December Car and Driver Preview 2005 Elise

[xxxotic]

Didnt they make it a law that all cars after 199? or so had to have steel beams inside the doors to protect occupants in the event of a side impact crash. This would account for some added weight too. An additional oil cooler, bigger radiator, ABS, bigger fuel tank,
and msot importantly a differant engine and transmission would account for some of the weight. Maybe they weighed it with the hardtop on too.

[jeffc]

The Elise already had side impact beams so it had no problem meeting the U.S. crash standards. I don't know if the chassis side rails are high enough to help in the specific test, but they probably help in real life. They're pretty high up so they may contribute significantly.

[jml1952]

According to the Car and Driver article, the Toyota engine adds 154 lbs to the weight of the car.

Sounds like A/C adds 50 lbs or so.

Air bags might add a little, as well as ABS.

This seems to account for most of the weight gain.

[smoseley]

Originally posted by jml1952
This seems to account for most of the weight gain.

They (and you) seem to be forgetting to account for one HUGE factor that will add to the weight of the Fed. Elise.... American Obesity !!!! I could see that adding as much as 50-75 pounds per car (assuming one occupant, or twice that for double occupancy) on average !!! This is a serious issue that I think we need to address with Lotus Cars !!!

[RacingDynamcs]

If i was really worried i would say this "lets give them nice ring-a-roo on the teli and ask them nicely to stop feeding the elise junk food. "

but i'm not because with some adjustments the car will be the best elise ever produced...

[Arno]

One contributor to the higher weight of 2004 models currently on sale in europe is the huge amounts (by Elise standards..) of added sound insulation/deadening now finding it's way into the cars.

The 2004 parts list now lists quite a big amount of the stuff and it's even stuffed in parts of the chassis beams!

Ripping most of that out probably gets you quite a nice weight loss on the car. It wll be louder and more rattly, but that's just like the current ones are

A/C is already available on European Elises and I don't think the version for the US will be very different. The european version adds about 15kg to the base weight of the car.

Doesn't cool very much though and for those of you who live in warm/hot parts of the US you may consider cutting off the constant hot water flow to the heater matrix completely (and putting in a local bypass in the engine bay). This cuts down on a lot of the heat that soaks into the cabin while driving and helps the cooling effect of the A/C system a lot.

Although.. Who knows.. Perhaps Lotus doesn't use a constant water feed for the heater in the US models..

Radio/speakers (2 or 4) are also pretty normal on most elises here, so no real weight difference with a US version either.

My guess is that the bulk of the added weight comes from the new engine.

Also don't forget the gearbox! The PG1 gearbox used with the Rover K-series in europe is also a very light (albeit terribly rattly..) unit and the toyota one may add some extra as well.

The combo of engine+gearbox may well add about 100kg to the car. (comparable to the Speedster/VX220 which is also heavier)

Bye, Arno.

[babak]

Originally posted by Arno

Doesn't cool very much though and for those of you who live in warm/hot parts of the US you may consider cutting off the constant hot water flow to the heater matrix completely (and putting in a local bypass in the engine bay). This cuts down on a lot of the heat that soaks into the cabin while driving and helps the cooling effect of the A/C system a lot.

Hey Arno,
I don't understand this...Does this mean that the heater coil for the cabin heater is constantly charged with hot water? Why would they do that?

[Arno]

Correct. The heater matrix is always 'hot' and a flap in the ventilation box is used to bypass it when 'cold' air is selected.

Remember, this is a *very* simple car.. No valves, levers, etc..

The heater circuit is the coolant bypass circuit of the engine on the Elise when the thermostat is closed.

Perhaps it will be different in the federal Elise, but I would not be surprised if this remains the same. Very simple setup and it (sort of ) works.

The basic problem with this setup in hot climates is that the heat from the heater matrix (even though no air is passing through it) is slowly heating up the entire ventilation box and the A/C evaporator has to work against this heat.

Also the pipes feeding the hot water to the heater unit run along the top of the chassis/dash and as aluminium is a very good heat conductor it will make the dash and surrounding areas feel hot to the touch as well.

Of course the main coolant pipes also run through the chassis beams and slowly heat the cabin, but it's less noticable.

If you disconnect the heater/bypass circuit and install a short bypass hose in the engine bay then you stop the heating of the ventilation box and also the dash.

Makes the job for the A/C much easier, but you lose all your hot air capacity..

BTW.. The excellent heat conductivity of the chassis also makes it pretty cold in winter as all heat you push in the cabin just gets 'sucked out' through the thin floor skin

Bye, Arno.

[jeffc]

I'd be kind of surprised if the Toyota engined version did not have a heater coil bypass near the engine and also stronger air conditioning. Some places of the U.S. are 100+ degrees F for days or months at a time.... Hopefully they didn't do all that air conditioning engineering and add all that associated weight for nothing.

[zvezdah1]

COmponents of the air con have been beefed up for the US car.

But, don't expect lexus blizzard cold a/c in 100 degree weather, a limit to how big compressor condenser could be fitted.


Chris

[strawtarget]

One bonus is that there is very little interior space in the Elise... less air volume means less work for the A/C to do. With the top on. In theory, anyway.

Arno: I hadn't really considered the heat conductivity of the chassis. Heh. You're right... the Elise is a huge heatsink.

[Dan]

http://www.caranddriver.com/article....rticle_id=7371

[Tpup]

I love that color!

Roy

[Randy Chase]

2005 Lotus Elise

The Brits promise your road racer is finally on its way.
December 2003


We seem to have been promising a fully certified, street-legal Lotus Elise for years. That's because Lotus for years has been saying it's coming to the U.S.—since 1997, in fact. Well, now at last it is ready. The first federalized Elises should arrive in May.



