Mercedes-based engine - fact or fiction?

[Alfadog]

Thought I might throw up a question in the arena for anyone to jump on top of. I see one Gladiator who will no doubt be able to tame this beast, anyone else game??

A few sources have said that the engine was "copied" from the Mercedes 6. How correct is this statement?

[Caen Fred]

Just before "Uncle Allan" step in this one... I think that is more a Prince issue, as they had some design lincence from Mercedes.

Some, say that you can even use a few parts from those Merc engines like pistons...

Allan, it's yours now... :classic:

[W.A.ZED]

while we are asking Allan, can you elaborate on the below information I heard, maybe from the old man but not sure. In his day it was twin cam mga's, e-types or twin cam cortina's.

1. Merc engine copy

2. lotus suspension copy

3. Porsche box copy

love to hear the truth!

[Bambikiller240]

Originally posted by W.A.ZED

twin cam cortina's.

I don't know about the rest, but Ford Cortina's did have a twin cam cylinder head (I believe designed by Cosworth) and were quite a neat little car. Our member Royce and his father still race two of these little demons in California these days.

[W.A.ZED]

yeh lotus cortina's, rare as buggery over in Australia. well at least original ones. really hard to find one in ozzy that has not been re-bodied. Still lotus body but not maching numbers.

[Bambikiller240]

Originally posted by W.A.ZED

yeh lotus cortina's, rare as buggery over in Australia. well at least original ones. really hard to find one in ozzy that has not been re-bodied. Still lotus body but not maching numbers.

Right, LOTUS CORTINA, with a Ford engine. My mistake.

[W.A.ZED]

probably my mistake!!

pretty sure the early mark 1 twin cam cortinas that came into oz had a lotus twin cam motor 1.6 ltr in them. Probably had the cosworth in the U.S models.

[Alfadog]

I thought it was Ford Cortina with Lotus mechanicals (suspension, engine)...

but that's not the subject of this thread!!!!!!! grrr

[HS30-H]

Hi all,

I really hate that word "copy". It implies that the person who is "copying" has not asked permission or paid any licensing fee to the holder of the patent or original design.

Its a word that has always been used in reference to Japanese industry ( and other areas of Japanese culture ) and it used to be used in an almost pejorative sense. Car journalists were some of the worst at throwing this word around.

The truth is that at the start of the Twentieth Century, Japan's industrialisation was playing catch-up with the rest of the world after the country had been all but closed to outsiders for a long period. This meant that the easiest way to get on terms with the rest of the world was in many cases to manufacture locally-made versions of foreign designs under license, hence cutting out a lot of expensive and time-consuming R&D and allowing them to get straight on and make components. In almost all cases, fees were paid to the licensing companies ( who did very well out of it ) and very little was pirated. Some small component manufacturing companies were guilty of copying without permission ( indeed, some cases of fakery were discovered ) but this was not all that widespread and not tolerated for very long.

After the Second World War, Japan's industry was left in devastation. The whole process started again with the country under American military control. Companies that had previously been engaged in the manufacture of aircraft and military vehicles were now forced to change tack. This is how the Prince Motor Co. was formed ( morphing from an aircraft manufacturer to a light car maker ). They needed to save time and get their products out into the market as soon as possible, so of course once again they started licensing foreign patents to use in their cars and trucks. Stuff like brakes ( notice all those Imperial sizes on Japanese brake components? ), carburettors and transmissions were big licensing areas, and companies like Girling, Solex, Bendix and many others had Japanese licensees making their own versions of the patented designs.

Of course, this phenomenon is widespread across all countries and industries. Most of the time you don't hear about it, but when Japanese companies did it they had the word "copy" thrown in their direction........

Prince paid a fee to Mercedes for licensing some areas of engine design ( I think this was to do with valve train and cam drive / distributor drive design in relation to one of the many iterations of the Prince "G" series engines ) but I do not think it was a WHOLE engine design. Its one of those things that people talked up, as it made the Japanese product sound like it might be better. You can't blame them for taking a little "shine" off the association...

That "Lotus supsension copy" statement is a little bit stretched. This most often refers to the rear suspension on the S30-series Z being similar to the "Chapman Strut" idea first used by Colin Chapman at Lotus. Basically, this was just the use of a McPherson Strut on the REAR of a car ( in this case, the first Elite ). It was never patented by Lotus, and once it had been done for the first time everybody else had a go at it too. Its more like a design principle than anything else, and Chapman's name will be linked to it forever. The first person / company to do something will usually get credited in this way ( ask Mr Panhard and Mr De Dion ).

The "Porsche gearbox copy" thing is also stretching it a bit. The synchro design used on the "A" series transmissions that were the first type fitted to the S30-series Z were actually patented by Porsche. Later on, Nissan switched to Warner-patent syncros. Lots of others used these patents under license, but its Nissan who get the "copy" thing thrown at them................

All the best,

Alan T.

( ps - I used to own a Cortina-Lotus MK.1 - wish I still had it. )

[HS30-H]

By the way, the engine in the Ford MK.1 Lotus Cortina was indeed developed by Keith Duckworth's team at Cosworth Engineering. It was based on the Ford "Crossflow" block.

The cars were built up to the bodyshell stage at Ford's Dagenham plant and then trucked over to Lotus at Cheshunt. There they had the full Lotus treatment ( alloy panels, special A-arm rear suspension and Lotus diff, special trans etc etc ).

The MK2 version was actually put together at Ford's Dagenham plant with some components supplied by Lotus.

There's not that many full-spec MK1's left on their original bodyshells. Most of them had a very hard life. Many of the survivors are still used as race cars.

The Lotus Cortina is a real legend amongst car fans over here. Good ones are mega money.

Alan T.

[owenk]

My first car was a 68 Cortina, it did not have the over head cam but it was a fun car to drive. I grew up it the Southern California Desert in the wonderful town of California City which had many graded but un paved dirt roads. She was a dream in a drift and always came back if she got a little out of shape. She came stock with headers and I would leave the house for school in Mojave (20 miles away) and about 1 mile down the road would "uncork" the headers then drive on in. Man I thought I was cool! Unfortunately since she was my first car she had a short life due to my treatment. In 73 my dad traded her for a 73 Dodge Colt which was my introduction to the quality of Japanese autos. I remember my mother going through a car wash and the attendant telling her that he would not be responsible for thing that fell off her piece of Japanese junk!

[Alfadog]

Thanks for clearing that up Alan - I thought that would be the answer...