S1 Exige...

[Evangelion]

HereBeMonsters said:

The thing about such a brilliant site as PistonHeads, is that someone always has to "one-up" your most recent achievement/purchase.

bd!

I hope it falls apart on you and um....melts. Yeah.


Best of luck with it fella, truly a brilliant car.

But at least yours is black HBM.

[Old Gregg]

Blimey, that is fantastic. I like the wheels in silver, too.

[HereBeMonsters]

Evangelion said:

HereBeMonsters said:

The thing about such a brilliant site as PistonHeads, is that someone always has to "one-up" your most recent achievement/purchase.

bd!

I hope it falls apart on you and um....melts. Yeah.


Best of luck with it fella, truly a brilliant car.

But at least yours is black HBM.

Except it's not.

[MattyB_]

Cheers all.

In all honesty, I do prefer the Elise as a road car, the Exige takes it step too far in terms of usability (or lack of) and needs to be pushed hard to really enjoy its talents - too hard for public roads. Its a grumpy bas***d around town! So its a good job I've got some trackdays lined up this year

[Black Sport 160]

Another former S160 owner here, now with an S1 Exige. Great minds and all that.......

Like yours, mine has the 190bhp upgrade option. As you also mention, the S1 Exige doesn't really feel any quicker than my S160. It is MUCH better behaved than the S160 at low speeds, though (when up to operating temperature!)

Great cars. Massive road presence and a real occasion to drive.


Justin

[stew-S160]

MUCHO WANTINGS!

[chevronb37]

How marginal are these for road use? It's one of only a couple of cars I'd realistically swap my Elise for. The chaps I know who run them are always off to France or Scotland in them and seem to use them plenty. Would it be too much of a headache compared to an S1?

Awesome car by the way and the silver wheels look fantastic - don't hurry to change them.

[MattyB_]

They're hotter and noiser in the cabin, plus the boot isn't compartmented but the space is still there.
In terms of driving, the road-legal slicks make them twitchy when its anything other than dry. It also 'feels' a little less nimble than the Elise, and all the power and benefits are right at the top end of the scale, so they need to be pushed very hard to really appreciate their talents.

I'd say that, unless your planning on priorotising trackdays, the Elise is much the better choice.

[chevronb37]

Thanks for the comments - always interesting to hear from the horse's mouth. What tyres is yours running? I rarely run in the wet anyway but even on AD07s it can get a bit sketchy. Just an itch I'm anxious to scratch at some point but the 111R is such a good fast road compromise I wouldn't want to lose that all-round ability.

[MattyB_]

Its on Yoko A048's at the moment. Absolutely *insane* grip levels in the dry once they're warm, but on greasy roads they can catch you out - as it did to me at the weekend when I got on the power a bit too early when the roads were greasy :O

EVO did a S1 vs S2 Exige mini article when they first reviewed the S2 Exige many years back. The basic conclusion was that, bar the looks, the S2 Exige was better in every respect, and if your considering a change from the 111R, might be worth thinking about just how you're going to to use it? If its fair weather, weekends only with plenty of trackdays, the Exige makes a compelling arguement.

The other side of the coin is the cost - seems that very soon you'll struggle to find a reasonable S1 for less than £25k...although I know of a 100k miler going for £17k if you're not bothered about the mileage!

[EX51GE R]

good choice