[Michael Oliver]

OK - some more info on the earlier 3-litre cars, from Lola.

T280 - a replacement chassis, HU280/5, was built by Lola in 1972 and despatched to Ecurie Bonnier to replace the one destroyed in the Bonnier crash, chassis number 2. Therefore, it seems that the car which appeared at Rouen in October 72 and then Kyalami was not in fact the prototype T282 at all (it certainly looked more like a T280 than the next year's T282 when it came out) but merely an extension of the T280 line, with maybe a few bits tidied up compared to the early cars? It may well have carried (for customs/carnet purposes?) the chassis plate HU280/2, even though it was the fifth T280 *entity* built. Not sure what happened to this car after the Kyalami smash - forgot to ask - but other people I've spoken to have said that it was rebuilt. Perhaps this was the basis of the Schulthess T284 (although Lola denies any knowledge of such a designation - see my note later on).

The only snag to all this is that Chris Fox is advertising *both* T280/5 and T280/2 in his advert, although I don't think he is sure about the latter (it is in the US) because it doesn't have a chassis plate. All he says is that it is the car which wasn't crashed by Bonnier at Le Mans 72 (which would make it, according to our calcs, T280/1, not T280/2). However, looking at it, it looks quite a lot different to the picture of the Broman car which we believed to be T280/1 based on the identifying feature of the odd roll-over bar/hoop in the 73 Rouveyran photo and the Broman pic. It doesn't have the roll-hoop on it either, although that could easily have been replaced when/if it was restored/rebuilt, particularly as Americans put particular emphasis on their (often oversized) roll-over bars on historic racing cars... It does, however, have an airbox on it, which was unusual and may or may not be the original.

T282 - Lola constructed only one T282 officially, HU282/6 was completed (or rather invoiced) 4/1/1973 and delivered to Larousse (I think it was actually run by Scuderia Filipinetti that year IIRC). They are adamant that no more T282s were built BUT there was a 2-litre chassis supplied (T292?) in 1973 with an uprated bulkhead and T282-type roll hoop to accommodate a 3-litre engine. I think this car was sold to Jolly Club and was the one which appeared at the 1973 Dijon 1000kms with a 3-litre Capri V6 engine installed. Don't know what happened to it afterwards but anyway this car is not in the official T28* numbering sequence.

T284 - Lola say they did not build any such car with this designation. So, this is either the T280/5 Kyalami crash car rebuilt (perhaps most likely), another 2-litre car upgraded or it could be the 73 Jolly Club uprated car which was sold to Schulthess for the 74 season? If it wasn't the Jolly Club car, then where is this - maybe this is the mystery car still in Italy referred to by Kojima_007?

T286 - chassis 7 was supplied new to Heini (spl?) Mader, who I guess may well at that stage have been the European agent for Lola? Anyway, I think this is the car that ended up being driven by Lapeyre - not sure if it was owned by someone else - did we say Andre Chevalley? Chassis 8 they originally said was lagoon blue and went to Italian hillclimb exponent Mauro Nesti but I think they might be getting confused because AFAIK he only had a 2-litre BMW-powered car during that period. What they did say was that two T286s were sold to Capoferri, so these must be 8 & 9 as we know 10 wasn't built until much later. They were different in that they had three fuel cells (right, left, behind driver) and both cars had twin front brake calipers. IIRC one of these cars ran a 2-litre turbo engine and the other a DFV?

So does this iron out the histories a bit more and how does it fit in with what everyone else has said/knows already?

Michael