C&D Lightning Lap: 22 cars; 4 categories. Setting: VIR. Elise SC featured!

[Bavarian Motorist]

The Lightning Lap, 2008 - Feature/Features/Classic Cars/High Performance/Hot Lists/Reviews/Car and Driver - Car And Driver


Hope this hasn't been posted...


I haven't even begun reading it. Wanted to share it first.

[lotusforsale]

Originally Posted by Bavarian Motorist

The Lightning Lap, 2008 - Feature/Features/Classic Cars/High Performance/Hot Lists/Reviews/Car and Driver - Car And Driver


Hope this hasn't been posted...


I haven't even begun reading it. Wanted to share it first.

Read it...not good for the Lotus...Cobalt was 3 seconds faster per lap. Seriously.

[fitfan]

haven't read it yet either - but i can assure you that they poked about in the elise as allways... i guess they don't get enough advertising dollars to but decent drivers in the lotus cars?

[Bavarian Motorist]

OK...so this review finally confirms what I've been thinking all along.


The reason for the Elise SC's terrible track reviews is the SILLY AD07 tires and smaller fronts!!!!

Originally Posted by C&D

With 218 supercharged horsepower in a 2029-pound mid-engine sports car, we expected to see much better times than we achieved with the Lotus Elise SC. The naturally aspirated Elise (190 horsepower) that ran at VIR in 2006 scampered around the 4.2-mile course in 3:09.2 versus 3:16.6 for the supercharged version.

That earlier Elise was equipped with wider and stickier tires, which offset the SC’s extra punch. And we experienced gear-selection drama with the vague engagements of the six-speed manual gearbox, which also held this car back.

So an N/A Elise turned in wicked times compared to most cars in this test, and it completely obliterated the ELISE SC by 7.4 seconds.. Way to go, Lotus...

[mopho]

Originally Posted by fitfan

haven't read it yet either - but i can assure you that they poked about in the elise as allways... i guess they don't get enough advertising dollars to but decent drivers in the lotus cars?

How can you assure us, where you there?

[kestrel74]

Originally Posted by lotusforsale

Read it...not good for the Lotus...Cobalt was 3 seconds faster per lap. Seriously.

Experienced race driver in the Cobalt, and an 11 year old girl in the Lotus ... These guys are a joke.

[mopho]

Um, the Cobalt is no joke. I've driven it, it is very fast

The Elise just sucks

[Bavarian Motorist]

I can't believe a company like Lotus would opt for the more "streetable", owner-friendly tires/wheels in the sport pack. This has killed many reviews of this car.


FIRE THE MARKETING TEAM; THE ENTIRE TEAM!

[m4mica]

Meh, who cares. If I wanted a Cobalt (or Vette or Viper) I'd go out and buy one. But I don't. I LOVE my Elise. I smile everytime I see it. I smile more everytime I fall into it. Sure, it's disappointing to see it perform relatively poorly, but at the end of the day it really doesn't bother me. Lotus FTW.

[EricH]

Originally Posted by Bavarian Motorist

The reason for the Elise SC's terrible track reviews is the SILLY AD07 tires and smaller fronts!!!!

I did not read the article, but of course I don't like that a Cobalt could beat an Elise SC in any contest... but since when were AD07's silly? Did the Cobalt have better?

[Bavarian Motorist]

Originally Posted by EricH

I did not read the article, but of course I don't like that a Cobalt could beat an Elise SC in any contest... but since when were AD07's silly? Did the Cobalt have better?

Read the quote I made of the article...


The Cobalt ran a 3:13. The Elise SC ran a 3:16. The 2006 test C&D did with an N/A Elise showed a 3:09 time.


Why? The article points out why. The tires were grippier and wider up front.




I'm sure a herd of Lotus-faithful are gonna flock in and tell me how the AD07s are great tires and blah, blah, blah. An Elise, especially a sport pack one, is about performance 1st. These tires/wheels don't live up to that challenge.

I don't know if it's the size difference or the tires themselves. I don't care really. The results speak for themselves.

[EricH]

But my point (or moreso my concern) is if the Cobalt had the 'same quality' tires on it, would it win? If it would then.. that sucks.. but oh well... my complaining ain't gonna fix it. I still would rather own the Lotus.

[Bavarian Motorist]

Originally Posted by EricH

But my point (or moreso my concern) is if the Cobalt had the 'same quality' tires on it, would it win? If it would then.. that sucks.. but oh well... my complaining ain't gonna fix it. I still would rather own the Lotus.

I know very little about this, so hopefully someone can chime in and make sense of this, but I think, judging on everything I've read, the tires' "quality" is not the issue, but the sizes are not proper. Lotus, as you probably know, changed to narrower wheels/tires up front on the sport pack cars which is causing the most problems here.


