LOLA-PORSCHE T492
Owner: Graham Lomax
The Lola-porsche is a one-off
“It’s a 1978 Lola T492 with a 3.2-litre Porsche engine and I use it for hillclimbing. It is the only one of its kind. It came to me as a rolling chassis with a nice new body on it, but no engine. Previously it had a Ford Sierra Cosworth RS500 engine fitted and I should have bought the whole thing, but I didn’t.”
He went for a Porsche powerplant
“I’d been a Porsche guy for
30 years and started hillclimbing with a 911, so I decided Porsche power was the way to go. At the time, it was either the Porsche engine or a Rover V8 and I couldn’t find a suitable gearbox for the Rover and the Porsche engine came with a gearbox, so in it went.”
He traced the histor y of the machine
“The chassis was eventually identified as HU62, which started life as one of the Kelly Girl-sponsored cars in Sports 2000 and was later raced by Alan Humberstone as a Special Saloon with a Skoda body.”
The engine and box are mainly standard
“In the early days I was very good at missing gears so it had two gearbox rebuilds and two engine rebuilds, so I tend to be a little bit careful now. I change gear really quite gently; you can’t rush across the box as it is a road-going gearbox. The engine is a standard 3.2-litre Carrera, which means that the crank and the crankcase are for the turbo so they are really robust. It’s got different cams as it runs non-turbo. The gearbox is a magnesium cased unit from an early 911, which is quite a rare beast. It has a limited slip diff with some nice gear sets. But the engine, apart from carbs at the top, and a home-made manifold underneath, is bog standard.”
He’s had a level success on the hills
“I bought it about 11 years ago and I’ve raced it for eight years. For the last three years I’ve won my class in the Midlands championship. I mainly do Prescott, Loton Park and Shelsley Walsh. That’s nine events in the season and you need time to mow the lawn and go on holiday. I budget for about £2000 a year to cover entries, fuel and most other things, which is not bad for a season of motorsport in these surroundings.”