1956 Lotus Eleven history

[rodncustom]

My dad has has an Eleven since the early 70's. We would like to
know the history. Thank you.

[rodncustom]

[Elton E. (Tony) Clark]

On Sun, Feb 14, 2010 at 3:10 PM, rodncustom <rodnc...@hotmail.com> wrote:

My dad has has an Eleven since the early 70's. We would like to
 know the history. Thank you.

Mr Rod N. Custom (?)

 

If you'd like history of the Lotus Eleven in general, we can suggest several books on the subject.

 

If you'd like history of your specific family Lotus Eleven, you'll want to provide as much information as possible as to the chassis number, prior owners, present owner, etc. 

 

 

[Mark Murray]

Hi
 
I apologize for posting twice. I am new to this forum and, obviously, haven't got it figured out yet. : )
 

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Date: Sun, 14 Feb 2010 17:11:22 -0600
Subject: Re: 1956 Lotus Eleven history
From: elton...@gmail.com
To: lotus-...@googlegroups.com; rodnc...@hotmail.com

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[Mark Murray]

To start, my name is Mark Murray and my dad is Stan Murray. He is the current owner of the car. We have been trying to track the history of the car for quite some time. I am in Seattle and so is the car.
 
The car had, at one point, all three tops. It has the provisions for the top bows, evidence of the posts for a one piece windshield, as well as evidence of the single seat wrap around windshield.
 
The car has the number 207 stamped in the aluminum in two different places, which apparently a few cars have.
 
It has dual fuel tanks as well as dual fuel pumps but the fuel pumps have green on the ends which apparently are unusual.
 
It has the standard 18 gauge bottom tubing but with 20 gauge tubing for the rest which is apparently only on the first 5-10 cars or the factory race cars.
 
The car appears to have been registered in England at some point as it had an England license plate on it that we still have with the number ROV511G.
 

 

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[rodncustom]

A couple other points of interest;

In addition it also has two brackets for the fuel pumps, which
apparently meant it was done at the factory.
It has a single float for the two carburetors.

It also has balance bars for the brake pedal which apparently is not
on all cars.

Thank you in our search for it's history.

[Elton E. (Tony) Clark]

I have a feeling that you'll be hearing from a Mister V. F. Thomas, founder of HLR, very soon.

Tony  

[Charles Helps]

Just out of interest the registration with its G suffix would have
been issued in Great Britain between 1 August 1968 and 31 July 1969.

Mark, was your father the first US owner or did he buy the car from
another American?

[Mark Murray]

No, he was  not the first US owner. The man he got the car, at this point, doesn't remember where he got the car.
 
> Date: Mon, 15 Feb 2010 02:21:21 -0800

> Subject: Re: 1956 Lotus Eleven history

> From: charle...@btopenworld.com
> To: lotus-...@googlegroups.com

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[Vic Thomas]

Dear Mark

As your Dad knows, I have this car well documented.

Sadly the UK registration has eluded

us discovering the chassis number.

Best regards

VFT

 

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[Thierry Clicot]

I Know About ROV511G!!

Hi!

I was living in Russell Square - Camden, in London Late 1973, and bought a '67 Jag E-Type DHC (RED, of course!) down in Kent---It was registered ROV511G--Even an MOT badge---When I left for the continent, I sold it to someone in town, and left for Nice...so I don't know how your Lotus got the plate???   all I know from there on, though...

T

[Christopher Tchorznicki]

I thought it was  allways assumed that 207 was only stamped on cars that were sent to the USA. Denis Ortentburger wrote in his XI book that my XI was made up of two cars, 255 & 207! Somewhat incorrect.  To my knowledge nobody seems to know what 207 signifies.

chris

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[Stewart Smith]

I thought Stan sold his car? Victor Thomas might have information on the car. 

