The s2000 is hardly a racecar. Honestly I'd be more interested in the Elise than a z or s2k if the ride isn't overly harsh. It has exotic looks, gocart handling, toyota reliability with the engine, and ~vette acceleration

NEW YORK TIMES: NEW YORK TIMES ARTICLE

2005 Lotus Elise: Lotus Finally Lines Up a New Car for America

By MICHELLE KREBS
Date Posted 05-14-2004


Birmingham, Ala.

EVERY few seconds a baby boomer turns 50, demographic experts say. That's a lot of potential midlife crises, and few things soothe middle-age angst better than a fast, low-slung, open-air sports car.

A car, in other words, like the Lotus Elise, which goes on sale next month. American boomers have already noted the Elise's impending arrival by making deposits for most of the 2,000-plus cars to be imported in the 2005 model year, according to Lotus Cars USA.


The Elise looks buglike, and with a 0-to-60 time of 4.9 seconds, it can fly.


Devotees of Lotus, the legendary British sports car maker, have waited a long time for the $41,000 Elise, which has been thrilling Europeans since 1996 but until now was not certified for the United States. Lotus's American operation has been hobbling along with only the larger, more expensive ($90,825) Esprit V-8, which has gone out of production after 28 years. (You may recall the Esprit that turned into a submarine in "The Spy Who Loved Me," a 1977 James Bond film.)

If you concluded that frequent model changes aren't a priority, you'd be right. The Elise is the first new Lotus to reach America since the Elan arrived in 1991, and it is the cornerstone of the company's expansion plans. Indeed, fully half of all the cars to be built this year will end up in American hands.

Through the death of its founder, Colin Chapman, and a succession of owners, Lotus lost its way. But the Elise suggests a return to Lotus's core values, for it epitomizes what made the company famous: heavyweight performance through featherweight components.

At 1,975 pounds, the rear-drive Elise is truly svelte - far lighter than either the diminutive Mazda MX-5 Miata (2,387 pounds) or the Honda S2000 (2,835 pounds). The Elise is so trim partly because it is so small. Less than 44 inches tall, it is 5 inches lower than the Miata. And with an overall length of 149 inches, it is shorter than any mass market car in America save one. (The Mini Cooper is just 142.8 inches long.)

The chassis is made of extruded aluminum - that is, the alloy is squeezed into shape, like pushing toothpaste from a tube - and weighs a mere 150 pounds. Thin, light composites make up the body, and more weight is saved by glueing the pieces together.

The four-cylinder engine, situated midship behind the seats, and six-speed manual transmission are borrowed from the Toyota Celica GT-S, a significantly heavier car. The dual-overhead-cam engine displaces 1.8 liters, and it permits the Elise to meet American emissions requirements. The Rover engine used in Europe could not be certified in the United States, the main obstacle that has kept the Elise from coming here sooner.

Front air bags were added to meet American safety standards. The car does not have side bags.

In the Elise, the Toyota engine produces 190 horsepower and 138 pounds-foot of torque, less than the S2000's 240 horsepower. But with its lower weight, the Elise rockets from a dead stop to 60 miles an hour in 4.9 seconds, Lotus says, and has a top speed of 150 miles an hour. Yet the Elise delivers an estimated 26 m.p.g. in city driving and 37 m.p.g. on the highway, better than a lot of so-called economy cars.

The Elise has had a face-lift since it made its debut, and it has a decidedly buglike appearance, its large, bulging headlamps looking like the eyes of "The Fly." The sides are cinched in to form air scoops, and the rear has a purposeful athletic look. The 14 available paints include the typical red, yellow and silver along with "lifestyle colors" like Krypton green.

The Elise comes with a canvas top that lifts off and fits in the small trunk (4 cubic feet) at the rear of the car. An optional hardtop is $1,475.

While I think the Elise is (pardon me) cute, I was intimidated by the prospect of driving it on the track of the Barber Motorsports Park here, where Lotus made early examples available for testing.

The apprehension starts before you get in. One doesn't just jump behind the wheel. Instead, because of the very low roofline when the top is in place, one carefully ducks and lowers oneself into the seat much as a professional racer gets into a car. Exiting requires ducking under the roof before standing upright; while at the track I saw a lot of drivers whack their heads.

The cabin, in the vein of a barebones weekend racer, has no frills. The door panels and floor are bare, exposing the aluminum skeleton, and there are no cup holders, no power outlets, no tilt steering wheel. For that matter, the Elise does not come with power steering or an automatic transmission, not to mention its lack of high-tech systems like traction control and stability sensors. But air-conditioning is standard, along with a Blaupunkt AM-FM-CD stereo and antilock brakes.