So to answer your question, I don't know if the Cobalt would win with better tires. It's an interesting question. It won with the stock tires anyways

[turbophil]

I think I'm going to have to agree with BavM. The Elise doesn't have a chance in the world as being accepted as a great DD, so why tip-toe around the subject. Every single one should come with the bigger and grippier tires than the 175 AD07s fronts... A step further, they all ought to have sport suspension or better yet sport pack ought to be standard and adjustables should be sport pack... I mean why not? Again, the s111 not going to sell well to the folks that want a Cobalt type car, it sells to extremists, so make sure everyone has extreme handling.... The car isn't all that much rougher riding in LSS form vs Std but it handles a bunch better and does a lot better in the mags with it...

How the car does in the mags has a lot to do with how the car sells, so it's largely up to the marketing team to get this right to ensure strong sales and a solid reputation---

Epic Fail Marketing team!

Cheers,

Phil

[Bavarian Motorist]

Originally Posted by turbophil

I think I'm going to have to agree with BavM. The Elise doesn't have a chance in the world as being accepted as a great DD, so why tip-toe around the subject. Every single one should come with the bigger and grippier tires than the 175 AD07s fronts... A step further, they all ought to have sport suspension or better yet sport pack ought to be standard and adjustables should be sport pack... I mean why not? Again, the s111 not going to sell well to the folks that want a Cobalt type car, it sells to extremists, so make sure everyone has extreme handling.... The car isn't all that much rougher riding in LSS form vs Std but it handles a bunch better and does a lot better in the mags with it...

How the car does in the mags has a lot to do with how the car sells, so it's largely up to the marketing team to get this right to ensure strong sales and a solid reputation---

Epic Fail Marketing team!

Cheers,

Phil

Thank you. That's precisely what I was thinking.



This is free press for Lotus, and C&D didn't have ONE single good thing to say about the car. Epic fail, indeed.

[mopho]

I don't know why some people feel the need to shoot the messenger (i.e. the magazine) when clearly the set up of the car is the issue. Why didn't Lotus supply them with an Exige 240s, the test was about turning the fastest lap times after all?

I think many people here forget that the Elise was never meant to be some ultimate lap time machine, as a matter of fact, the original concept was just a step up from a Miata with only 120hp.
It's all about being fun to drive, not about lap times, and Evo mag even thinks that the basic package with the smaller engine (europe only) and tires is the one to get for playing on the road.

[Bavarian Motorist]

Originally Posted by mopho

I don't know why some people feel the need to shoot the messenger (i.e. the magazine) when clearly the set up of the car is the issue. Why didn't Lotus supply them with an Exige 240s, the test was about turning the fastest lap times after all?

I think many people here forget that the Elise was never meant to be some ultimate lap time machine, as a matter of fact, the original concept was just a step up from a Miata with only 120hp.
It's all about being fun to drive, not about lap times, and Evo mag even thinks that the basic package with the smaller engine (europe only) and tires is the one to get for playing on the road.

I don't know if you're targeting me or not, but I'm not complaining about the magazine at all. Unfortunately, the 240 S would have been stuck right into the next group with the Viper ACR and Nissan GT-R. That would have been an embarrassing review....


Whatever the Elise began as is somewhat irrelevant now because it has stepped foot into more exclusive territory where the buyers care about magazine reviews and how the car stacks up to the competition (not necessarily lap times, but to a degree).


What I'm bitching about is Lotus' questionable (that's an under-statement) decision to add performance-detrimental parts to the SPORT PACK. If you don't care about lap times or performance, don't opt for the sport pack. But if you DO care about performance, Lotus said, "Screw you" for 2008.

[mopho]

Originally Posted by Bavarian Motorist

I don't know if you're targeting me or not, but I'm not complaining about the magazine at all. Unfortunately, the 240 S would have been stuck right into the next group with the Viper ACR and Nissan GT-R. That would have been an embarrassing review....

I was not targeting you

Whatever the Elise began as is somewhat irrelevant now because it has stepped foot into more exclusive territory where the buyers care about magazine reviews and how the car stacks up to the competition (not necessarily lap times, but to a degree).

Well, that is an American thing and not based in reality

[Bavarian Motorist]

We're all accustomed to Lotus being a small, niche car company that caters to enthusiasts. But if their objective ever becomes "sell cars", which it seems to have become, these are the types of things their marketing department has to focus on.


It's not as though it will affect me. If I ever had an Elise SC, I'd know exactly how to "fix" it if I wanted, as would you. But I am a Lotus promoter and I want Lotus to succeed as a brand, hence my complaining.

[mopho]

Originally Posted by Bavarian Motorist

We're all accustomed to Lotus being a small, niche car company that caters to enthusiasts. But if their objective ever becomes "sell cars", which it seems to have become, these are the types of things their marketing department has to focus on.


It's not as though it will affect me. If I ever had an Elise SC, I'd know exactly how to "fix" it if I wanted, as would you. But I am a Lotus promoter and I want Lotus to succeed as a brand, hence my complaining.

I agree with you, but it seems that people here get all upset when the car doesn't beat every other car in these tests and I think many forget what the concept of these cars is really about