted and slipped into a slot cut underneath the nose. The whole thing was re-decorated a while ago when I discovered that Pattos made a set of Lotus decals. That made me very happy. This isn't an exact race-replica model, as you can see, but I'm happy enough that it captures the spirit of the original, which didn't actually race that much. I did what I could with the time and resources I had, and now I'm happy to move on.... although everytime I get it on the track I think about another mod to make it look or go better.