Lotus Tuning Products

The years straight after the Second World War were a heyday for car manufacturing, and one of the foremost British names to emerge at that time was Lotus Cars. Design engineer Colin Chapman built his first racing car in his own garage in 1948, and a few years later, joined forces with fellow University College, London graduate Colin Dare to start the Lotus Engineering company. Chapman loved constantly tweaking his cars, and in his spirit, the cars his company has made are eminently capable of being modified. That has resulted in a thriving market for Lotus aftermarket parts so that owners can try to emulate Chapman’s own work.

A separate racing arm, Team Lotus, was established in 1954, entering Formula One four years later, and competing for each of the next 36 seasons, winning 79 Grands Prix and five drivers’ and seven constructors’ championships. Lotus Cars, the arm of the business responsible for designing and building road-going cars, has endured a chequered history, but has produced, often in collaboration with other manufacturers, a series of now-classic sports and high performance cars, such as the Elite, Esprit and Eclat.

Since 2017, Lotus has been in the hands of a Far Eastern group of owners, including car-maker Geely - which also owns Volvo - and the company which owns another major manufacturer in the region, Proton. Lotus currently has three models in production at its factory near Wymondham in Norfolk. The Elise and the Exige were launched in 1996 and 2000 respectively, while the Evora was added to the range in 2008.