Auto Pics

The Super 7 started life as a Lotus in 1957, and went through several versions before Lotus phased it's base model out of production in 1973. The original Seven series 1 was made from 1957-1960, the Seven series 2 from 1960-1962, the Super Seven series 2 from 1961-1968. This car is based on the Lotus Super Seven Series 3 which was made from 1968-1970. Lotus made a Super Seven series 4 between 1970-1973 (which had an ugly glassfibre body) before selling the production rights to the Super Seven to the Caterham Car Company owned by Graham Nearn. Caterham produced the series 4 version for one year before reverting back to the earlier more aesthetically pleasing series 3 type in 1974, and has continued to produce them to date.

The Super Seven is a simple car with a tubular space-frame chassis, light alloy body, independent coil sprung suspension all round and minimal creature comforts and weather protection (there is a hood and some side screens, but they leak and take time to put up, so bad weather is best avoided in a Caterham if you like being warm and dry!). This minimalistic specification ensures the car is very light and hence even the lowest powered versions have great power to weight ratios. This combined with great handling make them incredibly quick and fun to drive. In many ways they are the ultimate sports cars.

The choice of engine and gearbox is largely up to the customer, and many powerplants have been installed in Caterhams over the years. A common choice is a Ford 4 cylinder engine and 5 speed gearbox, but some of the wilder versions have highly tuned Vauxhall twin cam 2 litre engines putting out over 200bhp (which gives a staggering power to weight ratio). Caterham have also introduced versions with highly tuned motorcycle engines (from such superbikes as the Honda Blackbird, which has a compact highly tuned 4 cylinder engine putting out around 120bhp) which are very light indeed (as the motorcycle engine and gearbox combination weigh far less than an equivalent car drivetrain) ensuring supercar levels of acceleration.

This model by Kyosho represents a Series 3 Super Seven with a 4 cylinder Ford engine, complete with twin carburettors which protrude through an opening cut into the bonnet. It also has even less weather protection than usual with a pair of racing screens in place of a full sized windscreen and bicycle type front mudguards which move with the front wheels, in place of the usual longer versions which flow back to the edge of the passenger compartment. The bonnet is finished to represent polished aluminium giving the model a lovely overall appearance.

Areas for criticism include the seatbelts which look rubbery (they would look better if real strips of fabric were used) and the rear axle on my model is slightly bent so that one rear wheel can look out of alignment depending on how it is turned. Brake detail is ok on the front wheels, but there doesn't appear to be any brake detail at all on the rear wheels. The engine and the bodywork (especially the bare metal finish) are very good on this Kyosho and overall it is a good looking model.