Tuesday 21st April 2015

Lotus 'Small Car Platform' production landmark

Hethel has made 40,000 Elise-derived cars, hopefully a few more to follow!

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So as well as the Elise's 20th anniversary, Lotus has another milestone to mark in 2015: 40,000 models have now been made off the 'Small Car Platform' at Hethel, the bonded and extruded aluminium structure first seen two decades ago.

This was a little different!

These have predominantly been Elises but there are the lesser-spotted little Lotuses to remember as well. The Europa, 340R, 2-Eleven and of course both S1 and S2 Exiges were built from the Small Car Platform. The same technology was also used to underpin the Evora. Today the refined and developed platform weighs 68kg and, well, the Elise is still pretty amazing to drive, right?

The 40,000th Lotus built off this platform is, appropriately enough, a 20th Anniversary Elise. And what's next for small Lotus sports cars? Lotus CEO Jean-Marc Gales: "The platform will continue to be developed, improved upon and form a solid and dependable base for future new models demonstrating the production flexibility of the technology." So the Elise is safe for a little while yet!

[jmesgotav8]

So how many 'different' cars have been spun off this platform?

Elise S1, S2
Exige S1, S2 and S3?
Europa
Evora
320R
2 11
Telsa Roadster
Henesy Venom
That electric Elsie that wasn't a Tesla.
Have I missed any?