[Amahoser]

For me, mixed feelings. As stated before, the reflectors are damn ugly and the exhaust isn't menacing looking. But those are small concerns.

Likes:
- The general styling hasn't changed much, thank god!
- The LSS wheels are pretty and light!
- Both the leather and cloth seats have an air pump lumbar support... something that'll help my lower back issues.
- The exterior color choices much more varied than expected
- they were able to keep the car under 2k pounds! Yeah!
- mid year introduction of a lightweight option that removes A/C and the radio!.... and $500 of the sticker price.
- LSS is NOT a limitied production of three hundred! According to Tony Shute, the MINIMUM number they have to sell to break even on the wheels is 300. They are definatley NOT a limited production deal!
- the softop is actually pretty easy to put on and take off.
- no cupholders!!!
- the Auto Show test cars will be available to dealers for demo rides soon!
- 1st 40 fedealized production Elises will be demo cars for the dealers.


Dislikes:
- with the airbag equipped steering wheel, it is much closer to me making my arms bend more than I like.
- no Alcantara
- the shock dampening is NOT adjustable on the LSS option
- (LSS) the ride height is ONLY adjustable to two positions.... with a spacer and without. So corner weight adjustment is not possible. THESE are NOT adjustable coil-overs.
- the plastic cover over the door sill was already scuffed up bad... not a good design.
- not particulary impressed with the interior... seems a bunch more slapped together than the Euro-Spec car I drove
- I miss the Euro-spec seats
- no ashtray!

Laughable:
- anyone else notice that the trunk has an emergency release cable just in case I accidently lock myself in the trunk!

Another bit of news.....
Rumour has it that Symbolic BH might be closing down! If they do..... what will happen to my place in line and my gaurantee of MSRP??

Jose Soriano

 

[atyclb]

Laughable:
- anyone else notice that the trunk has an emergency release cable just in case I accidently lock myself in the trunk!

That one's a federal requirement...

 

[James A]

The news on the shocks is really disappointing, the ride deight is adjustable by shims??? Setting corner weights with shims is a real pain! Well there is always Raceline, www.raceline.co.uk/lotuseliseframes.htm

 

[Sownman]

Another bit of news.....
Rumour has it that Symbolic BH might be closing down! If they do..... what will happen to my place in line and my gaurantee of MSRP??

Jose Soriano

Are you sure ? The fact Ive heard is they are moving. If your rumor indeed proves to be true I imagine they will itegrate the LaJolla and BH lists and honor commitments as best they can. I really think you're incorrect though. Why go out of business when they finally have a car that will gaurantee them 8-10 sales a month ? Something I assume they've never had.

Steve

 

[adamant]

Thanks for the impressions. You raised some good issues.
Does anyone know how easy it is to remove the covering from the interior door sills. I want the aluminium look for the interior. I would seem to me that the exposed aluminum would be an improvement all round.

 

[nj1266]

The more I read about the LSS, the more I think it is not worth the money. Ride hide adjustability is meant to do two things: Lower the CG to reduce weight transfer and corner balance the car to maintain adequate weight transfer. Shims do the former but not the latter. A performance oriented suspension must have threaded ride height adjustability, there are no alternatives.

I have been racing/hotlapping my FWD 98 SE-R for three years now. And the more experience you get, the less useful the original suspension you started with. Originally I started with a double adjustable (compression and rebound) coilover with 350 lb-in front springs and 300 rears. I had a front 1 inch roll bar and a rear 3/4 inch roll bar. Now the car has 650 lb-in front and 550 rear with NO front roll bar and 1 & 1/8 rear adjustable roll bar.

As you can see, when I started I was leary of oversteer, now I welcome it and I cannot have enough of it

The Lotus LSS suspension does not allow us to experiment with suspension settings. It is a one size fits all. Unfortunately, different drivers have different styles and different skills. What works for you may not work for me.

I read about the racing line suspension and it is more promising than the LSS. The suspension and the roll bar will run you around $1951 (exchange rate @ 1.79). Admittedly, you do not get the rims and tires, but if you track the car you will need a separate set of rims and tires anyway. So you might as well keep a street set and a track set.

