Frankfurt Live - Caterham Seven 165 tempts you with an entry-level price tag

11/09/2013 - 16:12 Caterham Seven, 2013 Frankfurt Motor Show, Caterham Nithyanandh K

Caterham's new entry-level Seven has been revealed in the prototype avatar at the Frankfurt Motor Show. The production version will begin rolling out in January 2014 and deliveries would begin that Spring (March).

Called the Caterham Seven 165, the target price the kit-car company is aiming at is about $33,000 (21.78 lakh rupees) including taxes. It is powered by a turbocharged 660cc Suzuki K6A engine that develops 80hp, after enhancements were carried out by Caterham’s engineering consultancy, Caterham Technology & Innovation (CTI). The retuned engine delivers a torque output of 107Nm.

The '5' in the name connotes its compliance to EU5 emissions norms, which opens up the possibility of pan-Europe sales. It is also compliant with the comparable JC08 test mode Japanese sales, while in the home market of UK, the car will be known as the Caterham Seven 160, priced from about $26,000 (17.16 lakhs).

Caterham Cars CEO, Graham Macdonald, said: “Earlier this year, we launched the fastest, most powerful production Seven we’ve ever launched in Europe – the Seven 485. The 165 will sit at the opposite end of the scale, both in engine size and price, but the beautiful thing is that the two cars will offer exactly the same level of pure driving fun.”

More details can be found in the press release on page 2.