Lotus Emira

[godlameroso]

I know there's someone working at Lotus on these forums. I take my hat off to you good sir.

[RZS10]

Ah, the last proper Lotus ... looks good, as if the Evora and Evija had a kid. I like it.

[Morteza]

[AngusF1]

Go Lotus!

Funny though, it has the same power, weight and features as my 20 year-old Corvette. You'd have hoped things would have improved in 20 years.

[Greg Locock]

Grins, laws of physics haven't changed lately, and I suspect your 1:1 comparison is not entirely accurate.

[littlebigcat]

Theres more Toyota engineering in this than the Supra

[Just_a_fan]

Go Lotus!

Funny though, it has the same power, weight and features as my 20 year-old Corvette. You'd have hoped things would have improved in 20 years.

I bet the Lotus's handling, road holding, and ride quality are in a different league to the Corvette's, however.

[Greg Locock]

Dunno, about all of that, whatever its other issues the C5(?) had MONSTER TIRES on it, so I suspect the limit handling figures wouldn't be too shabby.

What I was gently angling at is that a 2021 car has a bunch of airbags and other assorted stuff for things like crash that a 2001 car didn't. This is all high up in the body so your mass and CGZ suffers.

[Zynerji]

Go Lotus!

Funny though, it has the same power, weight and features as my 20 year-old Corvette. You'd have hoped things would have improved in 20 years.

I bet the Lotus's handling, road holding, and ride quality are in a different league to the Corvette's, however.

Have you test-driven the C8 yet? Way better than the last Elise that I drove. Like, lightyears ahead. This new one looks fun tho...

[JordanMugen]

Have you test-driven the C8 yet?

It's very good, but isn't it setup to understeer with the standard chassis settings despite being mid-engined?

I am sure the Lotus will be much more neutral out of the box in typical Lotus fashion, without having to tinker with swaybars, spring rates or the like as Corvette enthusiasts may feel they "need" to do.

Hopefully the Emira will succeed at taking sales from Porsche, especially with Geely handling the "boring stuff" like switchgear which Lotus were not traditionally terribly good at.

...Journalists always rave more about cars that have spot-on neutral chassis settings out of the box -- be it the Alpine A110 (lift-off oversteer ahoy by L'argus at the Nordschliefe or on Best Motoring: "very sharp handling, great fun"), Lotus Evora, or a humble Ford Fiesta ST, EP3 Civic Type R or Peugeot 205 GTi -- so it does seem strange that a manufacturer like Chevrolet would deliberately set understeer, knowing that this will attract a lot of criticism and reduce the fondness and hype with which the car is received.

But the journalists do have a fair point in that is annoying to have a car that needs to be modified out of the box, just to perform how it should do in the first place. So they rightly praise cars which are 'correct' with their factory settings.

[Rodak]

Nice renderings. Have they built one yet?

[theblackangus]

Go Lotus!

Funny though, it has the same power, weight and features as my 20 year-old Corvette. You'd have hoped things would have improved in 20 years.

I bet the Lotus's handling, road holding, and ride quality are in a different league to the Corvette's, however.

Have you test-driven the C8 yet? Way better than the last Elise that I drove. Like, lightyears ahead. This new one looks fun tho...

I own a C8 and I would not say its light years ahead.
The steering feedback is no where near as good as an exige.
You cannot feel the tyres a much as an exige.
It feels much heavier than an exige on cornering, however doesnt have much roll. (Mag-ride here)
It is very planted and corners well.
It has alot of power, but is NA to somewhat lacking down low torque (as expected)
Seating position is about equally good.
The c8 is a big vehicle, and doesnt have the nimble feel of an exige.

The emira is temping for me.
I think it looks marginally better.
I could get a manual!!!!!
Power to weight is nearly the same so both should be very quick, but the emira will have more low down torque most likely.
Using hydraulic steering vs electric should give it a better steering/road feel.
Down side is that it will be alot more expensive for the same power to weight most likley

[Just_a_fan]

Go Lotus!

Funny though, it has the same power, weight and features as my 20 year-old Corvette. You'd have hoped things would have improved in 20 years.

I bet the Lotus's handling, road holding, and ride quality are in a different league to the Corvette's, however.

Have you test-driven the C8 yet? Way better than the last Elise that I drove. Like, lightyears ahead. This new one looks fun tho...

C8 isn't a 20 year old Corvette, is it?

[Stu]

Go Lotus!

Funny though, it has the same power, weight and features as my 20 year-old Corvette. You'd have hoped things would have improved in 20 years.

Lotus had a pretty big hand in the Corvette ZR1 if my memory serves me correctly (they were part of the GM group at the time), must be 30 years ago?

[Greg Locock]

Yes, the LT5 engine design and development was outsourced to Lotus and built by Mercury. I did a bit on the engine. Certainly motivated the Corvette guys to pull their finger out with the next engine.

Lotus R&H did a fair bit of work on it and the Active group were stuffing active suspension into it. The intention was to build 200 active units, that got canned pretty quickly.