Ford Lotus Cortina Driving Experiences

In 1961, Colin Chapman at Lotus was looking for a way to build his own engines for his cars to avoid the high costs associated with the Coventry Climax units they were built with. After developing a twin-cam version of the Ford Kent engine with Harry Mundy, Walter Hayes at Ford approached Chapman and asked if he could fit the engine they’d made to 1000 new Ford saloon models. And thus the Ford Lotus Cortina was born.

It’s quite fitting really that two such well known and loved names in British automotives should have united together on a car like this one. Whilst admittedly it pales in comparison to the uber fast speeds of modern performance cars, for a vintage British sports saloon of that time it was very impressive indeed.

The power on these two door models, weighing in at 904.9 kg - thus bringing it into Lotus’ design theory of ‘Simplify then add lightness’ - comes from a 1.6 Inline 4 engine, powering out 110 bhp. Behind the wheel of the Lotus Cortina, you could achieve top speeds of 104 mph, with acceleration from 0 - 60 mph in 11 seconds.

There are two four door versions - the only ones of their kind, in fact - of the Ford Lotus Cortina, which were made especially for the British Police forces of that time. They were produced as a trial for the Mid Anglia Constabulary to see if they would work as a fast patrol and pursuit car. The trials were unsuccessful, so these are the rarest Lotus Cortinas you can hope to find.

But crime solving’s loss was rally driving’s gain for the Lotus Cortina. Bengt Söderström and Gunnar Palm drove it to victory in the RAC Rally in 1966, as well as a win at the Swedish Rally - in challenging snowy conditions - in the winter of 1967.