RE: Lotus Evora Sport 410 | Spotted

[jayemm89]

Lovely car the Evoras, although the Sport 410 was generally a silly decision by them and the beginning of a bad patch for Lotus in my eyes

Still at this price a cracking buy for someone, and I quite like the colour too.

As for clutches, my Evora went to 25k miles before I sold it and the only part which wore out was the rear tyres. I'd like to say it was mechanically solid... but it wasn't - supercharger failed and my dealer left me in the lurch.

[C.MW]

Yes, they are getting long in the tooth but that aside, I think their sales are partly hurt by the fact that it just cannot serve the dual purpose (daily driver + sports car) that a 911 manages to do so well. A modern 911 could handily be a second car, whereas a Lotus, whether it is the Exige or the Evora, just could not as these are no where near as civilised or roomy as the Porsche. The end result is that they only appeal to those who can afford a 3rd car and there aren't as many of them in the sports car market. I know I'm not one and feel sorry for the brand because to my mind these are vastly superior as a driver's car than any 911 of recent times.

Edited by C.MW on Monday 17th February 23:32

[62dave]

C.MW said:

Yes, they are getting long in the tooth but that aside, I think their sales are partly hurt by the fact that it just cannot serve the dual purpose (daily driver + sports car) that a 911 manages to do so well. A modern 911 could handily be a second car, whereas a Lotus, whether it is the Exige or the Evora, just could not as these are no where near as civilised or roomy as the Porsche. The end result is that they only appeal to those who can afford a 3rd car and there aren't as many of them in the sports car market. I know I'm not one and feel sorry for the brand because to my mind these are vastly superior as a driver's car than any 911 of recent times.

Edited by C.MW on Monday 17th February 23:32

I have an Evora 400.. it’s my only car.. it’s brilliant

[otolith]

I would have to try the seats for comfort, but I love the colour and interior of that. À chacun son goût.

[C.MW]

62dave said:

C.MW said:

Yes, they are getting long in the tooth but that aside, I think their sales are partly hurt by the fact that it just cannot serve the dual purpose (daily driver + sports car) that a 911 manages to do so well. A modern 911 could handily be a second car, whereas a Lotus, whether it is the Exige or the Evora, just could not as these are no where near as civilised or roomy as the Porsche. The end result is that they only appeal to those who can afford a 3rd car and there aren't as many of them in the sports car market. I know I'm not one and feel sorry for the brand because to my mind these are vastly superior as a driver's car than any 911 of recent times.

Edited by C.MW on Monday 17th February 23:32

I have an Evora 400.. it’s my only car.. it’s brilliant

That is cool. I wish I could too.

[flukey5]

Yeah the problem with this one is those seats straight out of a lotus elise. They're great in the elise but much too small and uncomfortable for what should be more of a GT car.

As for the colour? It might not be to your taste but save boring colours for boring cars!

[davea18h]

Like these a lot but the colour is not a good look imo, looks like a Cadbury's limited edition! Couldn't they respray it, surely it would be easier to sell on?

[fridaypassion]

Quite a bit of misinformation on this thread. Why would you think it's lived on track? The cup 2 tyres are standard. Colour scheme is a bit out there but a lot of the sport 410s were in pretty garish colours. I actually own one but in a more muted tone of Carpathian Grey. It's a very rare car only 25 made although not a limited edition as such.

It's a hugely underrated car very focused people do use them on track and they are out of the box capable with huge stopping power/firm suspension and cup 2s. Direct competitors will probably irritate some but you are looking towards a GT3 or GT4 as being as close as you can get although a GT4 feels a bit soft round the edges after a 410.

These are the only sports GT/Junior supercar whatever you want to call it with hydraulic steering. It's a thing of complete wonder a true event to drive and they sound incredible too. The best car nobody ever bought. It was a frustrating car to buy new lots of niggles and the Lotus dealer network I'm afraid to say is pretty poor with only a couple of exceptions. They have a lot of work to do before selling a 2 million pound car with a straight face.

