Not every decision, when it came to tweaking the V8, was due to space and dimensions.‘ There’ s been lots of elements that we’ ve had to develop, partly for performance, partly for package, and also for the aesthetics of the car. One of the key things was that we wanted visible trumpets on both cars because it’ s such a signature of the T70. But, of course, on the road car, you can’ t have open trumpets. So the trumpets are actually inside a plenum and you view them through bulletproof glass through the back of the engine lid. They are functional. That is the plenum that you’ re looking into. It’ s being true to the car, how it actually looks as well as how it performs.’
Some very practical elements have to be taken into consideration, too.‘ We needed a Chevrolet small block that would emit to the standards that we needed so it could be sold in various places around the world. Whilst we’ re homologating to UK IPA standards, we needed an engine package that would emit in other places in the world to a stricter standard. What we have done is taken serious production catalytic converters that we know meet the emission specification.
‘ We’ ve taken a serious production ECU that has OBD2 on it and readiness monitors and all the other elements around that. So we do have what’ s essentially a 1969 vehicle with an OBD2 port. We need that to be able to sell it in the US, sell it in certain other regions.’
When you plug the T70S GT in, does it come up as some sort of Chevrolet?‘ It knows it’ s a Lola. The integration is a Lola internal programme and we’ ve developed our own controllers, fully functional. The engine controller has the ability to do a torque reduction, a torque increase, as all modern production ECUs do.’
Most modern ECUs will also be part of a car’ s ABS and traction control systems. Will the T70 GT have these safety elements?‘ We spoke to several people and we posed the question,“ If we produce a road car version of this, would you want us to put ABS and traction control on it?” And everybody said absolutely not.
‘ We do have the ability to deliver an ABS system for it. We can through our Lola electronics. But it comes back to what is historically correct. I think the joy that people are finding in being able to run something which is as close to the racecar as the GT is, is pretty phenomenal. We may blunt it if we start putting traction systems into it.’
It’ s not about creating something archaic, or old. It’ s about adding the correct technology in the right places.‘ The road car has a reverse camera, but it doesn’ t have a big screen in the middle of the dash. When you select reverse, it will actually flip the tach around and that becomes the reverse camera. Until you want it, it’ s not there.
‘ The things that we’ ve added to it, air conditioning, a heater, they’ re sensible things that you want in a road car so you can use it. They’ re not things that we’ ve tried to take away from the racecar. The monocoque is the same. The wishbones are the same. It is the racecar.’
A major difference is the gearbox.‘ We worked with Hewland; could we recreate the original LG600 gearbox but do that in a roadable package? Not really, because it’ s a 1960s design gearbox. The gearbox on the road car is derived from the current Hewland GT3 gearbox. It’ s a very nice package, but it’ s sequential, not H-pattern. And we wanted to keep the H-pattern.
The open trumpets of the T70 racecar that provide the look and noise retained on the road-going version
48 The Engine Rebuilder Issue 06