The Lotus Eclat is a 2-door 2+2 coupé from Lotus, built from 1975 to 1982, as the oil crises and the first emissions rules rewired the industry. Under the bonnet: 2.0 . Oliver Winterbottom drew it.
How it came about
The Lotus Éclat (Type 76 and Type 84) is a sports car built from 1975 to 1982 by British automobile manufacturer Lotus Cars. It was based on the Elite but had a fastback body style which offered more practicality with storage in the boot, albeit with less headroom above the rear seats. The car was initially to be called the "Elite Coupe". The lower half of the fibreglass bodywork was identical to that of the Elite.
The hardware
Power comes from 2.0 other versions carried different engines, listed in the specification table below. It weighs 1055 kg. It shifts through a 4-speed Manual transmission / manual / 5-speed manual / 3-speed Automatic transmission / automatic. The layout matters: a front engine drives the rear wheels, the classic proportion — long bonnet, cabin set back — that most people picture when they picture a sports saloon or a grand tourer. The wheelbase is 2438 mm. These are manufacturer figures carried by Wikipedia and Wikidata, not road-test measurements.
Family and rivals
Its family tree is legible: its successor was the Lotus Excel; assembly was at Hethel, Norfolk, United Kingdom. Its contemporaries in the catalogue — the BMW 3 Series, the Volkswagen Polo, the Hyundai Pony — show what else the money bought that year. Its Lotus stablemates include the Lotus 100T and the Lotus 101.
What it costs now
There is no federal ownership record for the Lotus Eclat — it predates the complaint database or was never sold in the United States — so MotorJury publishes no running-cost figure for it. For a car of this age the price is set by the collector market and the condition of the individual example, not by a formula.