They make a cracking used buy though very little depreciation and it's just a better car than the equivalent Porche. Im just approaching 2 years and 6k getting to the chop it in and change bit of the finance... I'm about to pay it off which I can't remember the last time I did with a car. Nothing to replace it with!

[jayemm89]

fridaypassion said:

It's a very rare car only 25 made although not a limited edition as such.

And I remember when they were announced they were "limited" to about 150 a year! Classic Lotus, I wouldn't be surprised if the GT430 is actually more common.

[C.MW]

fridaypassion said:

Quite a bit of misinformation on this thread. Why would you think it's lived on track? The cup 2 tyres are standard. Colour scheme is a bit out there but a lot of the sport 410s were in pretty garish colours. I actually own one but in a more muted tone of Carpathian Grey. It's a very rare car only 25 made although not a limited edition as such.

It's a hugely underrated car very focused people do use them on track and they are out of the box capable with huge stopping power/firm suspension and cup 2s. Direct competitors will probably irritate some but you are looking towards a GT3 or GT4 as being as close as you can get although a GT4 feels a bit soft round the edges after a 410.

These are the only sports GT/Junior supercar whatever you want to call it with hydraulic steering. It's a thing of complete wonder a true event to drive and they sound incredible too. The best car nobody ever bought. It was a frustrating car to buy new lots of niggles and the Lotus dealer network I'm afraid to say is pretty poor with only a couple of exceptions. They have a lot of work to do before selling a 2 million pound car with a straight face.

They make a cracking used buy though very little depreciation and it's just a better car than the equivalent Porche. Im just approaching 2 years and 6k getting to the chop it in and change bit of the finance... I'm about to pay it off which I can't remember the last time I did with a car. Nothing to replace it with!

Porsche fanboys will find it difficult to admit, but yeah, the 410 and above is a direct competitor to the gt3 and the gt3 rs. It definitely takes a victory in certain areas and not so much in others, like refinement. I own a 911 myself but a fact is a fact.

[CABC]

i've just bought an S1 SR to go alongside my Elise. i chose the S1 as it felt more of a GT car (seats are great!), visceral fun for me is related to weight so the Elise is the keeper.
i tried to find old Evo articles but found it very hard. certainly a few on the Exige. there's a lot of love for Lotus at Evo but they probably gave up with Hethel making things 10 times more difficult than everyone else. Geely came a bit late as these type of cars are not selling so much now. even the (great) new Porsche GTS will sell insignificant numbers.

[cayman-black]

I do like that, the colours suits it as well. But the best thing about owning one of these is that you haven't been brainwashed and had your pants pulled down by Porsche.

[Dr Interceptor]

There's a whole host of £65k Evora 410's in the classifieds, I'm not sure why you'd want a Purple one?

https://www.pistonheads.com/classifieds/used-cars/...

https://www.pistonheads.com/classifieds/used-cars/...

https://www.pistonheads.com/classifieds/used-cars/...

[Oilchange]

Wish i could afford one...

[Thorburn]

jayemm89 said:

fridaypassion said:

It's a very rare car only 25 made although not a limited edition as such.

And I remember when they were announced they were "limited" to about 150 a year! Classic Lotus, I wouldn't be surprised if the GT430 is actually more common.

Surprised if they made THAT few, I've seen almost that many listed on the classifieds for sale over the years.
The option pricing and lack of 2+2 seating (even as an option) made it seem an odd choice vs. the 400 - you could add all the carbon bits on to the 400 and it cost about the same as the base price of the Sport 410, but you had to pay for the air-con, headunit/reversing camera, etc, that were all standard on the 400. If you didn't WANT them on the 400 you could no-cost delete them from the spec.

I like the carbon fibre bits on them, but the lack of 2+2 seating meant it was a non-starter for me. I would have bought a GT430 but was told I couldn't order that as a 2+2 either - but I've definitely seen one 2+2 GT430 for sale on here since then!

otolith said:

I would have to try the seats for comfort, but I love the colour and interior of that. À chacun son goût.

