Alex L

Bibs, team and marshalls thanks for organising another great event.

Spotted in Kings Sutton about an hour ago, are you local? EX15GES by Alex L, on Flickr

Thanks, I've been quoted £35 for the towing eye, which doesn't seem steep. I can't be bothered to hack my own front grill, so happy to pay Lotus to supply and fit.

Update, I spoke to Lotus this week who still have no idea when the soft tops will be arriving. Thankfully Aimee to the rescue (suspect she got bored of me bugging her) and today I collected my new roof. Hopefully the weather will hold enough for some roofless motoring this weekend. The towing eye is still on back order, so she's not got rid of me that easily.

Everyone beat me off the line as I was trying to pull away with a modicum of mechanical sympathy rather than dialling in a load of revs and dumping the clutch. I didn't encounter any bogging at all and the car just kept accelerating all the way through the 1/4 mile I appreciate it's all about the quickest times as opposed to who gets through the line first but it felt like I lost against the Griffith 500 in my final run, despite beating his time and terminal speed. CT-0856 by Alex L, on Flickr

It was an enjoyable day but not something I'd do in the Exige again, just a box I wanted to tick having never been to Santa Pod. 12.9 secs did seem quite respectable as I had a full fuel tank, 2 helmets in the boot and for half of my runs I also had a passenger and was still achieving low 13s at circa 107mph terminal. I probably wouldn't have used launch had I even known how to, the time from the staging lights coming on until the launch isn't suffcient to follow the procedure above. I was also warned that someone recently had transmission failure and apparently the car had undertaken 11 launches and Lotus weren't keen on paying out under warranty. The track was cold and even pulling away with no preset revs delivered a load of wheelspin as per my video below. Please excuse my excitedness on the first run against the Zetec powered Anglia that I thought was going to destroy me https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bW-yBxEO1e4 External view that someone sent me, showing my lethargic reactions https://youtu.be/NaFmqgRxUE8

I did consider this but a) I've no idea how to engage it and b) I probably didn't have time to

Took my new Exige along to the Pistonheads Sunday Service at Santa Pod today to see how it would get on. I've never been to Santa Pod, let alone taken a car down a 1/4 mile straight so was slightly nervous being put against a Zetec powered, slick shod Ford Anglia on my first run. He had me off the line as my reactions were slow as I was looking at the Marshall and not the lights. Managed to reel him in as soon as the wheels stopped spinning when I got up to 2nd gear! Clearly the Exige was never designed with straight line launches in mind but considering, it managed some respectable times. On board video to follow

Ah ok, I was led to believe they have additional lining over the old rag tops. Had a look on Elise Shop and they're a lot more expensive than I'm paying from Lotus Silverstone

Apparently the S3 Exige soft tops are lined, whereas the older versions are not. I'm just waiting for them to come back in stock.

The car is booked in for the chop on the 1st April, unfortunately the soft top is currently on back order with no ETA

A couple of new photos taken at Bruntingthorpe by Pistonheads photographer Chris Teagles and obvs thanks again to Aimee for her valeting skills....

Matt, assuming you've not sold them all, please can you put one by for me for the 1st April when my car comes in for the soft top conversion?

Erm Aims, would you like the pack of chewing gum back that I found under the seat?

Great, thanks Neal. Coming from a 2-Eleven, I don't require any storage space :-)

The invoice does state it's lined so guess so. Out of interest does it fit in the boot when rolled up in the bag?

The conversion isn't that expensive, it's just the outrageous price of £734 for the soft top that's eye watering.

£966 to have the soft top conversion, ouch. Still, I'm going to get it booked in at some point over the next couple of weeks.

That one is has 2-Eleven wing mirrors

They're completely different animals, the C63 (estate) has so much torque and would be great with a manual gearbox but then it'd be useless as a daily driver. The C63 is actually the other half's car and she commutes 75 miles a day in it, my daily ride is an F30 3 series. Both cars run 265 section rear tyres and I can't help but think the Merc needs much wider to cope with the power delivery. The best thing about the Mercedes is that it's stealthy, it's rarely cleaned, has been debaged and is in silver so most people have no idea that it's anything more than a C220d. The Exige however is a little more shouty in appearance.

Here's my new toy that I collected from Lotus Silverstone on Tuesday. My second purchase from Aimee in 11 months

Thanks, not sure I can wait that long. May just bite the bullet

Thanks Bibs, knew I'd seen the post somewhere, just couldn't find it. Kalli, I collected the car yesterday and was advised not to buy direct as they're very expensive.

I'm going to get Lotus Silverstone to carry out the soft top conversion to my coupe but in the meantime was wondering whether anyone can point me in the direction of the correct tool to remove the hard top. Also where's the best place to buy a soft top from, as presumably they can be found cheaper than Lotus charge?