Petrolgeneration's Metallic Grey 2019 Lotus Elise Cup 250 - Project Thread

[Petrolgeneration]

The universe is trying to make me feel better by sending me gifts.

Thinking about removing the icons from the 4 bottom buttons and trying to map it to control the AIM MXS LCD Race dash.
Would be a pretty neat and clean solution I think!

Quality of the unit is great. I heard good things but it is much better than I even anticipated. Very sturdy, no flex and very nice tactile feedback on the buttons.

Now I'm just looking for a Lotus badge insert for it. I saw it somewhere but can't find it anymore. If anyone knows where to get it, please let me know!

Early next week the Reverie wing should get shipped aswel so hopefully I can fit it before the end of next week. Very curious on how it will look aswel.

Edited June 14, 2019 by Petrolgeneration

[scotty435]

Would be great if Lotus can offer some of the after market options you are making to your 250 on the next generation Elise would be great if they could carry on with a stripped out racer format but with up to date real world technology.

[Petrolgeneration]

10 minutes ago, scotty435 said:

Would be great if Lotus can offer some of the after market options you are making to your 250 on the next generation Elise would be great if they could carry on with a stripped out racer format but with up to date real world technology.

I think that probably goes against their 'keep it light and simple' vision. Actually had a pretty interesting conversation with my dealer on this topic. They do have a lot of great electronic parts available in the Geely group so it's not that it's not possible, they probably just don't want to. The next Elise will probably be bigger and heavier (hearsay/rumors) so they might step up their game on that one as they might want to compete more with cars like the A110 and 4C, also considered driver cars but they just don't do it for me. I think the main Lotus strenght it the fact they stick to 'f*ck it, let's just keep a great open gated shifter' and automatic transmissions spoil the experience and I kinda agree. Even though I love my C63, which is an absolute RWD monster with 611hp/847nM torque, I miss driving my manual 2012 BMW Z4 a lot which was a lot of fun. Shifting is slower but so much more rewarding.

Since we're not qualifying for 24h of Le Mans, I don't mind not having the latest Porsche PDK transmission. I just want to have a blast driving and Lotus one of the few (only?) manufacturers out their that still makes true lightweight driver oriented cars.

Edited June 14, 2019 by Petrolgeneration

[Petrolgeneration]

Car receiving the final details. Going to pick it up in about an hour or two. Too bad the weather is horrible today but can't complain. Finally receiving my little beast!

 

[Petrolgeneration]

I'm finally on the road. Finally picked the car up at the wrapper at around 5pm on saturday and managed to put 600km's on it this weekend. Time to get rid of that run-in period!

It does seem to lack a bit of the oemph I'm used to but I'm sure some modifications to 300hp will do just the trick for me.

I must say, I've never had as much fun with a car driving slow but the little Elise is something else. The AMG is only really fun when driving like a madman but this is just fun all the time.

Since this thread is worthless without pics, prepare to scroll a lot

 

I already modified the fuel filler to a full black one as it is all in the details.

Edited June 17, 2019 by Petrolgeneration

[Stubox]

2 hours ago, Petrolgeneration said:

It does seem to lack a bit of the oemph I'm used to but I'm sure some modifications to 300hp will do just the trick for me

Looks great,what modifications are going to take it to 300ps?

[Petrolgeneration]

15 hours ago, Stubox said:

Looks great,what modifications are going to take it to 300ps?

If you have a Cup 250 / 260, you just need to fit the Emu Black ECU and adjust the mapping. Talk to RRR Engineering. They can help with the mapping aswel.
They provide a basemap, can help you remotely with teamviewer and help you on your way. If the basemap is set, just take it to your local ECU engineer and let him finetune.

You do need an aftermarket exhaust because stock one is very restrictive (including manifold).

You can achieve the same result with a Cup 220 if you change the injectors aswel and add a smaller pulley. Otherwise the cup 220 will be running at around 260 hp.

I know several people who use this and are very pleased with the results! No failures and runs stable. Even guys hammering their cars on the track.

Edited June 18, 2019 by Petrolgeneration

[Stubox]

Looks interesting will be good to follow how you get on 👍

[Petrolgeneration]

14 minutes ago, Stubox said:

Looks interesting will be good to follow how you get on 👍

Will do! First complete run-in 😉

700KM / 2500KM 

[The Pits]

[Petrolgeneration]

There have been some upgrades since the last times I posted.

I received the Reverie wing in a massive box. It's a good thing I drove my Mercedes to work. It barely fit the car. (you can also spot the damage on the bumper from the truck driving into me *sigh*)

Tiny testfit done... double wing?