The mounting of them is all wrong - the seats are fine but the angle of them is not, too flat and no support under your calves. Can be sorted with some spacers to lift the front of the runners, but should have been right from the outset.
Since they don't fold you don't have much access to the area behind the seats, so they are pretty limiting in terms of storage in the car.

rockin said:

Maybe the colour was intended to hide the shape?

Alcantara plus Cup 2 tyres and only 3,000 miles on the clock smells like "run in on track days" to me.

Can't imagine why it hasn't sold, at only £65,000

All standard on the Sport 410. I think it did about 1000 of those miles on test drives and running round to various events (car meets, dealer days, etc) whilst at the original dealer - they certainly drove it down to Haynes on a driving day I did with them.

Edited by Thorburn on Tuesday 18th February 09:33

[otolith]

Dr Interceptor said:

There's a whole host of £65k Evora 410's in the classifieds, I'm not sure why you'd want a Purple one?

https://www.pistonheads.com/classifieds/used-cars/...

https://www.pistonheads.com/classifieds/used-cars/...

https://www.pistonheads.com/classifieds/used-cars/...

Of the four, I'd put the purple or yellow one first. The grey one would be last, for being the most boring colour, but for the green one having a clashing yellow interior. I can see what they were trying to do, with the green/yellow of the Lotus badge, but no.

[Dr Interceptor]

otolith said:

Dr Interceptor said:

There's a whole host of £65k Evora 410's in the classifieds, I'm not sure why you'd want a Purple one?

https://www.pistonheads.com/classifieds/used-cars/...

https://www.pistonheads.com/classifieds/used-cars/...

https://www.pistonheads.com/classifieds/used-cars/...

Of the four, I'd put the purple or yellow one first. The grey one would be last, for being the most boring colour, but for the green one having a clashing yellow interior. I can see what they were trying to do, with the green/yellow of the Lotus badge, but no.

All personal opinion of course... I'd go yellow, then green, then grey, then purple if I really had to.

[TimoMak]

Lots Of Trouble Usually Serious? But what am I saying, in order to pretend to be a proper PH car bore enthusiast, only a Lotus or Caterham will do.. Either way massively preferable to that pig ugly, god awful, French four pot RCZ equivalent.

Anecdotally I do remember a friends Exige burning up at the side of the A57 some years ago after the fuel line came off and sprayed a plume of flames out over the car. (luckily he was unhurt, physically at least..) irrespective, that day he swore never to buy another.

[otolith]

TimoMak said:

[fridaypassion]

jayemm89 said:

And I remember when they were announced they were "limited" to about 150 a year! Classic Lotus, I wouldn't be surprised if the GT430 is actually more common.

The Sport 410 was never a limited edition. It was lost in the Bahar era of pumping out special editions left right and centre it got superseded quite quickly by the gt cars. They also added 20k to the price which made me jump for the last untegistered 410 at the time.

The seats are the one area that I would concede fall a bit short of a car in this sector although they still be by far the lightest seats of any Sports GT. The frames weigh more than the seats. I think I might possibly get some sparcos or whichever the good ones were from the early 400s. I doubt really use it that much that the seats bug me enough. The main issue with them isn't really the size it's the lack of folding to access the storage in the back that can be a bit annoying getting luggage in there.

The Evora just hits that spot as a driver's car. I've almost replaced it with a 570 and very nearly a 991.2 GT3 in the last year but it's still here. If I sold it I'd kick myself as there isn't another one in quite the same colour and spec of I wanted to go back. I think a lot of the 410 and gt410 are in gawdy colour combos that wouldn't be for me.

The steering is completely peerless as far as I know as nobody does hydraulic apart from lotus (no mclaren isn't!) and no matter what Chris Harris says electric steering simply doesn't work on high performance cars.