Ken Okuyama 7 going in to production

Autoblog · Sep 18, 2008

Ken Okuyama 7 going in to production

Filed under: Sports/GTs, Japan, Lotus

Click above for a high-res gallery of the K.07 Spyder

When the K.O7 Spyder broke cover in Geneva we were struck by its bold design (it was penned by the guy who gave us the Enzo and the Quattroporte), but seriously doubted that the track star/supercar would ever see production. Well, a limited run of 99 K.O7s will go on sale on November 1st for the princely sum of 19,500,000 Yen. Yep, that's near-as-makes-no-difference $200,000 -- an awful lot of money for very little car.

And when you consider that it's essentially a modern remake of the fenderless Lotus 340R, which itself seemed expensive back in 2000 at $70,000, you've got to wonder how many more orders Okuyama-san will be taking beyond the 24 cars pre-ordered by Tag-Heuer, who've had a hand in the project since its inception just a year ago. You may remember that the Lotus 340R never reached its performance target of 340 bhp/ton, largely because it was powered by Rover's asthmatic K-series engine. This is why three-hundred and forty 340Rs were built -- the number had to stand for something.

Similar doubts surround the final performance figures for the 750-kg (1,653-pound) K.O7. Okuyama Design say that the good ol' Toyota 2.0-liter found in the Elise and Exige will be good for "200-240bhp", but we don't see a supercharger, nor room for one. However fast it turns out to be, it's a fine looking machine and is bound to remain exclusive.

Check out the gallery of images taken at yesterday's launch deep beneath Tokyo's streets. Note there was an K.O8 electric EV in attendance, sans batteries or electric motor, but since it took Ken just a year to get the 7 from drawing board to production, who knows... we may be back in that garage again in a year's time, reporting for AutoblogGreen.

Gallery: K07 Live from Japan

Gallery: K.O. 7 and K.O. 8

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