Lotus 80
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| Constructor: |
 lotus
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| Designer: |
Colin Chapman Peter Wright Martin Ogilvie Tony Rudd |
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| Predecessor: | Lotus 79 | ||||||||
| Successor: | Lotus 81 | ||||||||
| Technical specifications | |||||||||
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| Chassis: | Aluminum alloy monocoque | ||||||||
| Length: | 4630 mm | ||||||||
| Wheelbase: | 2789 mm | ||||||||
| Weight: | 580 kg | ||||||||
| Tires: | Goodyear | ||||||||
| Petrol: | Essex | ||||||||
| statistics | |||||||||
| Driver: |
 Mario Andretti Carlos Reutemann
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| First start: | 1979 Spanish Grand Prix | ||||||||
| Last start: | 1979 Monaco Grand Prix | ||||||||
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| World Cup points: | 4th | ||||||||
| Podiums: | 1 | ||||||||
| Leadership laps: | - | ||||||||
The Lotus 80 was a Formula 1 racing car from the British racing team Lotus , which was used in the 1979 Formula 1 season .
Technical specifications
The Lotus 80 was designed and developed by Colin Chapman , Martin Ogilvie , Peter Wright and Tony Rudd and was to replace the Lotus 79 for 1979 . The designers tried to make better use of the ground effect and failed. The side parts - and thus the aprons that made the floor effect possible in the first place - were pulled back in one swing between the rear wheels. The rear wing was an integral part of the chassis and was mounted so low that it barely protruded over the engine cover.
The car also had aprons under the nose, which quickly wear off when driving. After the first test drives, the front aprons were dismantled again and replaced with a conventional front section. The main problem was the main aprons. After the test drives, Mario Andretti reported that the race car had good propulsion, but was extremely restless in the corners. When driving, the flow under the car became unstable, which meant that the suction was repeatedly interrupted. It was especially dangerous to drive through banked corners. Despite many test drives, this phenomenon could not be completely eliminated. The vehicle was finally presented to the public on March 16, 1979 at Brands Hatch .
The vehicle's monocoque itself was made of aluminum and titanium in a sandwich construction with a honeycomb core, which resulted in a weight saving of 25 kg compared to the previous year's car. The body consisted of a single detachable piece and was made of fiberglass and aramid reinforced plastic. The wheelbase was 2789 mm; that of the front track 1700 mm and rear 1638 mm.
The Lotus 80 was powered by a Ford-Cosworth DFV. The water-cooled, non-supercharged eight-cylinder V-engine with a 90 ° bank angle and a displacement of 2993 cm³ developed around 470 hp (345 kW) at a speed of around 10,800 rpm. The manually shifted, longitudinally built-in Lotus-Hewland transmission had five forward gears and one reverse gear. The vehicle's tank held 175 liters. All wheels were individually suspended from double wishbones . The shock absorbers were obtained from Koni . Goodyear slick tires measuring 11 × 13 inches at the front and 18.5 × 13 inches at the rear were mounted on the Speedline wheels.
sponsor
The main sponsors of the team were the spirits manufacturer Martini and the mineral oil company Essex as well as the Swiss watch manufacturer Tissot . The vehicle was painted in the typical British Racing Green .
Season course
Despite the problems mentioned, the Lotus 80 made its racing debut at the Spanish Grand Prix with Andretti at the wheel, which promptly achieved third place with the car. After the races in Belgium , where Andretti only drove the car in one training session, and the Monaco Grand Prix , the racing car was withdrawn and aerodynamically revised. However, even these modifications were unable to improve the vehicle's handling significantly. The last time the Lotus 80 was used by Andretti was a free practice session for the French Grand Prix . After that, the development of the vehicle was stopped. The second works driver, Carlos Reutemann , had refused to participate in the Lotus 80 and had always driven the 79.
| driver | No. | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4th | 5 | 6th | 7th | 8th | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14th | 15th | Points | rank |
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| Automobile World Championship 1979 |
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39 | 4th | |
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M. Andretti
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1 | 3 | DNF | |||||||||||||||
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C. Reutemann
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2 | |||||||||||||||||
| Legend | ||
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| colour | abbreviation | meaning |
| gold | - | victory |
| silver | - | 2nd place |
| bronze | - | 3rd place |
| green | - | Placement in the points |
| blue | - | Classified outside the point ranks |
| violet | DNF | Race not finished (did not finish) |
| NC | not classified | |
| red | DNQ | did not qualify |
| DNPQ | failed in pre-qualification (did not pre-qualify) | |
| black | DSQ | disqualified |
| White | DNS | not at the start (did not start) |
| WD | withdrawn | |
| Light Blue | PO | only participated in the training (practiced only) |
| TD | Friday test driver | |
| without | DNP | did not participate in the training (did not practice) |
| INJ | injured or sick | |
| EX | excluded | |
| DNA | did not arrive | |
| C. | Race canceled | |
| no participation in the World Cup | ||
| other | P / bold | Pole position |
| SR / italic | Fastest race lap | |
| * | not at the finish, but counted due to the distance covered |
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| () | Streak results | |
| underlined | Leader in the overall standings | |
literature
- Jean-François Krause: Vehicle data sheet : Lotus 80-Ford. The bad construction! In: The large Formula 1 archive , Weltbild Verlag Augsburg, o. P.
- Anthony Pritchard: Lotus: The Competition Cars-All the Racing Type Numbers from 1947 to the Modern Era , Haynes Publishing Sparkford 2006, ISBN 978-1-84425-006-6 , p. 172 f.
- Ulrich Schwab: Grand Prix. The races for the automobile world championship 1979. , Motorbuch Verlag Stuttgart 1979, ISBN 978-3-87943-687-3 , pp. 33-35.
Web links
Racing car of the 1979 Automobile World Championship