Lotus 78

The Lotus 78 was a Formula One racing car used in the 1977 and 1978 seasons. It was designed by Peter Wright, Colin Chapman, Martin Ogilvie and Tony Rudd, and was the first ground effect car in Formula One. In early 1976, spurred on by a disappointing lack of pace of the ageing Lotus 72 the previous season and the indifferent performance of the current Lotus 77, Lotus’ founder and principal design engineer Colin Chapman wrote a 27-page document detailing some new ideas on low drag air penetration. Having studied the de Havilland Mosquito fighter bomber, he had paid close attention to its wing mounted radiators, and the hot air outlets that were designed to induce lift. Chapman realised that, inverted, such a system could give significant downforce. Careful examination of Bernoulli's principle of fluid dynamics confirmed his thoughts on the effects of an upturned aeroplane wing profile fitted to a car, and he finally handed the document to his head of engineering, Tony Rudd. Rudd appointed a team to work on the project: chief designer Ralph Bellamy, vehicle engineer Martin Ogilvie and aerodynamicist Peter Wright. Rudd and Wright had previously worked for BRM, and before joining Lotus in 1970 had done a design study into the possibility of an inverted wing profile fitted to one of their cars. Rudd had tested a number of scale models, but lack of the right testing methods and BRM's declining fortunes meant development had never got beyond the experimental stage. However, Wright remembered their work and brought it into the project.