Lotus Emeya - looks great but...

[TheDeuce]

So, you can order this very exciting sounding car right now, some tasty lease deals are incoming too apparently.

But, there are no actual reviews/road tests of the car other than some press stunt drives in one drifting around a snowy Finland.

Am I missing something? Does anyone know if there is a proper review hidden on the web somewhere? I'm genuinely interested in this car but where to start with no reviews or test drive opportunity..

[TheDeuce]

Europa Jon said:

Well Deuce, I reckon they're in short supply and the drifting one in Finland was a preproduction car.
I think the one I saw was preproduction too.
We'll have to wait for them to be shipped from Wuhan before proper reviews appear.

I get it, but it's annoying.. I know that cheap lease deals will come through the moment they turn the production lines on, to keep the production lines at peak efficiency...

And I love the idea of the car and would love to jump - but it's nuts that the time to buy is ahead of anyone actually reviewing the damn thing

Having said all the above, it's my problem really - I strongly suspect they'll sell strongly regardless..

[TheDeuce]

uktrailmonster said:

Maybe time to revive this thread now there are reviews. I like this guy’s take. Looks great to me, if a bit big for UK roads and parking.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ez6-I7DrEAA

Thanks for the vid link - it really does look like a great all rounder of a fun car!

Also 'made in China', often not seen as a huge positive, but in this instance it could mean that it's actually going to be a reliable Lotus


Lease deals around £1000pm... Not much chance of that dropping unless they struggle to sell them, which I doubt. I might have to go an work out how to make man maths fit this one...

[TheDeuce]

andrewcliffe said:

One of our customers switched to an EV for his everyday car 18 months ago for tax reasons, was a Tesla. He's now got an Emeya and seems to be mostly complimentary - but says its enormous. Haven't seen it yet.

It is big, but it's actually slightly less wide than my old iPace and that was fine in the ancient market town I live in, a bit of squeeze here and there but you just get used to it. Overall the luxury of size and space is more of a positive than negative in these sort of all rounder GT cars imo.

The turning circle is better than the iPace, which is good as that really did annoy me.

[TheDeuce]

LunarOne said:

uktrailmonster said:

LunarOne said:

It doesn't sound very exciting to me. I'd be just as likely to order a Castrol Semenya.

A what?

The controversial race version.

What a very odd comparison

[TheDeuce]

uktrailmonster said:

So I went to have a look at them at my local dealer. It certainly has the wow-factor in real life. Some really nice colour choices too. It’s a big car as expected, but quite a practical 5-seater with a huge hatchback. The hatch makes it more versatile than a big saloon and it looks more like a large, exotic sportscar. A Ferrari or Lamborghini badge wouldn’t look out of place here.

I had a sit inside and it felt pretty special. The interior detailing and quality is as good as I’ve seen in any car. Ultra-modern, sporty luxury. Couldn’t fault it really.

Test drive booked in for Tuesday!

Looking forward to hearing how you get on!

[TheDeuce]

uktrailmonster said:

V12 Migaloo said:

what's the range you anticipate in getting??

On a motorway trip cruising at 75 mph, at least 250 miles and probably a bit closer to 300 miles in ideal conditions. That s with the 600 hp version. It s not very efficient, but a large enough battery to compensate.

That's a little more than I get in my M50 but it's never bothered me, never slowed me down on a long journey - it's just a non factor now that chargers are so prevelant and the cars charge so quickly.

[TheDeuce]

V12 Migaloo said:

uktrailmonster said:

Ah I see what you mean. I also ruled out the Eletre SUV because of it s poor range. But I think the Emeya 600 has just enough range for those longer motorway trips and looks amazing in the flesh!

Have you considered the new iX3? Slightly less visually challenging than the iX and huge range. I m sure the lease deals on those will be attractive after the initial launch phase. List pricing is surprisingly keen. But I realise there are some great deals on the iX at the moment, so I can see the appeal.

Yes I have looked at most things, I actually prefer the next gen design of the iX over the iX3, and the fact I'm transitioning from a Q7 to a smaller car just wouldn't do! Going to wait till after the budget in any case, but will do some more digging on the Emeya monthlies.....

