The story
I purchased her last year and I have just finished a total restoration.
She was built by the Lotus Racing department in 1993 for Lotus Australia. According to invoices, the build cost was in excess of 200,000GBP.
She was shipped to Australia on flight QF2 together with two of the Lotus Race dept techs to race at Bathurts in the GT production category.
Since Sport 300's were not officially for sale in Australia at that time, after she landed, she was fitted with S4 panels and wheels. She raced in the Bathurst 12 hour driven by Larry Perkins who kept doing lap record after lap record until he broke her with 30minutes to go.
In 1994, Sport 300's were officially for sale in Australia, so she was returned to Sport300 look. She retained the rear S4 bumper, as well as the S4 interior door skins.
Brad Jones won the GTP championship that year with her.
She was built to basically the same specs as the LeMans entries, such as non-galvanised chassis, but with a few required mods. GTP rules didn't allow her to have fuel bladders, so normal tanks were retained. Also, the roof vented roof and bonnet panels were not allowed. She also has working electric windows and mirrors, as dictated by GTP rules (cars must be 'standard' production).
But the panels are so thin, they are almost flexible. The bonnet, roof and tailgate are very thin carbon fibre. The dash switches (hazards, parkers, etc) hide various add-ons such as over boost, gear box cooler activation, ABS on/off, etc.
I put her on a 500bhp hub dyno, and the dyno couldn't keep up with the quickness of her acceleration or the peak power. She has a 8,000rpm redline, and on 98octane fuel, we were achieving 444bhp at 6,000rpm, with a dead flat torque curve.
I haven't weighed her yet, but according to some of the techs that were involved with her, she's supposed to be 900kg dry.
I made her in the #44 LeMans livery as it makes her look her best.
She's an absolute animal to drive. Insanely quick, and LOUD. She only has a straight 6" dump pipe that shoots flames at every oportunity.
