RE: Driven: New Lotus Elise 1.6

[Stu_00]

UncappedTag said:

Stu_00 said:

KenBlocksPants said:

Gary C said:

UncappedTag said:

I'm staggered at the price these plastic pigs go for. £27.5k for a fibreglass body with a 1.6 mass produced engine.

And to think the RS gets some stick being £25k

Is it me or do these not offer any value for money whatsoever.

Its you

Nope me too.

£27k is far to much for this really.

Granted its not cheap, but then what is now. Its going to be better to own than an Asbo RS....Plus with the added benefit you can run it on the track and wont each tyres/pads like an RS would....

Still I am biased - I would rather walk than buy an RS

But personally why not shift production overseas. I do not give two hoots that it's been handbuilt somewhere in the countryside in Norfolk. To be honest I have no idea what the reliability of these the modern day Lotus, but my dad had a Excel from new and I always recall it always being off the road due to something failing. He wrote it off in the end and kindly declined another one!

Granted I sometimes dont like the UK, But I feel very strongly about keeping Lotus in the UK. Companies like this are still needed to fuel the UK, We need to be far more manufacturing based (High Tech) in the future, if we all based around Financial Service we could be in trouble.

KEEP IT IN THE UK! (With maybe an engine from Italy ! )

[BoRED S2upid]

I would never pay for a brand new car. Why would I want this new Elise for £27k when I could have the original for less than £10k? Even if I won the lottery I would still be shopping from the back catalogue so to speak.

[UncappedTag]

BoRED S2upid said:

I would never pay for a brand new car. Why would I want this new Elise for £27k when I could have the original for less than £10k? Even if I won the lottery I would still be shopping from the back catalogue so to speak.

Would you also be thumbing through the engine section for a rebuilt K-Series engine too?

Edited by UncappedTag on Thursday 15th April 13:38

[Rawwr]

Fidgits said:

have you had one?

have you actually driven one?

the last thing i would have called my R was asthmatic...

Nope, never even seen one.

[kambites]

UncappedTag said:

BoRED S2upid said:

I would never pay for a brand new car. Why would I want this new Elise for £27k when I could have the original for less than £10k? Even if I won the lottery I would still be shopping from the back catalogue so to speak.

Would you also be thumbing through the engine section for a rebuilt K-Series engine too?

Nah, if it goes bang you just stick a Honda K20 with a supercharger in it. It'd still be much cheaper than this and have nearly three times the power to weight ratio.

[snotrag]

RobCrezz said:

Cant help but think that they could have gotten more power out of the 1.6 (toyota managed this kind of power out of the old 1.6 in the 80s mk1 MR2, Honda managed 160bhp in the 90s)... 150bhp would have been more like it to sit under the 190bhp 111R.

Your neglecting the fact that a 150bhp 4-age in an 80's MR2 will be spewing out fire, brimstone, carbon footprints, and dead polar bears...

Whereas comparatively the new engine will leave a trail of fairydust and Baby rabbits in its wake.

[alexpa]

I like the mk1 smile on the mk2

Wish they'd gone with Honda Vtec's instead of oil hungry Toyota VVt-i's

[noodleman]

The weights quoted in this story are wrong.

876KG does not include a 75KG driver. It may include fluids but definitely not the driver.

[kambites]

noodleman said:

The weights quoted in this story are wrong.

876KG does not include a 75KG driver. It may include fluids but definitely not the driver.

Oh yeah, didn't spot that. Lotus definitely don't include a driver in their weights.

[edo]

Rawwr said:

Well that's st.

Almost as st as your post.

Personally I dont mind the new styling, and a low emissions model with a few OPTIONAL extras cant do any harm to the range.

[jatinder]

What a load of ste, options aside, why would you want to buy this?

It's barely faster than my integra. If at all.

If you want save the planet buy a telsa or a Golf Tdi

[edo]

jatinder said:

What a load of ste, options aside, why would you want to buy this?

It's barely faster than my integra. If at all.

