Twin Cam Engine Numbers

[TwinCam Jeff]

I'm trying to find out if the Twin Cam in my 1982 Seven was an original installation. The engine is not identified by the chassis number and I can't find any sign of the engine number stamped on the chassis plate on the engine itself.

 

The number on the plate is 6SM8ZL. Anyone know what type of engine this could be referring to, or where the engine number is stamped on a Lotus Twin Cam?

 

Cheers Jeff

[deanteam]

The engine number on a twin cam should be stamped above the engine mount on the right hand side under the carbs. The numbers quoted don't look familiar to me. I thought engine numbers started with a letter.

[TwinCam Jeff]

Hi,

 

that's where it is! Cheers. They have stamped the chassis plate wrong though the engine number is 6SM82L not ZL

 

Thanks Jeff

[Unclefester]

*thumbup*DT...Very interesting!

 

I had never managed to find the engine number on my 1980 twincam car.....with this, I went out and scraped the paint off the engine mount and there it slowly became visible....L18645. This isn't the number on the chassis plate, and I'd already gleaned the info from Caterham that the car didn't have a twincam actually fitted or supplied with the component form car, but its good to find the number anyway.

 

It seems the cars which had twincams fitted all had chassis numbers ending with the letters TC, and the last car with a TC chassis plate left the factory as CS3/4164/TCRM some time in 1983, though the twincam supplies were almost finished by 1980, when 30 were produced, with 26 in 1981, and 2 in 1982, and only 1 in 1983.

 

However, there must be others which had engines sourced by owners who built the cars from component form themselves....after all, Caterham didn't do fully built cars before January 1993 for the home market.....this came in with the LVTA low volume type approval from Jan 1st 93.

 

I have no way of knowing if my car is one of these or if it had a TC fitted as a replacement motor, and Caterham have lost the build record anyway! *eek*

 

NICE PLATE!!!

😬 😬here *eek*

 

Edited by - Unclefester on 19 Jun 2006 21:33:58