Junkyard Find: 1978 Lotus Esprit

by Murilee Martin

Published: September 11th, 2012

In all my years of crawling around in high-turnover self-service wrecking yards, not to mention old-timey slow-turnover wrecking yards, this is the first Lotus I’ve found. And it’s not just some boring Eclat— it’s a genuine mid-engined Elite! Granted, it’s been picked over pretty thoroughly…

Someone with a Sawzall got most of the fiberglass body, but you can see hints of Lotus-ness here and there.

Thanks to all the valueless Jensen-Healeys out there, the Lotus 907 engine isn’t difficult to find these days. However, the transaxle in this car might be worth pulling.

Veglia gauges with what I assume are Lucas Electrics components— such a reliable combination!

#1970s #1978 #1978LotusEsprit #BritishSportsCars #California #DownOnTheJunkyard #Esprit #Junkyard #JunkyardFind #Lotus #Malaise #MalaiseEra #LotusEsprit

Murilee Martin

Murilee Martin is the pen name of Phil Greden, a writer who has lived in Minnesota, California, Georgia and (now) Colorado. He has toiled at copywriting, technical writing, junkmail writing, fiction writing and now automotive writing. He has owned many terrible vehicles and some good ones. He spends a great deal of time in self-service junkyards. These days, he writes for publications including Autoweek, Autoblog, Hagerty, The Truth About Cars and Capital One.

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2 of 19 comments

StaysCrunchy on Sep 14, 2012

I'll get me mechanic, Ed, to work on the oily bits straight away.

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And003 on Sep 17, 2012

I wonder if the chassis is salvageable and restorable. If it is, this car would be a perfect candidate for custom coachwork.

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