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My Owners Diary July 2001Previous Entry | Diary Index | Next Entry4th July 2001Production Glass (see vehicle components / ongoing developments) now produce a two piece fibre glass hardtop for the Elise S1. They also produce one for the 340R! Let's hope they can get one into production for the S2.
6th July 2001A thought occurred to me this morning on my way to work. I've had the Scooby 12 months now and the last time I took it on my favourite circuit was over 9 months ago, just after I had run it in. I took it out this lunchtime, just to familiarise myself with the route and found out why I haven't done it recently. The Scooby can never disguise its weight like the Elise and simply doesn't give the same level of interaction and enjoyment. On the narrow B-roads it feels twice the width of the Elise and you don't seem to have as much space to play with on the road. Sure, it can circle my favourite roundabout at a constant 60mph with a continuous 4 wheel drift and associated tyre squeal. It's effortlessly quick, but that's the rub. There's no real input required and no adjustment needed. The Elise on the other hand was just as quick but it was more of a handfull to balance and keep on the edge of traction, with undulations in the road surface needing continuous tiny corrections. At the end of the long stretch of dual carriageway, the Elise would be up to about 120mph, requiring some rapid decelleration before hitting the 90° bend at the end of the slip road. Today I really didn't feel the need and it was just as well, as a Police patrol car sat at the end of the slip road. It is getting so much harder to having an enjoyable drive nowadays, so a car which is fun to drive at slower speeds has to be the best bet. The bottom line is, that without an Elise, I don't really have a favourite circuit anymore, and I guess that's why I haven't used it for over nine long months.25th July 2001Lotus will be producing a new turbo version of the VX220 for early 2002, using the Astra Coupe engine and producing 187bhp. This should take the 0-60 time down to about 4.5 seconds and estimated cost will be near to £25k. This should provide some added incentive for Lotus to produce their own high performance Elise to compete in the desirability stakes. Let's hope Lotus can stay close to the £25k mark.27th July 2001According to the latest news from Pistonheads the Elise came 65th out of 67 cars tested in the What Car? security review. The security of the S2 has barely changed at all from the poor security design used on the first S1 cars. That's over five years and virtually zero development and improvement on the cars security design. Some would say that Lotus have been negligent in this respect.
At least the boot is a little more secure on the S2 (now has a seperate lock) but I'm sure this was largely dictated by cable routing problems and not security issues. The doors can still be opened (when locked) from the inside. Anyone care to design a lockable enclosure/cover for the space behind the seats? I also thought that it would make a decent acoustic enclosure for some nice rear speakers at the same time (and is in keeping with the Lotus philosophy). A nice summer job for a student up at Hethel? Now if they could only integrate a cubby hole for a mobile phone and some sunglasses as well! |
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