The molded seats adjust back and forward only, and they won't accommodate aging boomers who have bulked up around the middle and bottom. Nor are the closely spaced pedals designed for big feet.

Nevertheless, at 5-foot-2 I fit perfectly in the seat, and my small feet had no problem with the pedals.

The Elise comes to life with the push of a starter button. Engineers designed the exhaust tone to be louder and throatier than the one in European versions, and it is an appropriate note for the character of the car.

Despite my initial apprehension, I found the Elise surprisingly easy to drive - and enormously fun. At the Birmingham track, the first exercise was to speed around a curving course to get a feel for the handling. The car's tiny dimensions allowed it to squeeze through the course's sharp hairpin turns and tight lanes. Nimble defines the Elise.

Next, I headed to the park's racetrack, used for sports car and motorcycle races as well as for Porsche's driving school. The Elise felt at home on the 2.3 miles of track with its hills, sweeping bends and blind turns. It stuck like superglue to the asphalt even through pouring rain and hail. The Elise has the instant reactions of a Go-Kart: turn the wheel and the car goes precisely and immediately where it is pointed.

Then it was off for real-world driving on the slow-moving country roads around the complex. Sitting a scant six inches above the pavement, I felt every pothole and bump. After confidently racing around the track, I felt humbled as S.U.V.'s and tractor-trailers towered overhead.

The Elise feels most at home on the track, and it is best viewed as a weapon for weekend racers. Whether one sees the car as an expensive toy or a bargain-basement Ferrari depends on what you compare it with.

The Elise starts at $40,780 including shipping. A $1,350 touring package adds leather seats, electric windows, carpeting, sound deadening, an insulated top and an upgraded audio system with CD and MP3 players. A sport package adds forged alloy wheels, special Yokohama tires and a track-tuned suspension. Other extras include the hardtop and special paint. Compared with a Porsche 911 or a Ferrari Modena, the Elise is a deal.

But for spoiled boomers who like being pampered with heated seats and automatic transmissions, there are less expensive ways to go topless. The Miata, starting at $23,000, and the S2000, at $34,000, are easier to live with every day. And for those who rarely or never venture onto a track, those cars may soothe the aches of middle age just as well.

INSIDE TRACK: If the toy fits, wear it.

That English Patient Is Starting to Stir Again
By JAMIE LINCOLN KITMAN

Published: May 16, 2004


THE newly Americanized Elise represents not just a successful return to the purist ideals of Lotus's founder, Colin Chapman. The Elise will once again make Lotus a presence on American roads while raising production to the highest levels in the 56 years since Chapman built his first car.

Volume is a relative concept for a company like Lotus, which has sold barely more than 70,000 road cars in its lifetime, along with a much smaller but unverifiable number of racing cars and kits. Compared with, say, the 900,000 F-Series trucks that Ford will sell this year, it doesn't add up to much. But the 4,000 Elises that Lotus hopes to build at its English factory in Hethel, Norfolk, over the next 12 months is a lot more than 320, which is how many cars Lotus sold worldwide in 1993, its recent nadir.

Like so many sports car makers, the company's sales figures correlate closely with the American market. In its best year, 1969, Lotus sold 4,500 cars, primarily on the strength in the United States of its Elan roadster (whose most famous driver may have been Diana Rigg, portraying the British agent Emma Peel in the television series "The Avengers") and its midengine Europa sports car.

After 1996 the Elise raised Lotus's sagging volume, but that car was not certified in the United States until now. Its arrival as a 2005 model is already spurring activity at the Duluth, Ga., headquarters of Lotus Cars USA.

Mark O'Shaughnessy, director of United States marketing and sales, said this month that more than 2,000 deposits had already been taken by Lotus's 40 American dealers, who hope to deliver more than 1,000 cars by year-end. In anticipation, Lotus Cars has doubled its stateside staff to 12, a number that may soon reach 20. A new president and chief executive, John A. English, who previously worked at Mazda and Volvo, was installed last week.

The American operation had lain low in recent yearswith four employees and one model, the handsome but dated Esprit V-8, whose roots go back to 1975. A mere 89 Esprits were sold last year. Production ended in March.

While Chapman's engineering credo, to gain performance by subtracting weight and "adding lightness," has been adopted by others, few have emulated the boom-and-bust cycles that marked his reign at Lotus, which ended with his death in 1982, or the turbulent years that followed.

