electro_boy

Saw a beautiful red coloured Emira in St Albans this morning going towards the train station. I was in the Peugeot 206 in front, sorry wasn't in the Evora today. The view in the rear view mirror was amazing, those vents on the bonnet are a great styling touch! It was the first Emira I've seen in the wild so I was a bit confused trying to work out what this red spaceship looking thing in my mirror was, then the penny dropped it was an Emira!

Hi All, thought I would give an initial thoughts on the new suspension. Sport 410 dampers and springs are much stiffer than the S1 NA dampers and springs. Around town the car is less comfortable and has more harshness over bumps but once you get a a bit of speed and hit some corners you instantly feel the increased cornering performance. There is a lot less lean in the corners so on quick succession corners, the car feels more composed and a lot more agile as it doesn't roll all the way one way and then back the other way. For sure the bias has shifted away from road and is more track / sport focussed. That silky beautifully judged damping that breathes with the road is still there but you need to start pushing the car through some lovely bends to find it. I felt previously the S1 NA suspension felt special even at 30 mph around town. Now it feels stiff and harsh until I find some open road. Don't get me wrong its not crazy stiff and bouncing away like mad but it is tuned such that it only makes sense at speed. I want to use my car less of an everyday car and more for special Sunday drives and track days so this change really makes sense to me. For anyone that firmly uses their car as a road only or as a daily, stick with the original suspension it really is amazingly well judged (and I kind of miss it). But for anyone happy to make the compromise for better cornering ability its worth it.

I'm no expert by a long way but is that some kind of rivet? You may have to drill that out and put a new revet?

@Fasteddie, I’ve talked to a couple folks who all said for a road car it’s really hard to beat the Lotus standard damping on the S1 and they would recommend just sticking to the standard damper. Even when I was trying to give them my money they discouraged me from changing the dampers. So it looks like Lotus did a really good job. For a track work yes sure the S1 can be improved but road manners will suffer. @Bruss, if I remember correctly you use ES Motorsport to work on your car? They currently have my car in at the moment, it’s getting the dampers swapped out for the 410 dampers as I’m wanting to do more track work and want sportier handling. I haven’t had a detailed chat about it but I think they swapped over without too much trouble. If you want to ask them for more info tell them you’re calling about Jai’s car, Orange Evora S1. Sorry @Spinney I already had bought mine before yours were up for sale otherwise would have gone for them.

+1 to what @Rambosaid.

If the grey Eletre being talked about is the same one I've seen on display at the factory. Then the colour is as @NedaSay says, in the right light with right angle it has red / pink shade and looks really nice its not a barbie pink or childish pink but nice mature shade. This is different to the grey/silver Emira's I've seen on display at shows or at the Lotus Driving Academy which are more standard metallic silver with some flakes to add sparkle but didn't have the red / pink tint to them.

Yep aluminium plate and black frame for the radio come off in one piece including the buttons. Its held in place with clips that you can use a pry tool to get off. If you've not done it before, I had to use more force to pry it off than I initially thought but it did come off safely and in one piece. Attached photo show locations of the clips and where you'll want to focus using the pry tool.

Surely you need to add the extra weight of the electrons when the battery is fully charged! 😄 Joking aside these days EV cars are not really much heavier than your average car. I think a mid range saloon car weighs somewhere in the range of ~1700-2000kg and a similar EV car would be around the same sort of ball park maybe +100kg. So really the article should be comparing modern cars vs old cars and if our infrastructure is build to withstand the weight of modern cars not just EV. Another sensationalist headline from the Daily Fail ... but then you wouldn't click the link 😉

Just read a thread on a different forum where someone's Volvo XC60 did the same thing, i.e. couldn't move the gear stick left or right out of neutral. Eventually the air temp rose to +3 degrees and they could select gears again. They took it to a Volvo dealer who said water can get into the gear cables and freeze up and it may need flushing out with silicon spray.

Try starting the engine and waiting till is warmed up fully and then switch it off and let the heat soak warm up the whole engine bay and see what happens. You can also check the mechanism on the gear box end to try and isolate where the problem might be. Underneath the air box is where the gears cables terminate on to a set of leavers attached to the gear box, one lever controls the vertical movement which appears to be working in your car and the other lever will control the cross gate action. If you can access them you can manipulate them by hand and see if you can select the full range.

I think thats the frustrating thing for us old school Lotus fans. The new car is very accomplished but also more subdued and less raw. It ticks all the boxes that the head wants but only a few of the boxes the heart wants. Its so close but I know for me and what I want from a car, the Evora is right choice for me.

I echo the thoughts above, it's almost as if the Emira is too composed and feels capable of so much more that you forget how good it already is and want more from it. Its what I expected the car would feel like; in my opinion the general public don't want a car too feel too lively and exciting so I guess Lotus had to dial down the fizz the bit to give the car more mass market appeal.

