1971 Lotus Europa Series 2

The Series 2 is often dismissed as a facelift. It was rather more than that. The body was now bolted to the backbone chassis instead of being bonded to it, which meant a damaged shell or a tired chassis could at last be dealt with separately – the single change that has done most to keep Europas on the road ever since. The windows wound down, the seats adjusted and the cabin was properly trimmed.

Power rose modestly to 82bhp and weight to around 703kg, but Lotus built roughly 2,750 Series 2 cars against some 644 Series 1s, which tells you plainly which version customers could live with. This one was first registered in February 1971, within months of the Lotus-Ford twin-cam arriving and the Renault era ending.

Why it matters

Serviceability, not power, turned a bold experiment into a production car.