Caterham Superlight R #29

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Had a cheeky drive out over the hills this evening. It's a whole load of fun.

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I know!

I had to put it back together with a deadline looming. I'll revisit some of it in due course and finish to a higher, more focused standard.

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It's been so nice having this sat in the garage ready to use whenever I fancy a blast. Last weekend my daughter wanted to go and buy a coconut and as it was sunny it made sense to undertake such an important mission in the fluorescent yellow car.



The problem is, she's crazy and constantly asks me to go faster. She doesn't seem to understand speed limits...

On to hugely important and necessary upgrades: When putting this back together some of the old fasteners bugged me. I'm quite obsessed by details and also have a soft spot for using the best fasteners for a specific job. The steel button heads, with chipped paint that were holding the aeroscreen on looked tired and let the exterior down.



I ordered some replacements that I thought would look better. These are M8 alu countersunk bolts with countersink washers. All, obviously, anodised black.





Much better.

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Ha cheers.

Mikeulster500, fasteners are from Pro Bolt UK. Not the cheapest, but good quality and very good service.

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Thou said:

So, million dollar question, and one that I'm sure will be difficult to answer until you've had more time in the car and had the opportunity to take her on track - which is more fun, this or the Elise? Considering both options for my next car.

They're very different. The Elise chassis is much more competent than the Caterham one, but then you'd expect it to be as it's 50 years newer. The Lotus chassis is significantly stiffer and has much better architecture.

The Caterham is essentially limited by a very primitive rear axle. Where an Elise will flow down a road in a lovely, oiled, light-footed way, the Caterham rear end is limited in its ability to deal with imperfections. The front end of the Caterham is great, you point it and it goes, the back may skip, step out or grip but you often don't know which until you've committed. So, you drive with an additional margin or you get used to grabbing some opposite lock. I'm fine with this and don't mind a high-speed drift but it means you need to be absolutely on top of things when pushing on, but then I guess you should be anyway. At 7 or 8/10ths it's all sorts of fun. Through slower stuff you can choose to overdrive the rears with a flex of the foot and either leave a corner with a subtle over-rotation tucking the nose in, or with them lit up, leaving black lines and nicely crossed up. The LSD locks quickly and progressively. The quick rack and tiny steering wheel means you drive with your wrists whereas the Elise you use your elbows too.

I'm yet to get it on track. I imagine the Caterham will come into its own on a smoother surface where the rear axle limitations will impact overall capability less.

I'm having to remember what a more standard Elise is like as my last one had almost every component uprated, but as standard the Caterham has a vastly superior gearchange, the 6-speed box is very sweet and obviously the lever interacts directly and mechanically without any additional linkages or bloody cables.

Brakes on both cars are similar. My SLR has the uprated AP brakes and master cylinder with the proportioning valve. Both have great unservo-ed pedal feel and give lots of feedback. I'm not overly keen on the Pagids the Caterham currently wears, before track use I'll probably swap to my default favourite pads, CL RC6 as I love the feel of them and they're practically infallible.

Ergonomics the Lotus wins hands down. The Caterham pedal box is really limited. I don't like the lack of clutch stop. I don't like that my clutch foot has nowhere to brace. I don't like that it's compromised for heel and toe, I often catch my heel on the right-hand internal wall when heel and toeing and must keep my foot less twisted sideways than I'd prefer. The S1 Elise pedal box is practically perfect though, so it's stiff competition. With the lowered floors I find the handbrake in the way of my left arm too. I can see why race chassis don't have one there. I have to tuck my arm over the tunnel which is difficult with a passenger.

However, you asked about fun.

The Caterham, especially with the aeroscreen on is an absolute riot. It feels like it should be very illegal and it's completely and utterly attention consuming. It removes another layer that isolates you from the environment and immerses you into your surroundings and gives you a wide-screen HD version of the analogue act of driving. As pure fun, it beats the Elise hands down.

So, it's an old-fashioned car and good old-fashioned fun. You just need to be aware of and drive around it's idiosyncrasies.

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SamuliS said:

Took a second before I realized who's car this is. First thought was that you have done well with MX-5 as we got ours to 890kg, then when I saw that you owned K swap Elise it clicked. Do you still have Elise?

Lovely color, really great for safety. I have lived under impression that Rover K has really bad reputation because being picky about how it's maintained, but it being fun and full of character is new to me.

I don't miss my Westfield, but I wouldn't mind having Caterham. I started local Se7en club and got to drive lots of different sevens, loved R1 engined and looking forward to test driving Seigth (only one in whole of Finland).

Edited by SamuliS on Tuesday 5th June 15:06

Samulis, hope you're well my friend. I sold the Elise. In fact I bought another one after the one you probably mean, but I sold that one too.

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I normally drive the Caterham in ballistic rated goggles. These seem to work ok, although you obviously get buffeted slightly and seem to naturally limit speed to relatively sensible levels to prevent the sensation becoming unbearable. Last week I bit the bullet and decided to go full-bell-end and take it out with my helmet on.

I had a great drive, it's significantly more comfortable and I naturally drove faster without really thinking about it.









It's not a subtle car anyway and you have to be prepared to be gawped at. But with a lid I felt like erm, a bit of a helmet.



On the plus side, nobody could actually see my face and identify me. Also bikers started nodding and acknowledging me which is an unexpected phenomenon. All good though. In fact the car seems to bring universally good feedback from other road users and pedestrians for that matter. People of all types seem to wave and smile. I've also had quite a few cars indicate left and wave me past when I approach from behind on single carriageway national speed limit roads, which is a turn up compared to the usual light flashing and fist shaking most motorists offer anyone who dares to overtake nowadays.