Tell Stan hello for me, 

Stewart Smith

Sent from my iPhone

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[Lotus Eleven Register]

Since this thread has been re-energized I thought others might like to hear what has been going on with this car.  When Mark Murray started the thread he was justifiably frustrated with not getting any new answers from Victor and me, and in preparation to sell the car he reached out here and in other places for someone who might know more about his un-numbered Eleven.  The new owner in the UK has done the same thing, including questions on the AutoSport Nostalgia Forum.  We were back where we began, looking at the same facts / data as mentioned at the top of this thread. And once again we went nowhere with it.  But this year two new interesting discoveries have given us hope.

First, on an old photo that Charles Engberg (Bob's brother) has had on his wall for years, it was noticed that an Eleven he once owned had a large oval cutout in the rear undertray, just ahead of the tube the tail section pivots on. This car was Charles' "other" Eleven, not to be confused with #216 which is buried in his back yard. This other Eleven was a bit of a mystery to him too, and in the 1960s he was running it with an assortment of panels and parts borrowed from #216. The oval cutout was strange but identical to one on the original rear undertray from the Murray car. It was evidence that the Murray Eleven had been in California in the early 1960s, not back East or in the UK as the Murrays' had been told.

Second, the new owner provided us with the serial number from what he (and the Murrays) believed to be the original Climax block. It was a number that, if Lotus used engines more or less in sequence, would have been installed in an Eleven built in the 213-215 range. We know this isn't the way to arrive at the truth but we quickly eliminated other cars and found a smoking gun pointed at #214. This was the Jack Nethercutt Eleven, most notable for being featured on the cover of the March, 1957 issue of Road & Track magazine. That car has been missing from the record for a long time since.

In studying online photos of the Nethercutt Eleven one thing about it stands out: it doesn't have the normal air vents -- cutouts -- in the tail. So how did air trapped in the tail escape? This little trace of a clue has made us very curious about the Jack Nethercutt Eleven and inspired a lot more online photo searches. If any of the other enthusiasts here can find a ground-level photo of the rear of Nethercutt's Eleven they can help solve this identity mystery or send us back to the drawing board.

Regards,

Jay Sloane
PS: the whole question of the 207 marks deserves another thread. It will take cooperation from many owners to reach a satisfactory answer. 

[rodncustom]

Hi Jay,

Thank you for the update!

I have attached a link below. I believe that it is extremely significant to this new information. It contains a photo of Jack Nethercutt racing the Eleven in 1956 at Pomona. The significance is the full width windscreen. What my dad, Stan Murray, and I have always thought was interesting about the car was the fact that it had a set up for set ups. This picture, I belive, clearly points to the fact that the car did run with the full width windscreen, as well as the single seat set up as in the Road & Track photo.

http://thechicaneblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/Pomona-Results-MotoRacing-Nov-1956.pdf

Mark Murray

[rodncustom]

I meant to say the car was set up, or had provisions, for all the different windscreen's. A little mis typing. : )

[Bob Engberg]

It seems to me that Nethercutt entered a race in his Eleven BeFORE the build date of 214. You could check it out. 214 would have been built May/June along with the LeMans cars. Bob

Sent from my iPad

[Lotus Eleven Register]

As many here have already learned, there has been much progress in determining which Eleven this is. The story is told in issue #80 of Historic Lotus. In his article there (page 30) Vic Thomas writes of the emergence of the ex-Hawthorn-Bueb Eleven, chassis 162.   That is what this car has been all along.

After my post here last October I was able to contact Jack Nethercutt through his museum and determined that his Eleven #214 had nothing to do with this car. At the same time Russ Hoenig traced the name Bill Winfrey to a man still living and happy to talk about the Eleven he once owned. Old photos, an old title, shipment records, all came out of the woodwork and showed this to be #162. Jon Adams meanwhile was tracing one lead after another to fill in the history of its brutal first year of racing. The distractions and false clues that hampered previous efforts to identify this car became clear.

A group effort with a fine outcome, fully documented and supported by known facts.   Congratulations Jon !

Jay Sloane