New arrival. Exige 410 Sport

[ecain63]

A couple of pics from it's first road test. GF Williams just happened to be in attendance

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BertBert said:

All good?

Yeah, so far so good. No faults, no rattles. Got a couple of final fittings to add tomorrow but I should be good to collect and bring her home on Saturday

[ecain63]

Proof of the pudding. 1000 mile test drive.

[ecain63]

And that's 2022 pretty much done. After a 1600 mile round trip taking in the Nurburgring, a stop off at Spa and safety car duties at Silverstone for LoT the new engine and gearbox are run in and we're all set for 2023.

[ecain63]

Chamon_Lee said:

this thread reads like someone shedding a 200 quid pug 206 for the track but its with a 10's of thousands of pounds track weapon exige. Utterly brilliant!
Enjoyed reading it.

Glad you enjoyed it. Gotta be honest the Lotus ownership thing has been a tale of emotions and difficult conversations over the 3.5 years, but so far it's all been totally worth it and the car packs so much fun and experiences into a sub £100k budget that you can't imagine what else you could possibly own. The fire was a big challenge and is not something I'd want to repeat, but it's part of a story that my son will hopefully inherit and government allowing will be used properly for may years to come.

This coming year I've already got Silverstone booked for March with Lotus on Track. Then in May we're back to the Ring with DN. I'm hoping to get to Spa in the summer and also Goodwood but with the economic downturn threatening to punish us on the mortgage and energy front I'm reluctant to book too many too early. It's going to be an interesting year or so for a lot of people unfortunately.

Here's a couple of pics from the Christmas break. Literally the only dry day we got

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[ecain63]

I carried out the bolt to stud conversion on the car this week. Parts were from Seriously Lotus. Really can't wait to get this thing back out on track again.

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Little bit of lol there

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And we're back at it







All went well for the first full bore day out since the rebuild, just a couple of things to adjust with the geo and the rear wing.

[ecain63]

We're still banging them in over 2250 miles last week and 25 laps of the Ring.

[ecain63]

21,789. Over 2250 on this trip.

[ecain63]

This will be why we struggled with grip and temperatures on Friday. Rear geo is too aggressive and has eaten the inner half of the tyres.

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st33ly said:

Can I just say I’ve started reading your thread and reading your adventure with your son in your car made me well up. Just epic sir. Truly epic. What a dad.

Thank you, I love taking him on our adventures and he definitely loves coming along. We're off to the Ring again in September so there's lots more to come

[ecain63]

st33ly said:

On Sunday I’m about to join the lotus fold. Bought an Elise 220sport and if I like it and enjoy it I’m thinking exige. I’ve been drooling over the 350 v6 cup car in green down south. A bit above my budget but man it just looks so dam cool. I understand I’ve not even got my new car yet and I’m looking at its replacement but after reading 80% of your thread and what you do with your son I know my young daughter is the same and I’d love to do adventures like you have with your son with her. Anyway, epic thread mate and here’s hoping Sunday will be a blast when we collect the little Orange Elise.

Hopefully the Elise will be everything you want it to be, and that your daughter shares and enjoys the magic. Keep us posted on your adventures

[ecain63]

st33ly said:

On an entirely different note. Do you or did you use a booster seat when your son was on the car? We obviously use an isofix booster seat but it won’t fit in the Elise. I can’t fully retract the isofix mechanism.

Early on he was in a recaro young sport but now he's just got a booster seat (soon to be redundant). You need one that's narrow enough for the bucket seats. Argos actually do a cheap narrow one.

[ecain63]

st33ly said:

So we have been on a few short journeys but she loves it. Especially the colour and when driving with the roof off. Lol.

Very nice. She looks very excited about the whole thing

Maybe start a thread telling us about your adventures together

[ecain63]

custardkid said:

Is the car still going ok?

Yeah, fantastic buddy. Got a squeaky / clicky rear clam to pad out but otherwise absolutely sound. At the end of the month we're off to the Ring again but in the meantime I'm trying to squeeze in a uk road trip to push the annual miles up

[ecain63]

Not sure why I didn't add it here, but we did Silverstone last month. It was a bit warm and quite busy, but a really cracking day out .........

[ecain63]

custardkid said:

Are you getting away with the standard exhaust on track or using the quieter exhaust or a stick out silencer?

I seem to be getting away with it at the moment. Silverstone was absolutely fine and yesterday morning I did over 60 laps of Combe with no noise issues

[ecain63]

Talking of Castle Combe......

BHP were running their last ever trackday so I decided to brave the bumps and head over for a morning of fun. I've done Combe before and if I'm honest I didn't really like it. Yesterday changed that!. We had perfect weather, quiet laps and great company. Unfortunately there was no tog on site but I did get some vids

Last lap of the day was a nice one: https://youtu.be/u3UqE5pxfjM

Had some fun with a GT3RS: https://youtu.be/RQt0jvBQ4nk

We'll be at Claysemore Supercars on Sunday if anyone is going, otherwise our next trip is to the Ring again in 3 weeks