Lotus 49
Lotus 49B
Lotus 49C

Category	Formula One
Constructor	Lotus
Designer(s)	Colin Chapman (Technical director) Maurice Philippe (Chief designer)
Predecessor	Lotus 43
Successor	Lotus 63 /Lotus 72
Technical specifications[1][2]
Chassis	Aluminiummonocoque
Axle track	1,524mm (60in) front and 1,549mm (61in) rear[3]
Wheelbase	2,413 mm (95.0 in)
Engine	FordCosworth DFV, 2,998 cc (183 cu in),V8,NA,mid-mounted
Transmission	Hewland-Lotus 5-speedmanual gearbox
Power	420-440 hp @ 9,000-10,000 rpm[4]
Weight	501 kg (1,105 lb)
Fuel	Esso (9 GP),Shell
Tyres	Firestone,Dunlop
Competition history
Notable entrants	Gold Leaf Team Lotus Rob Walker Racing Team
Notable drivers	Jim Clark Graham Hill Mario Andretti Jochen Rindt Jo Siffert Emerson Fittipaldi
Debut	1967 Dutch Grand Prix
Races Wins Podiums Poles F/Laps 42 12 23 19 13
Constructors' Championships	2 (1968,1970[a])
Drivers' Championships	2 (Graham Hill,1968 /Jochen Rindt,1970)

TheLotus 49 was aFormula One racing car designed byColin Chapman andMaurice Philippe for the1967 F1 season. It was one of the first F1 cars to use astressed member engine combined with amonocoque to reduce weight, after BRM, with other teams adopting the concept after its success.^[5] An iteration of it, the49B, adopted, after Ferrari, the use of strutted aerofoils to generate downforce.

Jim Clark won on the car's debut, in1967, and it would also provide him with the last win of his career, in1968.Graham Hill went on to win that year's title and the car continued winning races until1970.

After a difficult first year forLotus 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, andLotus 38 Indycar, the 49 was the first F1 car to be powered by theFord 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 (seen earlier with the H16 engine in the Lotus 43 andBRM P83, and prior to that in the front-enginedLancia D50 of 1954),^[6] 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 the49B for the1968 Monaco Grand Prix. Following Ferrari's introduction of strutted wings in F1, this chassis was the firstFormula One car to use aerofoil wings mounted directly to wheel hubs, following their success onJim Hall'sChaparral 2E.^[7] 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.

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.'^[8]Jim Clark won with ease driving the 49 in its debut race atZandvoort, 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 the1967 Belgian Grand Prix, held on the 8.76 mile (14.73 kilometer)Spa-Francorchamps.

Clark and Hill fell victim to its reliability issues at theFrench Grand Prix, held at theLe MansBugatti Circuit (a smaller circuit using only part of the track used for theLe Mans 24 Hours), and lost toJack Brabham. Clark then ran out of fuel atMonza during theItalian 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, theSouth African Grand Prix and theTasman Series in Australia, but was killed in an F2 race atHockenheim. 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 byRob Walker, to win theBritish Grand Prix at Brands Hatch that year, the last time a car entered by a genuine privateer won a championship Formula 1 race.^[9] The 49B also tookJochen Rindt to his first victory, in1969, atWatkins Glen, New York, before he drove the type to its last win, in the1970Monaco Grand Prix.

The 49B was intended to be replaced by theLotus 63 midway through 1969, but when that car proved to be a failure, an improved version of the 49B, the49C, was pressed into service until a suitable car could be built.^[10] The 49 took twelve wins and contributed to two drivers' and constructors' world championships, before it was replaced by theLotus 72 during1970. The final appearances of the 49C were in 1971, withWilson Fittipaldi finishing ninth in the1971 Argentine Grand Prix, andTony Trimmer finishing sixth in the Spring Cup atOulton Park.^[10]

Of the twelve 49s built, seven remain. Chassis R3 (driven by Hill, then sold to privateerJohn Love) is the only example of the original 1967 cars still in existence, and is on display at theNational Motor Museum in Hampshire.^[11]

(key) (results in bold indicate pole position; results in italics indicate fastest lap)

^† Points were awarded on a 9-6-4-3-2-1 basis to the first six finishers at each round, but only the best placed car for each make was eligible to score points. The best five results from the first six rounds and the best four results from the last five rounds were retained in 1967 and 1969, five from the first six and five from the last six in 1968, and the best six results from the first seven rounds and the best five from the last six rounds were retained in 1970.

^‡ Formula Two cars occupied fifth to tenth positions in the1969 German Grand Prix, but were not eligible for championship points. The points for fifth and sixth were awarded to the drivers of the eleventh and twelfth placed cars.

^{^} Total points scored by all Lotus-Ford cars, including 45 points scored by drivers ofLotus 72 variants.

(key) (results in bold indicate pole position; results in italics indicate fastest lap)

From its introduction in 1967 works Lotus 49s were painted in Lotus's traditionalBritish racing green with yellow centre-stripe. Over the following 16 months the design gained increasing numbers of sponsor patches and large driver name strips, while retaining the traditional base scheme. However, for the 1967-1968Tasman Series races Team Lotus's 2.5 litre engined 49s were painted red, cream and gold — the colours ofGold Leaf cigarettes — after Chapman signed a lucrative sponsorship deal. This colour scheme was introduced for the1968 World Championship at the second race of the season, the1968 Spanish Grand Prix, making Lotus the firstworks team (second only toTeam Gunston entering aprivateBrabham car at the1968 South African Grand Prix) to paint their cars in thelivery of their sponsors.

Lotus 49s were also run by the Scottish privateerRob Walker Racing Team, who painted their car in theScottish national racing colours (dark blue with white nose band), and the American privateerPete Lovely team, whose car (chassis R11) was painted in the American national racing colours of white with a blue centre-stripe.

The Lotus 49 was the first Formula One car powered by the Cosworth DFV engine that would power most of the Formula One grid through the 1970s. Since then, it was one of the most competitive cars in F1 history.

The Lotus 49 appears in numerous video games includingForza Motorsport,Assetto Corsa,Project CARS,TOCA Race Driver 3 Challenge andFormula One Championship Edition.

Tamiya released a 1/20 scale model kit of the car as well the B-spec counterpart.

In 2024,Hot Wheels released a 1/64 scale die-cast version of the car with a driver inside.

• Cruickshank, Gordon (April 2024)."Lotus 49: Revolutionary car with era-defining engine".Motor Sport.Archived from the original on 20 December 2024.
• Jennings, Charles (12 August 2014).Burning Rubber: The Extraordinary Story of Formula One. Quercus.ISBN 9781623655372.
• Pritchard, Anthony (1986).Directory of Formula One Cars: 1966-1986. United Kingdom: Aston Publications Limited.ISBN 0946627029.
• Race results drawn fromChicaneF1.comArchived 9 July 2013 at theWayback Machine,Formula1.com andGEL Motorsport Information.

• Oliver, Michael (2004).Lotus 49: The Story of a Legend. Veloce Publishing.ISBN 978-1901295511.
• Wagstaff, Ian (2014).Lotus 49: 1967–1970 (all marks): Owners' Workshop Manual. Haynes.ISBN 978-0857334121.

Wikimedia Commons has media related toLotus 49.

• 1967 Formula One season cars
• 1968 Formula One season cars
• 1969 Formula One season cars
• 1970 Formula One season cars
• Lotus Formula One cars
• Tasman Series cars
• Formula One championship–winning cars

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