A closely held company in Chapman's lifetime, Lotus lurched from crisis to disaster to triumph and back again, more than once. Financed (and depleted) by side ventures - including a Formula One race team, now defunct; yacht, bicycle and micro-light airplane projects; and countless design consultancies for other manufacturers, including an infamous association with John Z. DeLorean's sports car - the receivers were never far away.

The DeLorean episode is remembered for $17.7 million in payments from the British government and private investors that went missing. As investigators closed in, Chapman suffered a fatal heart attack at age 54. A former chairman, Frederick Bushell, went to jail.

A succession of hopeful buyers took the reins after Chapman's death. Lotus was sold in 1987 to General Motors, which named Robert J. Eaton chairman before he departed to run Chrysler and become famous for selling that company to Daimler.

After investments in a new, front-wheel-drive Elan monumentally failed to spur sales in the United States, G.M. passed Lotus on to an Italian industrialist, Romano Artioli, who had begun to resuscitate Bugatti. It was, paradoxically, at this low point that the high-tech Elise arrived, just ahead of the company's sale to Proton of Malaysia, which retains control today.

The Elise has been universally acclaimed; Lotus even builds versions of the car that are sold by General Motors in Europe as the Opel Speedster and Vauxhall VX220, which have their own G.M. bodywork and engines.

So not only has the Elise restored some bustle to Hethel, it has turned on the cash flow to a company that made it out of the 20th century against all odds.

Executives hope the infusion of Americans' dollars will let the company develop larger, upscale cars, drawing on the Elise's adaptable architecture and allowing Lotus to avoid the bust that has, always before, followed success.

Lotus has announced bold plans for a ‘circuit car’ based on the Elise, and set to challenge the plethora of super-lightweight track such as the Caterham CSR, Radical and Ariel Atom 2.

Unveiled at Lotus Club International’s annual dinner last week, these renderings provide the first indication of how the new pared-down Lotus will look. According to highly-placed Lotus sources, its sculpted composite body panels have been designed to maximise downforce without consideration for practicality or suitability for the road. This single-seater is an out-and-out racer intended solely for track day and competition use.

The car will weigh just 600kg, and will be powered by the same Toyota 1.8-litre variable valve timed engine as the Elise 111R. In 189bhp tune, Lotus estimates a 4.0sec 0-60mph sprint and 100mph in 11.0sec. A supercharged version is likely to pack 240bhp, like the forthcoming Exige 240R, but with 300kg less to carry, it should rocket to 60mph in 3.5sec and pass the ton in 9.0sec.

Prices have yet to be set, but the normally aspirated car is likely to cost £32,000, while its supercharged sibling is expected to come in at around £35k. Volume is expected to be limited to around 100 cars per year. Production begins at Hethel this December.

A supercharged version is likely to pack 240bhp, like the forthcoming Exige 240R, but with 300kg less to carry,

These are the first official pictures of what could be the fastest ever Lotus, the track-biased Circuit Car, due to make its public debut this weekend at the Shelsley Walsh Hill Climb Centenery Festival Meeting.

Weighing in at just 650kg, the Circuit Car is 75kg lighter than the 340R making it the lightest production car yet to be spun off the Elise's extruded and bonded aluminium chassis. Like the 340R, the Circuit Car does without doors and roof, and this time it goes a step further by losing its windscreen and adding a full roll cage. The aerodynamics have received a thorough revamp and power comes from either 189bhp normally aspirated or 243bhp supercharged Toyota four-cylinder engines. Lotus claims that the supercharged car will go from rest to 60mph in under 4.0sec, to 100mph in under 9.0sec, and on to a maximum speed of over 150mph.

The Circuit Car will come as standard with a single seat, although there will be the option of adding a passenger seat to bring a friend along for the ride, and it will be given a Lotus 'E' name or type number before it goes on sale. Though it is designed as a track-day car, the new car will also be offered with an optional 'SVA pack' for road use and only around 100 cars per year are expected to be built, with a likely starting price of around £25,000 when it arrives in mid-2006.

The public will see the car for the first time when it is demonstrated on August 19 and 21 by head of product development Tony Shute, the man behind the ultra-lightweight polyeurathane-bodied Exposé.

HETHEL, England — Lotus' Circuit Car is due to make its public debut this weekend at the Shelsley Walsh Hill Climb Centenary Festival Meeting in England.

Weighing in at just 1,323 pounds, the Circuit Car is basically a stripped-down Elise 340R, weighing 165 pounds less than the road car. It is the lightest production car yet to be spun off the Elise's extruded and bonded aluminum chassis.