Removing the wing was easy. The good thing is the Reverie wing fits on the OEM Lotus mounts.

Sideblade fitted but not flush. Gonna need to modify the holes a bit as they don't align perfect. A bit of a shame for such an expensive wing.

Fitted and looking good! It makes the car look very aggressive and even a bit over the top. I do plan on using this wing almost exclusively for track use so will fit the original wing for regular driving. I am planning on comparing these side by side on track and see if there is a noticeable difference in track performance. 

Next up was cleaning up the engine bay a bit. The naked engine looks a bit sad in my opinion so I had the carbon engine cover fitted. Also planning on comparing temperatures with it removed because I think it will make a big difference. On the other hand, leaving the engine exposed to the weather elements seems sub optimal aswel. 

Seatbelt harnasses fitted. Removed the black cover behind the seats for some extra weight shedding. It also included some sound insulation even though the car was delivered without any insulation. I guess this is something they fit nonetheless. It did shave of a bit over 2kg's in total so nice bonus.

Finally I fitted the license plate. Was still waiting on the paperwork but all done. It's some sort of plexiglas front plate so it was heated up in an oven so we could make a bend that aligns properly with the edged front of the car. Looks good imho!

 

Also had the first small drive after the run-in period. I was a bit sceptical for the power as I'm used to quite a powerful car as a daily but I must say, so far I am actually pretty impressed.

I think the car will be perfect with around 300hp and that is doable fairly easy. Will keep you guys posted on that as I've been getting several questions on how to do it so I will try to document my experiences as good as possible.

On the way now are the boss steering wheel adapter and a quick release. Once they arrive I will be fitting the Momo wheel and the Summit Raptor 8 steering wheel buttons.

Can't wait for the result. Been very pleased with how everything is going (and looking) so far!

Edited June 28, 2019 by Petrolgeneration

[Petrolgeneration]

New day , new toys.

Finally received a steering wheel hub and the quick release. Going to install on saturday. Should be a massive upgrade as I feel it will do the interior a lot of good and give it a much more racecar-feel.

 

This is the Summit Technologies Raptor 8 control unit. I'm not going to install that just yet as I'm planning on ripping out the dashboard for carbon and alcantara retrims anyway.
Also with the AIM MXS Dash, the dashboard would have to come out aswel. Don't want to remove it more than necessairy not to unnecessairy wear it down as it wasn't made to be pulled apart multiple times.

Edited July 3, 2019 by Petrolgeneration

[Neal H]

I did wonder why you specified an expensive carbon wing if you were then buying an after-market one, but if you're swapping them between road and track then that makes sense!

It will be interesting to hear if the big wing makes a noticeable difference on track. I'm not a fan of the big wing look on the Elise. I do love that carbon engine cover though, the look of the bare engine is disappointing to say the least.

[Five50]

Engine cover looks fantastic!

Also interested to see the Momo model 88 wheel in the car if you have any pics?

Keep up the good work!

[JJ55]

Any new updates to report?

 

[Petrolgeneration]

Hi guys,

It's been a while since I posted. Been very busy at work and took my first holiday in forever so I was 'off the grid'.

A lot of stuff has been going on with the Lotus.

First off, I've driven the car on track for the first time. It was at circuit de Folembray in France. I was the 3th fastest car on track behind a 650hp ZL1 and an Ariel Atom. All within 1 second from eachother. I missed a bit of top-end speed but we will get that part sorted later (more on that soon ;))

I did notice too much bodyroll in my opinion so I'm gonna get that sorted out by installing a Nitron system for starters. I'm planning on driving the 24h of Zolder in Belgium next year and I'm getting the racing license in september. They also give lessons in telemetry readouts and car setup so I'm still waiting a bit to figure out if I'm installing a simple 1-way system or a 3-way. 3-way is much harder to set up and I still want to be able to arrive at a track and get it sorted in a matter of minutes and not spend hours doing a few laps, pitting, adjusting, doing laps, pitting, etc.

On the modification end:

I ended up talking to Jubu Performance and Komo-tec. I'm planning on doing a few things to the engine. Reinforce, more cooling on the gearbox, better intercooler, manifold and exhaust, ECU and up the power to 300 for starters. Then drive around, keep an eye on exhaust temps, and take it up from there. There is a possibility to do a single garret turbo conversion that can get up to 470hp on the dyno, which is insane in a little Elise and still keep it controlable using a boost-by-gear setup in the ECU. That way you don't get crazy wheel spin and it makes the power delivery very useable, however I plan on sticking to a supercharger setup as it resembles an NA engine more and has a better power curve for track usage in my opinion. My goal is to end up at around 350hp. That would give it an insane power to weight ratio and will make the car blistering fast on track.

