After Lotus ended production of the Lotus Seven, Caterham bought the rights to the design. The modern Caterham Seven is based on the Series 3 Lotus Seven, though developed to the point that no part is the same as on the original Lotus. In 1973, Lotus sold the rights to the Seven to its remaining agents, Caterham Cars in England and Steel Brothers Limited in New Zealand. When Caterham ran out of the Lotus Series 4 kits in 1974, they introduced their own version of the Series 3 as the Caterham Seven. The modern-day Roadsports and Superlights are direct descendants of this car and therefore of the original Lotus 7.
The original Lotus Seven used an extremely light space-frame chassis with stressed aluminium body panels. This basic formula has remained essentially the same throughout the Seven's life, with the exception of the Series 4. Early cars used a live rear axle, initially from various Fords, later from the Morris Ital. De Dion rear suspension was introduced in the mid-1980s. Late 90s and early 2000s versions, such as the Superlight, employed adjustable double-wishbone suspension with front anti-roll bar and a de-Dion rear axle, located by an A-frame and Watt's linkage.
The Caterham 7 range was based exclusively on the Series 3 chassis until 2000, when the SV (Series V, or Special Vehicle) chassis was released. The SV chassis offers an extra 110 mm (4.3 in) of width across the cockpit. Both chassis sizes are available today in earlier Superlight and current 360, 420, 620 and Super Seven 2000 configurations. The SV chassis subsequently provided the basic dimensions for the Caterham CSR.
Early cars used the Lotus TwinCam engine, followed by Ford crossflow engines. The first Cosworth BDR engines appeared around 1983. By 1990, the top of the range engine had become the two-litre Vauxhall HPC. In 1993, Caterham created the JPE special edition using a two-litre Vauxhall Touring Car engine. Around 1997, the cross flow range was replaced by 8v and 16v Vauxhall units.
The Rover K-series made its appearance in 1991. This engine became the backbone of the range for the next 15 years. 1996 also saw the addition of the 'Superlight' range, which focused on reducing weight and bespoke tuning of the K-series to higher outputs. The later Superlight-R offered the dry-sumped VHPD (Very High-Performance Derivative) variant on the 1.8-litre K-series. Three years later, Caterham created the Superlight R500, based on the Rover 1.8-litre K-series and tuned by Minister Racing Engines to around 230 bhp.
After the demise of Rover and Powertrain, Caterham started phasing out the Rover K-series engine and replacing them with Ford engines; the Sigma engine for Roadsports and later 270 and 310 models, and the 2.0-litre and 2.3-litre Duratec engines for the more powerful Superlight, CSR, 360, 420, 620 and Super Seven 2000 ranges. In 2013, the 620R had a Ford Duratec direct injection 2.0-litre supercharged straight-four engine.
In 2013, Caterham also launched the 160/165 which used a Suzuki 660 cc three-cylinder turbo K6A engine. The 160 was replaced in 2021 by the 170, which uses a newer Suzuki 660 cc three cylinder turbo R06A engine.
The Superlight is available in both S3 and SV chassis sizes. Standard equipment reflects its bias to track work, including wide-track front suspension, a 6-speed sequential manual gearbox, carbon-fibre dashboard and front wings, a GRP aeroscreen, and racing harness. All Superlight cars use the 2-litre Ford Duratec engine in differing states of tune; the R400 with 210 bhp and R500 with 263 bhp. Caterham used to manufacture an R300 using the same engine at 175 bhp. With the launch of the R500 in April 2008, Caterham made available the options of a sequential gearbox and launch control. In October 2012, a supercharged model 'R600' for a race-series above the R300-class was released.
The Lotus 7 was conceived by Chapman as a car to be raced. The car has had a strong racing history throughout its life under both Lotus and Caterham stewardship. Caterham Super 7 Racing, a one-make championship for Caterhams, began in 1986. In 1995, the Caterham Academy, a novices-only format, was introduced in the UK. The car was banned from production car racing in the UK in 1976 for being too successful. The RAC lifted the ban in 1980. In 2002, an R400 won its class at the Nürburgring 24-hour race, leading to a ban on entry in subsequent years.
This article is based solely on the supplied corpus. No external sources were consulted; claims that could not be substantiated against the corpus were omitted under the drop-the-claim rule.
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