 

[ChrisB]

Re: Re: Elise Impressions after the L.A. AutoShow

Are you sure ? The fact Ive heard is they are moving. If your rumor indeed proves to be true I imagine they will itegrate the LaJolla and BH lists and honor commitments as best they can. I really think you're incorrect though. Why go out of business when they finally have a car that will gaurantee them 8-10 sales a month ? Something I assume they've never had.

Steve

From what I have heard, their lease was expiring and they intended to move to another location, but could not close a deal prior to the end of their lease. I believe they have already closed. I would assume that until they can get another location in LA, they will operate out of their La Jolla store. I wouldn't expect any negative impact on their LA customers, other than the inconvenience of going to La Jolla for a while.

As long as they deomonstrate a short-term desire and ability to reopen an LA store, I would espcect LCU to treat their allocations as two stores (if they in fact would have originally).

I would suggest that anyone with a deposit call them and find out your/their position.

 

[MattG]

Does anyone know how easy it is to remove the covering from the interior door sills.

It looked like a separate piece from the one covering the floors, so removal *should* not be too difficult, I doubt Lotus glued it down. There's still enough exposed aluminum above it, though, that it might not be worth the effort to remove it.

 

[jml1952]

The letter that we received from Symbolic indicated that they were moving and looking for a larger location that would allow an on-site service center.

In any case, my salesman (Nick Smith) has been working out of the La Jolla office for some time, so I don't believe this will have any affect on us, except perhaps for requiring us to pick up cars in San Diego if they still haven't opened a new location in the next five months.

I'm not sure that the LA Auto Show cars will be available for test drives. The Lotus guys told me that the red car had problems when they tried to drive it off the transport truck (engine exploded and damaged the rear end, which was repaired) and all of the cars are really cobbled together. Perhaps some are driveable.

One of the Lotus guys told me they encourage people to drive the car prior to buying it so that they won't have misconceptions and be disappointed. I told him that I would love to drive the US car if only I could. He said wait until May when the dealers get their demos.

Nick and Tony did drive the Bordeaux red car to the show (Clyde told me where it was parked, so I took a look at it), so perhaps that one could be around for test drives. It has some rough edges, so wasn't up to spec for display at the show.

I would be happy to drive one, but I don't need to do so to make my decision. I'm in.

I was impressed with how nice the hard top looks, very well integrated with the body. The improved soft top with the touring package also is impressive, attaches easily to side mountings and is more firmly attached than I thought, so it would be hard for a thief to just rip it off (but easy to cut, of course).

Very easy to reach accross to the passenger door, so manual or electric windows would be fine, but I prefer the small switch for the electric windows over the manual crank.

These cars are not finished production versions, so I think it's hard to judge the interiors, but I was quite pleased overall.

The reflectors are integrated into the fenders pretty well, they just don't look great. Not as horrible as I thought from the photos, but not wonderful. The reflectors on the rear diffuser plate also are not particularly attractive. The exhaust tips are so low and recessed that they are not too noticeable. I prefer the previous version with separate pipes towards the sides of the car, but this layout is not possible with the Toyota engine (would add weight and lose efficiency according to Nick).

 

[_JD_]

Did any of you show attendees notice if the pedal spacing is the same as the 111s? Good info btw jml.

 

[Amahoser]

Considering what the LSS is, I probably will NOT get it. I'll need to test drive a standard Federalised Elise before making up my mind though. The LSS seems to be geared towards people who occasionally track their cars and don't want to be concerened with suspension setup. I'm sure that the aftermarket for us folks in the U.S. should be able to provide better options.

As for the Symbolic issue, hopefully they will find a new location. From what I heard at the show, Lotus is under negotiations with Symbolic. They want to have a presence in the Los Angeles area. And if Symbolic cannot meet that obilgation, they will look into another dealer. The hope is that the deposits can be transferred to the new dealer. Kinda sucks for me since I have very much enjoyed dealing with Nick over at Symbolic.

The plastic door sill covers *seemed* to be loose. Hopefully that is a pre-production piece that will be finalized later.

I agree that the interiors are still in pre-production form. So I hope the production versions will look better.

One thing I forgot to mention is the hard top. Here's one car that definatley looks better with the hard top on rather than off! So IF I do end up buying an Elise, it'll be a standard Elise with no touring pack, no sport pack but with a hard top.

Jose Soriano