The good news is that it is a better car than the spartan original. It has 60 percent more power but is only 14 percent heavier than the existing European model. It has the airbags, the anti-lock brakes, and the air conditioning that the car has lacked until now. Perhaps not so good is its sticker of $39,000. It's a fair price for the nearest thing to a modern race car you can drive on the road but will discourage those who see it as a sexy little boulevard cruiser.

That's probably just as well because the Lotus Elise, as a closely focused driver's car, makes few compromises on behalf of the well-being of a passenger. You sit on a thinly padded seat in an aluminum tub (the Elise chassis is made from aluminum extrusions bonded together). There is hardly enough room for two, so the driver's seat is adjustable but the passenger's is fixed—and the cockpit space on the right-hand side is just two-thirds of that provided for the driver.

[Randy Chase]

Elise enthusiasts—there are at least 60 owners of race-spec cars in the U.S. as of this writing—will accept that what it lacks in comfort is compensated for by the performance and handling. Lotus claims the federalized Elise will do 0 to 60 mph in 4.9 seconds and run to 141 mph; prototypes ran to nearly 150 mph. Not much this side of an exotic supercar will keep up with it on a racetrack.

The Elise was designed around the 1.8-liter Rover K-series engine found in the mid-engined MGF sports car, a good choice in 1996 but now getting on in years. Rover has never certified that engine for the U.S., and Lotus judged that a federal emissions program would be too expensive to undertake alone. It looked around for suitable alternatives, engines that were already in use in the U.S. Roger Becker, a veteran development engineer who started at Lotus under Colin Chapman, the company's founder, has been leading the U.S.-certification project. He picked up an old relationship with Toyota (which for three years in the 1980s owned 21 percent of Lotus) and secured a deal to use the 1.8-liter VVTL-i (variable valve timing and lift) engine from the Celica GT-S and its accompanying C64 six-speed gearbox.

Although the internals of the engine are standard Toyota (in fact made by Yamaha), Lotus fits different intake and exhaust systems and, significantly, has devised its own engine control electronics. The result is 190 horsepower (10 up on the Celica) at 7800 rpm and 133 pound-feet of torque at 6800 rpm.

We have our reservations about this engine and transmission in the Celica as it is difficult to keep the engine on the high-rpm cams as you accelerate through the gears. The performance is more accessible in the lightweight (2000 pound) Elise, due in part to Lotus's improvements to the electronics and gearshift. And for those accustomed to the Rover-engined Elise, the Toyota-powered car is noticeably quicker even before the cam phase change at 6200 rpm. Besides which, it sounds terrific, whereas the old K-series and its five-speed gearbox had a rough and rattly edge.

[Randy Chase]

Installation of the Toyota engine required a new subframe and modifications to the rear of the aluminum chassis. The suspension—double control arms front and rear—needed only minor changes in spring and damping rates to cope with 154 additional pounds of weight. Becker and his associates were determined to maintain the Elise's pure responses and wonderfully balanced handling while making subtle changes to the dampers and bushings to cope with the worst of America's highways. U.S.-bound Elises will use a unique Yokohama tire.


Although its cousin, the Opel Speedster that Lotus makes in Europe for General Motors, has anti-lock brakes, Lotus has traditionally regarded both ABS and a brake booster as unnecessary frills for the Elise. But its engineers accept that pedal assistance is needed when vehicle weight rises above 1800 pounds, and that ABS is becoming a standard safety feature of most performance cars. Therefore, the challenge was to provide this latest Elise with ABS that would not intervene during intentional hard braking until the limit of front-tire grip. For the same reason, there is no electronic traction control nor is any planned. The steering does not have, or need, power assistance, although Lotus accepts that some customers may expect it.

Externally, there are few changes from the Elise that was launched in 2000. Identifiers include the twin tailpipes and the slightly raised grille on the front hood to clear the new brake booster. Inside, though, the car has had an upgrade with a new and more shapely instrument panel, injection molded rather than vacuum formed, which accommodates the passenger airbag. The radio is now at its center, and most of the ugly screw heads that were peppered around the earlier cockpit have been concealed. The convertible top is from the '00 car: easier to erect than the original but still a fairly primitive affair.

We drove a prototype U.S. Elise on the test track and on country roads around the Lotus factory in Norfolk, England. As we first wrote of a similar exercise with the original Elise, it's a hoot. For pure sports-car thrills, it's in the top five most-entertaining cars available. The same comments apply to the federalized Elise, which, although it is 450 pounds heavier than the original, is faster and better equipped but still has nearly perfect balance. It is the best Elise yet, and for Americans wanting a race car for the road, it's worth the six-year wait. Lotus Cars USA, which has been subsisting on the sale of a handful of Esprits a year, hopes to expand its annual sales to 2500.

[Randy Chase]

2005 LOTUS ELISE

Vehicle type: mid-engine, rear-wheel-drive, 2-passenger, 2-door roadster
Estimated base price: $39,000
Engine type: DOHC 16-valve inline-4, aluminum block and head, port fuel injection

Displacement: 110 cu in, 1796cc
Power (SAE net): 190 bhp @ 7800 rpm
Torque (SAE net): 133 lb-ft @ 6800 rpm
Transmission: 6-speed manual
Wheelbase: 90.6 in
Length/width/height: 149.0/67.7/44.0 in
Curb weight: 2000 lb

Manufacturer's performance ratings:
Zero to 60 mph: 4.9 sec
Zero to 100 mph: 12.6 sec
Top speed (drag limited): 141 mph