>From Steven Jackson:
>>>>>>>>>>>
I've only subscribed to my first internet mailing lists in the last month or
so, so I'm new to these waters and obviously missed your requests for
information about the 907 engine. I had a '73 JH in college which I gave to my
brother who, like many of us, is restoring it between addressing the
responsibilities of life. My car was very, very rusty and the PO had it
patched up very badly. I have a couple of spare 907s and know some things
about the engine.
I won't get into what little I know about it's biography, but I would like to
sing its praises a bit. It's a truly wonderful, racing-type lump to have under
the bonnet. It's extremely compact and light weight, tremendously strong
(except for the earliest ones), relatively simple, and phenomenally efficient.
>>>>>>>>>>>>
Well said! To add a little on the history aspect: I've read in my books on
Esprit that as the first "home" for the 907 engine, the Jensen Healy engines
had some teething pains. Evidently there was some shutting dowm of milling
equipment (due to energy crisis, or was it a strike of some sort?) so the
tolereances would drift until the equipment stabilized each day. In any event
the later blocks were far better and all the early bugs with oil consumption,
etc were worked out before Lotus started using the engine themselves. I mention
this as I've seen complete used 907 Esprit (or Eclat/Elite)engines (some with
reasonably low miles) starting around $1500. If one had a bad JH engine you
might be better to buy a solid later 907 and just bolt-on cams & carbs ,etc.
Anyways, it's something to be aware about. (not sure when the major probs got
fixed).
I hear that the US JH's had as little as 125 hp, as certified. You can do
wonders with just recurving the distributor & adding DellOrtos and exhaust.
(~150-160 hp)
Of course you can do the "full treatment" from Bean (and others) as Steven has
mentioned and go to 2.2 liters with new crank & cams and get well over 200
n.a. hp. (I think Bean quoted 230... fun :-)
Compared to your average LBC this is ALOT of power.
-Bob T.
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