After 32 years, fare well to my Esprit

[mr50bmg]

 

I am writing this in the final hours of my 32+ year Esprit ownership.   I've been wanting to sell it these last few years.   I'm almost giving it away with a very low price and tomorrow it will be done.

I haven't been on this forum since 2015 and, even then I wasn't a frequent poster.   This posting is a farewell to my Esprit as it moves on to a new life with a new owner and, not coincidentally, a farewell to my interest in sports and exotic cars.

 

This is its story.  I am the third owner of what is a RoW Lotus Turbo Esprit first sold in Belgium and destined for the Middle East.   It was imported to the US by the second owner, from whom I bought it in 1991.   

 

When I bought it, I loved the shape Giugiaro had designed (still do).   I was a member of the local Lotus club and my greatest desire was to take it on monthly drives with the club.  Sadly, most of my memories with the car are those of disappointment.

 

Club drives didn't happen very often and when they did, often it required leaving home at 7am on a Saturday morning to drive and be at the meetup spot at 8am.   As a night-owl firmware engineer putting in 60+ hours a week, that drive schedule didn't work.   On the few drives I did attend, a navigator was required in order to follow the map or scribbled directions to know where I needed to go.  Some clubs, like our Jag club, are good with discipline to ensure cars don't get separated while going through city traffic  ("always let the car behind you stay in sight") or our Triumph club which has a sweep car.   In hindsight, I should've driven with those clubs in my Esprit - they had weekly drives.

 

Later on, our club did have more frequent drives but it seemed that my car was always being worked on when a good drive was scheduled.   I spared no expense to keep my Esprit in the best condition I could.   At that time, any expense less than $10,000 was essentially of no concern to me.  The shop had a few knowledgeable Lotus mechanics, but their specialty was another marque.  After many years, they had more and more work and it was clear they didn't really want to work on my Esprit (usually carb tuning for emissions, regular maintenance, timing belt, etc.).   Usually my car was at their shop for over a month, set aside.  One mechanic clearly stated he didn't like working on the car.  Even so, I kept it healthy and running; it had no issues.

 

Yet, my bad luck in missing drives continued.   In 1995 Lotus was the featured marque at Laguna Seca.  A lot of people from our club were planning to drive our Lotuses there and stay for a week.   I planned for this and got my car ready.   On the morning of the drive to our club's meetup and departure point, I packed all my gear in the car, got in, pulled out the choke, put my foot on the throttle, and... the pedal fell to the floor.   The throttle cable snapped just at the carbs and fell somewhere down between them.  With neither a spare cable nor any time at all to try to do a repair, I was forced to drive my daily car to the event.  I was really mad.

 

Ten years later there was a similar Lotus event 1200 miles away.  Only one other club member besides myself were driving to it - but that was better than going alone or not at all.   At the event, at the first night's grand dinner, there was a little contest to determine who had driven the furthest.  The drama built as the mileage threshold increased and participants dropped out.  At 1200 miles, the contest was between me and one other driver.  He beat me by 100 miles. The host stated that there used to be a time when you wouldn't want to drive your Lotus further than you could walk back home; he asked the winning driver what his Lotus was.  I was curious what my 22-year old Esprit lost out to.  It was a new, week-old, Lotus Elise.  Right.

 

I took my Esprit out on a few other drives in the following years, but by then it needed more maintenance.  It needed a new timing belt, new tires, needed the carbs to be tuned and the valves adjusted. I also got a new proper flywheel for it, as the original had been shaved and it was too light.  The tach stopped working and I got it fixed, but upon putting the tach back in somehow the shop got my wiring harness messed up and my telltale lights would not come on.

 

I last drove the car in 2016.  I got busy with work and the car sat in my garage till 2019 when I had it trailered to a different, much more distant shop, for the needed work.  That shop also specializes in another marque, but the proprietor and head mechanic knows Esprits, has worked on them, and has a good reputation.

 

Then the Covid craziness appeared, my mechanic's help disappeared, and the car sat with its engine and transmission out.  So it has been there since 2020.

 

Over the years I've had other sports cars and touring cars as well: a TR6, a Jag XJ6, an Audi S4, and a Porsche Cayman S.  The Audi and Porsche were very nice.  But I came to realize I wasn't enjoying them.   There would be a nice warm sunny day and sometimes I'd feel it was more of an obligation and chore to drive the car alone up the freeway and back for 90 minutes when I'd much rather get into my daily car and just go to the coffee shop.

 

With all the jerks today and their loud exhausts, bright lights, and braggadocio posturing, I realized that now I dislike sports cars. I never liked muscle cars.   The two most enjoyable and satisfying cars I've ever owned and driven were small manual transmission economy cars (one a diesel!).  I'd own them again today if they weren't so dwarfed by so many bigger vehicles driven by unaware impaired drivers.

 

In the last few years I realized I didn't want to drive the Esprit nor own it any more.  My time with it had come and gone.  It is partially disassembled now, but the engine and transmission are fine.   Getting it all back together, sorting possible unknown new issues, paying for that, and then looking for a buyer or selling on consignment is more than I wanted to deal with.  I'm retired now and I can no longer say $10,000 is of no concern as I'd had in the past.

 

I indicated to the shop I wanted to sell the car and was open to consider any offer no matter how low.   I got an offer for the Esprit from a customer whose other car was in the shop and who saw my Esprit.  It was a low offer, maybe laughable to others, but I accepted it.   If the owner puts $10,000 into it, paying for labor already done and future labor, he will easily have a $20,000 to $30,000 car, if my understanding of current BaT prices are correct.

 

So tomorrow my Esprit gets a new owner.   May they both fare well.

[jep]

Enjoy your retirement.

A good mechanic near home is essential to enjoying any older car (or do it yourself). Outside the UK, that can be tricky with Lotus and especially tough in US. 

It's long been the vicious circle for low volume manufacturers even when the cars are new, let alone once they reach classic status.

Justin 

[jonwat]

Same here, I gave up mine (five Lotus in total) when I became too old to crawl around underneath it & there's no local specialist to take it to.

It was a fabulous 23 years of fun while it lasted but it was time to move on.