Wednesday 11th May 2005

Tuned Elise develops 275bhp

Turbo-fed Lotus outputs 2x standard car's power

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Californian tuner ForcedFed has turbocharged a standard 1.8-litre Lotus Elise, which wrings a claimed 275bhp and torque of some 200lb-ft from it. As a result, the ForcedFed LE Sport 275 rockets to 60mph in four seconds, according to company boss Brett Payne -- who also doubles as a part-time celebrity chef.

Payne's recipe consists of a small Garrett GT28R turbocharger, a Spearco intercooler, some plumbing and an ECU. The turbo reaches full boost by 2,600rpm, and it delivers more torque at 3,000rpm than the standard engine does at 5,000rpm. The kit adds $7,200 (£3,820) or $8,700 (£4,617) installed to the price of your Elise.

Payne said a ForcedFed LE Race 400 will be available in mid-May with 400bhp.

The company points out that ForcedFed's products and services are not associated with, sponsored by, or approved by Lotus, and that installation of its products voids your Lotus warranty.

• ForcedFed

[boggy]

If this becomes available in the Uk then I'm buying into it depending on price, this sound's wicked.

Boggy

[tvrman]

Ummm gives me a few ideas of what to do with my Celica engine :-)

[gofasterrosssco]

Doesnt meantion about lowering compression, stronger bottom end etc. assuming the boost is low enough and the mapping good enough that reliability is assured?? Im sure its a question elise owners and prospective purchasers ar gonna ask?

[AlShack]

Checkout those wheels on the blue car -

[charlieromeo]

What the hell is going on with the exhaust? It's smaller than the one my original Mini had!

>> Edited by charlieromeo on Wednesday 11th May 14:47

[shadowninja]

400bhp Elise? There's an interesting option.

[ninjadave]

charlieromeo said:

What the hell is going on with the exhaust? It's smaller than the one my original Mini had! >> Edited by charlieromeo on Wednesday 11th May 14:47

My first thoughts too!

No mention of any engine re-enforcement? Sounds like the service interval gets very short or the engine life expectancy does?

[Gentelman]

Just picture what that could do to the self-esteem of a couple teens in their jacked-up camaro at a stop light.

[Badcow]

Very surprised that with a claimed 275 bhp this car can't do better than 4 secs to 60 mph...

It is SAE rating maybe ?

[kittridge]

I got a different opinion...

As we all know that there ain't a doubt about handling

and cornoring. But 4 sec for 275bhp is really good.

Think about it. US Elise gained considerable weight

due to many safety measures and new tech gears. Not

to mention a bit heavier engine and mission. On top of

that there is turbo, new manifold, intercooler and so

on. I think full running condition of this Elise would

be close to 1000kg. Which means 275bhp for a ton.

And you gotta factor in the horrible drag that Elise

have. Ferrari F360 or F430 would have similar PWR, yet

have better drag. Don't V8 ferrari goes about 4 sec?

Anyway, just a little thought

[robdickinson]

US elise doesnt weigh much more than the current UK one , 50kg or so ?

The new engine etc added quite a bit.

[lap_time]

In australia we only recently got the normal exige so u in the uk should consider yourselves lucky. congrats to forcedfed for keeping the engine bay looking standard.

[shadowninja]

I just had a thought... the Elise they started with didn't have 118bhp did it...

[dinkel]

www.automobile.de/cgi-bin/deeplink.pl?home=/cgi-bin/LAYOUT/automobile/expose.pl%3fAID=0&ID=1213527%3f
What's this then . . .

www.sportscartesting.com/news/mazda/id530/pg2669
. . .or a V6 in.

www.turbotechnics.com/cars/waldron.htm
Brrr . . . 1.4 with 300 horsies.

[peter450]

there may well be an official supercharger upgrade in the wings although 240 is what that puts out lthough i'm sure it could be tuned for a bit more

[lap_time]

IN REPLY to peter450, lotus sport did recently announce a 240bhp supercharged elise, but im not sure how many have been or are going to be made.

[kittridge]

reply to robdickinson

well... you are right and wrong

us elise base weigh 1984lbs (touring pack +15lbs

sports pack +20lb) 1984lbs is 898.752kg full tank of

gas, other lubs, turbo kits, and a driver. I assume a

ton for elise... (fans of Elise would be disguise..)

Lotus USA claims 4.9 sec for base and 4.7 for sports.

Either way, that's around 15%~20% increase

Anyway 1984lbs is curb weight according to Lotus USA's

Elise Spec PDF file

[errek72]

Apart from adding turbo, intercooler and the likes to the engine, shouldn't there be any reinforcments to chassis, gearbox etc.. to keep up with the power increase?
Me thinks that otherwise you can keep accelerating to and fro the mechanics, no?
That lot should add some weight too.
I guess most tuners or brands will try to offset this with lightweight carbon/resin body parts and magnesium/titanium/alloy chassis pieces, but that will be difficult to improve on an Elise.
The whole story smacks of 'Max Power' figures to me -re the alloys already mentioned.

[peter450]

while not a expert such a huge increase over stock i would have thought would require good engineering an stronger internals an other uprated parts certainly a uprated clutch it may well turn out to be a good conversion but personally i would wait for what lotus comes up with as a factory approved offering would kill the residuals on a aftermarket option like this stone dead if it appears

[forcedfed]

Hello Guys,
To answer a few questions:

1. Our Sport 275 Edition did a 0-60mph time of 4.0 seconds in the latest issue of Motor Trend magazine. It also did a best time of 12.3 seconds in the 1/4 mile at 114mph. On the same

2. The car weighs 1950 pounds with a full tank gas. We actually only add 9 kg to the weight of the car with the addition of our turbo package!

3. The car has run reliably over 5000 test(hard to say the least) miles for an extended period of time. The kit makes 240whp at 7psi and is extremely responsive with full boost by 2600rpms.

Prodrive will be carrying our products throughout Europe.Please let me know if you have any other questions.


Brett Payne
Forcedfed