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Lotus 12

British racing car

UK Cliff Allison | Turbo/NA = Naturally-aspirated The Lotus 12 was a British racing car used in Formula Two and Formula One. It debuted at the 1958 Monaco Grand Prix and was Colin Chapman's first single-seat racer.

Design

Colin Chapman's first foray into single-seater racing, the 12 appeared in 1958. It featured a number of important innovations Chapman would use on later models. To better use the power of the Coventry Climax engine, it was designed, as usual, for low weight and low drag, relying on a space frame. It placed the driver as low as possible, reducing the height of transmission tunnel by way of a "conceptually brilliant" five-speed sequential-shift transaxle located in the back. This transaxle was designed by Richard Ansdale and Harry Mundy. The gearbox had a (long-undiagnosed) oil starvation problem, thus earned the nickname "Queerbox" for its unreliability.

Although the first two examples of Lotus 12 had De Dion rear suspension, it also introduced a new suspension configuration with what came to be called "Chapman struts" in the rear, essentially a MacPherson strut with a fixed length halfshaft with universal joints on the ends utilised as a suspension arm.

Lotus 12 was the first Lotus to be fitted with the iconic wobbly-web wheels.{{Cite book

Despite its engineering advances, the 12 was not a success in F1. In F2, the car won the class in the mixed F1/F2 1958 BRDC International Trophy, driven by Cliff Allison, but in spite of a small number of podiums, was usually drowned in a sea of Coopers.

Gallery

Lotus 12 Donington.jpg|Lotus 12 in the Donington Grand Prix Exhibition in 2007 Lotus 12.jpg|Lotus 12, Chassis No. 353 in 2010 Lotus 12 Chassis No 353 of 1958.JPG|Lotus 12, Chassis No. 353 in 2013

Complete Formula One World Championship results

(key) (Results in bold indicate pole position; results in italics indicate fastest lap.)

Year	Teams	Engine	Tyres	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11
	Team Lotus	Climax Straight-4		ARG	MON	NED	500	BEL	FRA	GBR	GER	POR	ITA	MOR
Cliff Allison		6	6	4	Ret	10			7	10
Graham Hill		Ret	Ret	Ret
Ecurie Demi Litre		Ivor Bueb							11*
	Dennis Taylor	Climax Straight-4		MON	500	NED	FRA	GBR	GER	POR	ITA	USA
Dennis Taylor				DNQ

All points scored using the Lotus 16.

F2 driver

Notes

Sources

Setright, L. J. K. Lotus: The golden mean, in Northey, Tom (ed.) World of Automobiles (London: Orbis, 1974), Volume 11, pp. 1221–34.

References

"Ultimate Car Page Lotus 12".
Setright, pp. 1225–6
Setright, p. 1225

Info: Wikipedia Source

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formula-two-cars lotus-formula-one-cars

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