If you want save the planet buy a telsa or a Golf Tdi

The car isn't for you. It isn't all about straight line speed. Drive an Elise and you might get the point a bit better.

[jatinder]

edo said:

jatinder said:

What a load of ste, options aside, why would you want to buy this?

It's barely faster than my integra. If at all.

If you want save the planet buy a telsa or a Golf Tdi

The car isn't for you. It isn't all about straight line speed. Drive an Elise and you might get the point a bit better.

Firstly
I drive an integra, it's got plently of feedback....

Secondly my next car is going to be a VX220

It is a pointless car.

Edited by jatinder on Thursday 15th April 14:01

[Fidgits]

erm, Lotus has always offered a "bottom of the range" elise...

thereby are you saying all elise's are pointless? or just ones that dont have a vauxhall badge?

[jatinder]

Fidgits said:

erm, Lotus has always offered a "bottom of the range" elise...

thereby are you saying all elise's are pointless? or just ones that dont have a vauxhall badge?

No, just this one.

[edo]

jatinder said:

edo said:

jatinder said:

What a load of ste, options aside, why would you want to buy this?

It's barely faster than my integra. If at all.

If you want save the planet buy a telsa or a Golf Tdi

The car isn't for you. It isn't all about straight line speed. Drive an Elise and you might get the point a bit better.

Firstly
I drive an integra, it's got plently of feel....

Secondly my next car is going to be a VX220

It is a pointless car.

Well I guess Lotus have done a little more research than you - just a hunch.

Note also that this brings down their average C02 output across the range - something that (like it or not) all manufacturers are being targeted to do.

[alexpa]

My Favourite standard Elise of the various i've driven was the mk2 135r, handled like a very well set up go kart. 135hp/124ibft from the crappy k series unit (i like my heads gaskets to stay in one piece...), blinding car though... would love to stick the (~same weight) 1.8 vtec teg unit in one...

Edited by alexpa on Thursday 15th April 14:07

[jatinder]

edo said:

jatinder said:

edo said:

jatinder said:

What a load of ste, options aside, why would you want to buy this?

It's barely faster than my integra. If at all.

If you want save the planet buy a telsa or a Golf Tdi

The car isn't for you. It isn't all about straight line speed. Drive an Elise and you might get the point a bit better.

Firstly
I drive an integra, it's got plently of feel....

Secondly my next car is going to be a VX220

It is a pointless car.

Well I guess Lotus have done a little more research than you - just a hunch.

Note also that this brings down their average C02 output across the range - something that (like it or not) all manufacturers are being targeted to do.

I'm sure they have, but give it a couple of years, your lightwieght sportscar will be somewhat bloated.

[dylan0451]

jatinder said:

What a load of ste, options aside, why would you want to buy this?

It's barely faster than my integra. If at all.

If you want save the planet buy a telsa or a Golf Tdi

i do agree with you, if you're a straight line hero then this is pretty pathetic. but then so is a teggy or indeed anything that doesn't run on meth and get to 200mph in 3 seconds

does it really matter what model of elise you buy (HGF issues aside) ? if you treat it as the design was intended? i would think any of them have well enough power for their chassis capability be it on road or track, sure you'll loose out on the straights but unless you live in holland that's not really a problem!

[RobCrezz]

snotrag said:

RobCrezz said:

Cant help but think that they could have gotten more power out of the 1.6 (toyota managed this kind of power out of the old 1.6 in the 80s mk1 MR2, Honda managed 160bhp in the 90s)... 150bhp would have been more like it to sit under the 190bhp 111R.

Your neglecting the fact that a 150bhp 4-age in an 80's MR2 will be spewing out fire, brimstone, carbon footprints, and dead polar bears...

Whereas comparatively the new engine will leave a trail of fairydust and Baby rabbits in its wake.

No no, I do understand that new engines need to be cleaner, I just thought that It would still be possible to get more power from a 1.6 but still meeting the regulations. But I would guess that Toyota know this too, as why this engine has the -FE engine code, meaning an economy biased engine.