I own an S1 Evora (+2), have sat in a few 4XX Evora's but not loads of experience of them and have driven the Emira during a day at the LDA. Getting in and out of the Emira is much easier than a S1 Evora, its very obvious and noticeable straight away mainly due the huge sill that the S1 has. Emira vs 4XX car is a lot closer, its not something that you would instantly detect and you would have to be specifically trying to compare but maybe, possibly, the Emira is a little easier to get into and out? The seats in all three cars are comfortable, different but all comfortable. Both the 4XX and Emira seats hold you in a bit more so better for spirted driving or track driving but then possible S1 seats better for a long drive down the motorway... The space in the back of my +2 Evora is certainly bigger than the space in the Emira. But again I think there is plenty room to put a couple small suitcases in the back of an Emira. I didn't bother looking at the boot of the Emira when at the LDA but I gather its similar to the Evora. So I think is practical enough for two people to head off on an adventure for a few days. For sure on a trip down to Ikea I am going to fare better in my +2 Evora compared to the Emira but thats not really a sensible test. So overall I think the Emira is going to be perfectly fine car to live with everyday and get around in comfort and carry a typical and sensible load for the type of car. So I guess the extra cup holders in the Emira tips the balance in favour of the Emira for everyday liveability! 😉

Guess it depends on what you want from the car. Want something with more power but use as daily then I guess either an S or Phil’s spec 400? Want something with sharper more sporty handling than any of the 4XX would fit that bill. Want to do lots of track days… I guess either Sport 410 or GT430?

Depends what the price is and response from the dealer. If the car was priced up at the top end then yes I expect faults to be fixed but also bearing in mind its not a new car so there will be wear and tear. If the car was priced lower and the dealer was open about the faults on the car then thats fine to me. Work out if the price reduction makes up for the faults and make them an offer or not. If the dealer was pretending the car is immaculate then I would walk away.

I've had the battery disconnected on my S1 Evora for over a week and have not had air bag light come on. I also connected and disconnected the battery multiple times when trying to debug the old faulty battery and connecting up a new one. Didn't get any issues with mine. If my experience is not a fluke then I would suggest to remove the battery and keep that on trickle charge through the storage period. There will be zero load on the battery as it is not contented to anything so zero chance of something rouge on the car drawing too much power and depleting the battery while on trickle charge. This assumes the car is 100% not going to be used over the winter period and assumes the car is safely and securely stored as the alarm will not be functional with the battery removed. But doubt either option makes much difference, there are thousands of people that store their car for long periods with the battery connected to the car and on trickle charge without much problem. Personally I say stick some winter tyres on it an enjoy over winter 😉

Just caught up on the Austin race, it was a pretty good race with lots going on, really enjoyed that. Good to see that Merc have bought some upgrades are more competitive, they were in for a chance of a win there and not just because they got a dealt a lucky hand with safety cars or changeable weather etc. Comments from DC suggested it wasn't just the track really suiting their car and this was genuine increase in overall performance. Hopefully this means they understand their car better and can keep this good form for the next few remaining races and even start next year back at sharp end and fighting it out with Red Bull and Ferrari for the wins. Oh also that move by Charles down the inside of Sergio (I think?)! 🫣😆😍 Wowza!

This post a couple after it suggest that when variable slip mode is enabled the stability control is disabled.

Hi All. I took a look at my carbon tail gate today, I got the "unfinished/factory seconds" version. It looks like its fully finished with glossy finish and just a few light scratches on it. I was planning on just getting a detailer to give it a polish to remove the light scratches. From reading through this thread, seems like thats the wrong action? Even though the tailgate has a glossy finish it still needs a top coat of lacquer to prevent it from going milky? Can any bodyshop do this or does it have to be a carbon fibre specialist with some special top coat?

Agreed there needs to be a proper punishment given to RBR. Bending the rules, finding holes in the specification is part of F1 but when teams get caught being bending them too far, they have always been punished. I don't see why this would be any different!

Amazing ballsy move my Max on the first corner to get back in the front! Congratulations Max on a well earned championship! FIA causing another fiasco with unclear application of the rules making it a not so clear that Max had won the championship so was a bit of an anticlimax. I guess the mis-table battles will still go right to the wire to see who can get 4th position in the constructors and I guess 2nd, 3rd, 4th in the drivers championship is still relatively open so still plenty of action in the remaining rounds.

Ahh so it just clips into the rear seat belt socket? Nice thats a neat trick! Think I might end up copying you. Mine is very similar to yours, high miles (~80K) but has has a lot of stuff fixed. I put some feelers out for prices and got some low offers because of the high miles. The fact that I had done many fixes and improvements did not seem to matter.

@SCMTBCOACH, beautiful car! (I'm also a burnt orange Evora owner!) Can you give me some info on how the racing harness is tethered please? Was thinking a harness might usefully on track days and keep strapped in the seat a bit more.

Can only agree with the folks above. Sure if you are Lewis Hamilton and need to extract every ounce of performance from the car get it checked by all means. But usually if car is tracking straight under acceleration and braking, everything feels fine and symmetrical in the corners and the tyres are wearing evenly (maybe slight bias to inside edge as its sports car). Then that points to everything being OK.

The 400 shifter mech fitting was part of a bunch of other mods and fixes I was doing at the time so I don't know how much it cost on its own. Have a chat to Dave at ES Motorsport and get a quote from him. I don't think it was cheap, certainly only something to consider if you have a shifter mech failure or you really want a better shift feel. I was getting clutch changed to 400 clutch and lighter fly wheel so car was in bits anyways and made the job easier for them so I went for it. As far as I know there was not any issues in fitting it. ES Motorsport didn't comment on any difficulty or problems so I assume it was straight forward. I've had it for over a year now and maybe over 10K miles and it really is an improvement over the S1 version; has a better feel and is more accurate when shifting. Its not perfect you still can't rush the change too much but it is significant improvement over S1.