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I have both the vinyl ones, including a half-tonneau for the passenger side and these rigid carbonfibre ones as per the pictures. The carbon ones are made by Tillett who make lots of the carbon parts for Caterham including the aeroscreens and obviously the seats.

I fitted the carbonfibre ones as I just think they look better and match the theme of the car more. They’re also neater in the way they fit inside the scuttle rather than attach over it. They fit behind the rear arches and press-stud on the side tub beneath the door aperture.

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On Sunday I had to go shopping for some new hedge trimmers; I took the practical shopping car.



I came the long way back and had an absolute riot.



Fun car is fun.

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Needed to take one of my bikes to the shop. Guy who owns shop is a car fan, and wanted to see the Caterham. Easy, take bike there with Caterham.







Level up achieved.

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I've continued to really enjoy the Superlight R over the summer in the fantastic weather that we've had this year. My parents came down to visit and I got to take my Dad out in it which was cool. We stopped for fuel and then drove to the local brewery to collect beer.



When we got back the alternator belt had a slight squeak, so I put my Dad to work to earn his beer...



He's a time-served mechanic on all sorts of stuff and has helped me to build race cars in the past. He adjusted the belt easily but afterwards we found the oil pressure gauge was no longer working. I investigated and isolated it to probably being a broken wire but couldn't find the problem, so I took it down to PGM where they diagnosed that the oil-pressure take off hose had damaged braid which had chewed through the signal wire. It turned out to be a lucky catch as the hose internal was bulging and failure would have obviously meant oil evacuating quickly with potential engine damage occurring.

Collecting the car from PGM gave me another chance to use the bike carrier. I've since changed the way the rear wheel attaches by using a Seasucker and I have to say the bike is held absolutely rock-solidly even up to ahem, high speeds...





I thought I'd also stick some recent pics up of some of the carbon details on the car. It's easy to take these for granted when I saw the car everyday but they really do look great.








And so onto the next chapter.

I'd fancied something daft after the Elise went and a fluorescent yellow car with no windscreen seemed to fit that bill. I enjoyed the journey of buying it and researching its history but quickly realised that the plans I had for it made no sense. Caterhams are really sensitive to spec and history and this being an SLR with provenance had a value that was really closely tied to being the spec it was. So the cage I'd bought and other fancy carbon bits didn't get fitted. Instead I essentially did a restoration and the car now is as it left the factory, but just with the spec polished to improve it and make it better to drive. Caterhams are also sensitive to seasons and weather, so If I was going to sell I had to do it now or wait until next summer. So I but out a tentative 'I might sell this' on Instagram and as luck would have it someone who'd been following this PH thread got in touch and was keen to buy.

So I took my last trip in the car to go and collect him.



That view is one I'll certainly miss. As is the incredible good will that the car garners from other road users; something that's incredibly rare nowadays.

I didn't really enjoy the Superlight R at first, it seemed quite slow and cumbersome after my Elise that I'd really honed to be a GT3 killer. However over the months I grew to really enjoy it. The weather's obviously been perfect for a car like this and taking it out in convoy with some v. quick cars made me realise that the performance it had when you really pushed it was actually very impressive. This particular SLR is set up and mapped really, really well; It feels at least as quick as R500s (K) that I've driven but is also incredibly flexible. It'll pull 6th gear from tickover with no fuss or histrionics. The Caterham itch may have been scratched but it's certainly one I'll revisit. I'd buy a race car next time though; they're cheaper to start with for a given spec and less sensitive to modifications in terms of value. I really wanted one with a cage so that box would get ticked too.

Everyone should have a fast Caterham at some point. Now it's gone, I really do miss it and so will my kids which is an absolute first for any of my cars as they usually show no interest whatsoever.

So it's gone. Yet it genuinely couldn't have gone to a nicer bloke. From the very first contact through the entire process and transaction it was a pleasure to deal with him and to sell him a car. So although the SLR will be missed I was pleased that it was going to someone cool and that obviously was going to enjoy the car to its best. He said he'll take over the thread so I'll sign out and hand over to him. I'll stick a new thread up soon for my next car, although most of the cash will be going into house renovations.

Thank you F1URO, you were a blast.

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I've had quite a lot of interest in the bike carrier, so here's some more pics of the details.

















Drop me a message if you want more specifics.

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Fantastic stuff. Will continue to follow this to see how you get on.

I’d also like to dibs first refusal if you sell it on. Hopefully you’ll keep it long enough that my new garage will be built by then.

Edited by 573 on Tuesday 14th August 22:40

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And the shift light is the large white one at the top between the speedo and tacho. After an Exige S you may find you’re not accustomed to winding the revs around that far!

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Earplugs are a necessity as already stated. They make it really quite bearable with just ballistic goggles on; You just have to admit defeat with the hair though, there’s no way to prevent that ending up a disaster.

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Just a heads up for the future or for anyone else with a small lithium. They sometimes like a bit of load to warm them up before starting. It sounds counter-intuative, but if you pop the sidelights on for 60s or so before you want to start, the load will prep the battery ready to start the car.

Glad you're out enjoying it any taking it to meets. Not jealous much!

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Absolutely fantastic. great to see it out on track.

I can't believe the Raceco got it down to 90db, that's incredible!

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Brilliant.

Glad you met Nige, he's a good friend of mine, have done lots of my track days with him.

Do you not still have the other set of wheels with the wet tyres on them? You're a very brave man taking it out in a monsoon with the ZZRs on it.

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aww999 said:

I also had the opportunity for some head-to-head runs against my mate's new 420R, Happy to report than the old K-series walked away from it in every gear which is incredible when you think about it!

I know you've now sold the car, but this line above made my day. It always felt a very healthy K and with the lighter weight over the Ford engined car this doesn't surprise me but it's still good to read.

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Thanks for the input! I always assumed that was the sister car, nice to have it confirmed.