I'm interested in the ix3 as a next car, I quite like the idea of getting back into an SUV... I used to hate SUV's but electrification has removed the traditional drawbacks of such cars.

But I wouldn't be swayed on my choice of car by it's range credentials... I understand that new to EV drivers worry about range and 'more is better'... But actually making use of more than 200 miles real world range is something that will happen so infrequently for most drivers that they're better off putting other aspects of their car choice ahead of range.

[TheDeuce]

uktrailmonster said:

TheDeuce said:

I'm interested in the ix3 as a next car, I quite like the idea of getting back into an SUV... I used to hate SUV's but electrification has removed the traditional drawbacks of such cars.

But I wouldn't be swayed on my choice of car by it's range credentials... I understand that new to EV drivers worry about range and 'more is better'... But actually making use of more than 200 miles real world range is something that will happen so infrequently for most drivers that they're better off putting other aspects of their car choice ahead of range.

I m not that focused on range either, but the Eletre falls a bit short for me. I found the difference between a 200 and 250 mile real world range surprisingly large for my usage. An extra 50 miles meant that I didn t have to charge on several of my regular round-trip journeys.

For me the ideal motorway range would be around 300 miles and anything above that would be dead weight for 99% of the time. My minimum is 250 miles and the Emeya passes, while the Eletre falls a bit short. Fortunately, I prefer the Emeya anyway.

My current car will do 250 miles real world range, which admittedly has resulted in me is Ng public chargers slightly less on longer journeys compared to my old iPace.

But... Despite needing to charge slightly less often, I'm not actually stopping less often or saving any time. If I'm driving 200+ miles then at some point during that 3.5-4 hour period I'm going to stop for a break/food/toilet break whatever I'm driving - it doesn't matter if I need to plug in at the same time or not really.

It used to matter as chargers were less reliable and plentiful a few years ago, but now there's always available high speed chargers at every services I might use on a longer journey. They all work without needing an app too!

If BMW offered me a free upgrade to my car that would either add 100 miles additional range OR remove 200kg of weight, I'd choose the latter.

[TheDeuce]

uktrailmonster said:

TheDeuce said:

My current car will do 250 miles real world range, which admittedly has resulted in me is Ng public chargers slightly less on longer journeys compared to my old iPace.

But... Despite needing to charge slightly less often, I'm not actually stopping less often or saving any time. If I'm driving 200+ miles then at some point during that 3.5-4 hour period I'm going to stop for a break/food/toilet break whatever I'm driving - it doesn't matter if I need to plug in at the same time or not really.

It used to matter as chargers were less reliable and plentiful a few years ago, but now there's always available high speed chargers at every services I might use on a longer journey. They all work without needing an app too!

If BMW offered me a free upgrade to my car that would either add 100 miles additional range OR remove 200kg of weight, I'd choose the latter.

I do a few weekly round trips of just over 200 miles. My first EV could barely manage that range at motorway speed and often required a top up charge on the way home, especially in winter. With a 250 mile motorway range in any conditions I never have to stop to charge on those journeys and it s often in rush hour on the way back.

So it all depends on your use case and especially the length of any regular round trips where you wouldn t normally stop unless you had to. Like today I m driving into London and back, which is around 100 miles each way. I can do that easily with a 250 mile range without stopping on the way home in heavy traffic. With my old car it would have been a close call and I often had to top up on the M40 to make it home.

I actually used to do a similar 200 mile out and back drive to London occasionally in my old iPace, it did push the limits of range but all that was required was a 5-10 minute stop on the way down to add more than enough miles for the return leg. I'd plug in, go grab a coffee and fire off a couple of work emails.

Don't get me wrong, I do like not having to stop at all on the same trip now, but realistically my additional stops probably added up to less than an hour a year. Would I inconvenience myself by an hour per year if it made the difference between me having the car I wanted for reasons other than range...? Yep.

The same way all my previous ICE cars were very inconvenient on my wallet... I liked the cars so I ignored the inconvenience.