The steering wheel hasn't been installed yet. I've been waiting on a demon tweeks order for over a month now that has the screws to attach the wheel in it. Hasn't been shipped yet due to an item in backorder.... 

For the AIM dash, I plan to have it installed at the same time we do a first power increase so we can have all the sensors installed right away aswel. There is a possibility to install an MXG, which is slighter bigger by removing the binnacle or modifying it. I do like the open binnacle style but I'm afraid the sunlight will make the display unuseable so I'm looking into possibilities to design a custom binnacle in CAD and have it 3D printed and trimmed with alcantara.

Edited August 26, 2019 by Petrolgeneration

[Petrolgeneration]

Next up, I took a trip with the Lotus! (a second car was with us for the luggage).

We started the trip in our own country, going to visit a buddy of mine who was racing the 24h of Zolder in a Cayman GT4, then drove to Cologne (Germany), then to Slovania (Bled and Bohinj) and finally spent 10 days in Southern Croatia in Makarska.

The roads there were amazing. Not much traffic and crazy bends on great asphalt. Drove all the way there with the brakes and tires used on the trackday and they still are pretty ok in my opinion. Tires are starting to wear now but the brakes feel perfectly fine. It's amazing what a bit of weight shedding can do on a car.

I will post some more updates when the modding starts again. 

I'm planning on doing a trackday the 15th of september in Abbeville and perhaps Zolder end of the month september.

After that, track season is slowing down and I will start tearing the car apart to start the real big modifications.

 

[Petrolgeneration]

I'm still planning on installing an AIM dash, however there will be a Lotus specific dash somewhere in september so I'm waiting to see if I'm going for that one or an MXS/MXG. This actually caries a lot of the features of the Aim dashes and can connect with the smartycam HD 2.1 to give you a professional overlay video with throttle input, G sensors, etc. You can also do a full analysis of your laps in the race studio software, which is great if you're serious about driving your Lotus on track and improving your laptimes.

Despite the fact I'm installing a dash for sure, I decided that for the upcoming trackdays, I wanted to experiment a bit in advance with the AIM Race Studio 3 and learn the ropes a bit so I couldn't longer resist myself and bought an Aim Solo 2 DL GPS laptimer with ECU connection. The Solo 2 (non-DL) version is the same but can't do ECU readouts and at a significant lower cost.

It was a bit fiddling around with the laptop, however the AIM documentation is really good and I managed to get it installed and working in less than 30 minutes. Next is looking into all the ECU parameters I can actually read from the Lotus ECU and then create my own custom pages with the information I want to monitor.

I'll give some brief info on installation:

Connecting to the ECU is easy. There are 2, actually 3 options to monitor engine stats. The first one is an RPM sensor, this would be relevant for older cars but gives very limited info without installing additional sensors.
The other option is using an ODB11 connector or CAN RS232. I would recommend RS232 for a fixed install as this goes directly to the ECU and will provide fastest communication. There were some issues with older Lotus ECU's that had a slow ODB readout but this seems to be very spot on from what I've tested already. You just plug it in with the port located under the center of the dash, below the aircon controls.

Next you launch AIM Race Studio 3 and you make sure the Solo 2 has wifi enabled. (It gets powered from the ODB but there is also a charger included and it can run from the batterypack)

Next you connect wifi to your Solo2 DL. They suggest setting a wifi password but it doesn't really matter. I'm just turning wifi on and off on the unit when needed and I don't see someone hacking your facebook account by connecting to your laptimer 😉

You then create a 'new device' and select Solo 2 DL. This will show you all the possible settings for the unit.
The unit can't detect what ECU is being used but the AIM website has a very nice page where you can search for your model and you can easily select the correct ECU version without hassle.

After that, it's just configuring the settings like you prefer them:

• Backlight color
• Mode (performance driving f.e. accelerations or track driving)
• Predictive LED lights for laptimes or shift indicator
• ....

Plenty of possibilities and I still need to research all the potential but so far I'm super excited already. It's a bit more expensive than a Vbox but I can see why (in my opinion).
The final step is creating pages. You can select different page layouts and you can easily assign which value you would like to display where and save it as a page.

After that, it's just a matter of clicking on 'transmit' and it sends your setup to the unit. You can for example create settings when driving on track but also make a more simple page when driving on the road. (I find a decent speedometer really useful as I don't like the Lotus one hehe). What I do like is the fact you can create lay-outs and new profile settings without being connected to the unit. So you can sit next to your wife/girlfriend on the sofa and just fiddle on the laptop with your settings. Then just upload when done!

