Lotus 49

The Lotus 49 was a Formula One racing car designed by Colin Chapman and Maurice Philippe for the 1967 F1 season. It was one of the first F1 cars to use a stressed member engine combined with a monocoque to reduce weight, after BRM, with other teams adopting the concept after its success. An iteration of it, the 49B, adopted, after Ferrari, the use of strutted aerofoils to generate downforce.
Jim Clark won on the car's debut, in 1967 [Formula One season|1967], and it would also provide him with the last win of his career, in 1968. Graham Hill went on to win that year's title and the car continued winning races until 1970.

Concept

After a difficult first year for Lotus in the three-litre formula using the heavy and unreliable BRM H16 engine, Chapman and Philippe went back to the drawing board and came up with a design that was both back to basics and forward-thinking. Taking inspiration from earlier designs, particularly the BRM P83, Lotus 43, and Lotus 38 Indycar, the 49 was the first F1 car to be powered by the Ford Cosworth DFV engine, after Chapman convinced Ford to finance Cosworth designer Keith Duckworth's DFV design and build a F1 power-plant.
The 49 was an advanced design in Formula 1 because of its chassis configuration. The specially designed engine became a stress-bearing structural member, bolted to the monocoque at one end and the suspension and gearbox at the other. Since then, virtually all Formula 1 cars have been built this way.
The model continued to be a testbed for several new pieces of racecar technology and presentation with the introduction of the 49B for the 1968 Monaco Grand Prix. Following Ferrari's introduction of strutted wings in F1, this chassis was the first Formula One car to use aerofoil wings mounted directly to wheel hubs, following their success on Jim Hall's Chaparral 2E. Originally these wings were bolted directly to the suspension and were supported by slender struts. The wings were mounted several feet above the chassis of the car for effective use in clean air, however after several breakages which led to dangerous accidents, the high wings were banned and Lotus was forced to mount the wings directly to the bodywork.

Racing history

Formula One

In testing, Graham Hill found the Lotus 49 easy to drive and responsive, but the power of the Ford engine difficult to handle at first. The V8 would give sudden bursts of power that Hill had reservations about. After his first run in the car, he said in typical witty fashion, 'It's got some poke! Not a bad old tool.' Jim Clark won with ease driving the 49 in its debut race at Zandvoort, and took another three wins during the season, although early unreliability with the DFV ended his championship hopes. The 49 had problems in its first race for Hill, and it had spark plug trouble at the 1967 Belgian Grand Prix, held on the 8.76 mile Spa-Francorchamps.
Clark and Hill fell victim to its reliability issues at the French Grand Prix, held at the Le Mans Bugatti Circuit, and lost to Jack Brabham. Clark then ran out of fuel at Monza during the Italian Grand Prix. Mechanical failures cost Lotus the championship that year, but it was felt that 1968 would be a better year after Cosworth and Lotus perfected their designs, which were clearly the way forward.
Clark won the first race of the 1968 season, the South African Grand Prix and the Tasman Series in Australia, but was killed in an F2 race at Hockenheim. Hill took over as team leader and won his second World Championship title, after clinching three Grand Prix wins – including the fourth of his five Monaco Grands Prix. Jo Siffert also drove a 49B, owned by Rob Walker, to win the British Grand Prix at Brands Hatch that year, the last time a car entered by a genuine privateer won a championship Formula 1 race. The 49B also took Jochen Rindt to his first victory, in 1969, at 1969 [United States Grand Prix|Watkins Glen], New York, before he drove the type to its last win, in the 1970 Monaco Grand Prix.
The 49B was intended to be replaced by the Lotus 63 midway through 1969, but when that car proved to be a failure, an improved version of the 49B, the 49C, was pressed into service until a suitable car could be built. The 49 took twelve wins and contributed to two drivers' and constructors' world championships, before it was replaced by the Lotus 72 during 1970. The final appearances of the 49C were in 1971, with Wilson Fittipaldi finishing ninth in the 1971 Argentine Grand Prix, and Tony Trimmer finishing sixth in the Spring Cup at Oulton Park.
Of the twelve 49s built, seven remain. Chassis R3 is the only example of the original 1967 cars still in existence, and is on display at the National Motor Museum in Hampshire.

Tasman Series

The 49 also saw service in the Australia and New Zealand based Tasman Series. Fitted with a 2.5L version of the DFV dubbed the Cosworth DFW, Jim Clark drove the 49T to victory in the 1968 Tasman Series, winning 4 of the 8 series races including the 1968 Australian Grand Prix. Graham Hill only drove in the 4 Australian events and still finished 4th in the series in his 49T Cosworth V8. For the 1969 Tasman Series, Jochen Rindt had replaced Clark at Lotus and while he would have wins in the Lady Wigram Trophy race in New Zealand and a masterly drive in a very wet Warwick Farm International in Australia, could only finish 2nd in the series behind the Ferrari Dino 246 Tasmania of "local" Kiwi driver Chris Amon. Reigning World Champion Hill endured much bad luck in his final Tasman Series, including retiring from the first two races in New Zealand, then the high rear wing collapsing during the Australian Grand Prix, as well as soaked electrics at Warwick Farm which saw him finish 11th and last.
Jim Clark noted in 1968 that the lower power of the 2.5L Tasman DFW was not suited to the full size Lotus 49T as it lacked the top end power of the Formula One engine. This was seen to effect when he won the Surfers Paradise round and the Australian Grand Prix at the Sandown Raceway in Melbourne, both noted power circuits. Despite winning, both times he was pushed hard by Chris Amon in the Ferrari with its Formula 2 chassis and lighter V6 engine that only produced around .
The 1968 Australian Grand Prix and the 1968 Tasman Series were Clark's last win's before his tragic death at Hockenheim.