Like the 340R, the Circuit Car has no doors or roof. Further weight has been shaved by dispensing with the windshield. The car has a full roll cage, as it is specifically designed for motorsport use. It's powered by either a 189-horsepower normally aspirated or a 243-hp supercharged Toyota four-cylinder engine. Lotus claims the supercharged car will go from zero to 60 mph in under 4 seconds, and to 100 mph in under 9 seconds.

The Circuit Car will come standard with a single seat, although there will be the option of adding a passenger seat, and it will be given a Lotus "E" name or type number before it goes on sale. Only around 100 cars per year are expected to be built, starting mid-2006.

Having just completed the first full year of Elise sales in the United States, Lotus officially set a new record. A total of 2385 Loti were delivered through 45 dealers. That makes Elise the best sales success the company has seen in its 57-year history.

Harking back to some key Lotus sports and GT racer colour schemes (used on some versions of the Lotus Elite, Type 23, and Lotus Elan) from the 1950s and 1960s, Lotus introduces the limited edition Lotus Elise Sports Racer.

Two distinctly different vehicles have been produced. The first, in Ardent Red, features a single painted white stripe flanked by two thinner painted white stripes and has distinctive white wing mirrors. The interior of the car is also unique, with matching red stitching set against black leather trim.

The second car is Nightfall Blue and has twin painted white stripes running the length of the vehicle. Again, this car features white wing mirrors and has a unique interior, subtly matching the exterior of the vehicle, with blue stitching on the leather.Both the versions have a coloured (red or blue respectively) Elise logo stitched into the headrests and unique Elise Sports Racer decals positioned on the exterior of the car.

The Elise Sports Racer will be built in limited numbers with a total production run, across the two colours, of 199 units worldwide with each one given an individually numbered build plate.

Under the blue and red colour schemes, the Elise Sports Racers use some of the best sports and track specific components available including ultra-lightweight 7-twin spoke forged alloy wheels (saving a massive 1.2 kg of unsprung weight per corner), Advan Neova AD07 LTS tyres linked to sports suspension (uprated Eibach springs and stiffer Bilstein dampers), twin oil coolers and switchable Lotus Traction Control (LTC).

The switchable engine-managed Lotus Traction Control System (LTC) is active above 8 km/h (5 mph) and works through the engine, reducing power when required to maintain traction. It operates much quicker than many brake based systems. A Torsen-type limited slip differential (LSD) is available as an option for tight low speed, high acceleration driving (such as auto tests).

Standard luxury kit includes a colour matched hardtop, central door locking, electric windows, interior stowage net, sound insulation pack, black soft-top with sound/thermal insulation and black full carpet set.

LED rear lights are fitted which are brighter and the brake lights illuminate 2 tenths of a second (0.2 seconds) quicker (or one Elise car length at 70km/h / 43 mph) and are 36% lighter (around 0.6 kg) than conventional filament bulbs.

The Proven and High Performing Engine and Gearbox
With a VVTL-i engine (Variable Valve Timing and Lift-intelligent) producing a maximum power output of 141 kW (189 hp or 192 PS) and 181 Nm
(133 lbft or 18.5 kgm) of torque, the Elise Sports Racer sprints to 100km/h in 5.2 seconds (60 mph in 4.9 seconds) and 160km/h (100 mph) in 13.0 seconds before reaching a certified top speed of 241km/h (150 mph).

This performance is achieved through a balance of environmental considerations with the fully Euro IV Emissions compliant engine helping the Elise to return 8.8 litres/100 km (32.1 mpg) on the combined cycle, as well as the very low figure of 208 g/km of CO2 emissions.

Sometimes steel is lighter than Aluminium!

A new lightweight pedal box

The Lotus Elise Sports Racer uses a new lighter weight pedal box with forged steel pedal arms and extruded aluminium pads. This new unit, which is lighter that the previous extruded aluminium unit, has an electronic throttle for quicker and smoother engine response, reduced brake pedal ratio and improved pedal feel for the brake and throttle. All three pedals are better positioned for improved “heel and toe” brake and throttle control on downshifts. The cable-less throttle also ensures that emissions are managed more effectively and kept as low as possible under all operating conditions.

Air-conditioning is available as an option and weighs in at a featherweight 15 kg.

The Lotus Elise Sports Racer is available from Lotus dealers in November 2005 at a recommended retail price of £31,995 in the UK. Other world market prices will be issued shortly.