 

 

Preparing for the track day a few things needed sorting out first.

Brake check, fluid check etc.

Brakepads were halfway gone. Not bad after taking the road trip to croatia and back, including a full day of beating the car up at the track.

The perforated brake discs were filled with brake dust but nothing a drill can't fix!

 

 

I do need new semi's though but not sure what tires to buy. I'm open to suggestions!

Edited August 30, 2019 by Petrolgeneration

[Five50]

Thx for all the updates. Will be interesting to see this develop...

 

Re tyres - there is lots of forum wisdom in different directions. I looked at Avon ZZR and Toyo R888R.

To me, some consistent themes in discussions and online have been that the Avon ZZR has the higher lateral grip capability vs R888R - however, the Avon’s also take fewer heat cycles before going ‘off’.

For avoidance of doubt I have no scientific basis for this!

i have also found R888R ok in wet conditions whereas I have heard that ZZR Is less so (again, hearsay not science). I’d still be a bit careful on 888 in standing water - but my general experience with them on the road has been pretty good.

An Avon ZZS would have improved wet weather performance over ZZR (similar / same compound more grooves).

However, when I was looking there was quite a price difference between ZZS and R888R - and wanting one tyre to do everything I thought that was as good a reason as any to try the 888 first. I thought they also looked better - lol.

Not disappointed so far.

[Petrolgeneration]

9 hours ago, Five50 said:

Thx for all the updates. Will be interesting to see this develop...

 

Re tyres - there is lots of forum wisdom in different directions. I looked at Avon ZZR and Toyo R888R.

To me, some consistent themes in discussions and online have been that the Avon ZZR has the higher lateral grip capability vs R888R - however, the Avon’s also take fewer heat cycles before going ‘off’.

For avoidance of doubt I have no scientific basis for this!

i have also found R888R ok in wet conditions whereas I have heard that ZZR Is less so (again, hearsay not science). I’d still be a bit careful on 888 in standing water - but my general experience with them on the road has been pretty good.

An Avon ZZS would have improved wet weather performance over ZZR (similar / same compound more grooves).

However, when I was looking there was quite a price difference between ZZS and R888R - and wanting one tyre to do everything I thought that was as good a reason as any to try the 888 first. I thought they also looked better - lol.

Not disappointed so far.

Any reason you're staying away from A048 and A052?

[Five50]

Forum wisdom at the time was that the 048 was >10 year old technology.

52 I am not so familiar but seem a bit more of a high performance road tyre than true semi? Happy to be corrected.

Most popular tyre at any given track day?? I’d say R888R based on what I’ve seen

My understanding is that with a race car and the ££ you’d go ZZR

 

Would welcome any other views

[Neal H]

I believe AO48’s are no longer in production as they don’t meet the latest EU noise regulations although there’s still stock around. AO52 is the replacement.

I’ve not tried the latest R888R but I used to run R888’s. Compared to AO48’s I found them better in the wet and more progressive on the limit, although they didn’t have quite the outright grip of the AO48’s.

I recently bought a new set of rear AO48’s as mine were shot after 4K miles and three track days. Front’s are still fine. Next time though I’ll be looking for an alternative.

[Five50]

I would expect to get double or triple the number of TD’s from R888R tho appreciate everyone drives differently 

[Petrolgeneration]

3 minutes ago, Five50 said:

I would expect to get double or triple the number of TD’s from R888R tho appreciate everyone drives differently 

The general consensus seems to be the A050 are 'the closest' a tire can get to slick with barely being legal, however it seems they are way more suited for time attack with the G/S compound version. The M & MH versions don't seem to be close to the performance of the G/S and as soon as they overheat grip fades rather quick. The A052 should be a faster choice but the downside is the shorter lifespan compared to the R888R but to me it seems like a fair compromise.

I like long sessions and go out for many laps on a single trackday so probably gonna test a set of A052s. Too bad the A050 is less suited for these longer sessions as it is blistering fast.

[Petrolgeneration]

Meanwhile another small update.

I couldn't help myself and bought the Smartycam HD 2.1 as I was going to install it anyway with the Aim MX dash. It works perfectly with the Solo DL2 so I went ahead and bought it so I can get some better footage on my upcoming trackday in 2 weeks.

Install was fairly easy. Camera is ridiculously solid. I believe the aim website when they state a car can drive over it. Wouldn't want to get hit in the head by it

Used a RAM mount to install on the harness bar and looks very clean. As I have a closed cockpit I opted for the 67° angle camera.

Can't wait to test it!