Not for the faint of heart! - Now "Exige Cup 430"

[razad]

http://www.lotuscars.com/exige-cup-430

 

Max power	430 hp at 7000 rpm (436 PS)
Max torque	325 lbft at 2,600 rpm to 6,800 rpm (440 Nm)

 

[TBD]

21 hours ago, 550superfast said:

Maybe so, and the same goes for my cup with SSC TVS1900 kit etc. But the Lotus job here looks well engineered - more cooling, bigger clutch, less weight, more air flow to engine compartment and a warranty. After market tuning does not have this level of detail.

OK, lets get a bit more detailed. The Cup 430 costs about 35.000 € more than I paid for the EX460.

My car has 460 HP, the Öhlins (road), bigger brakes, aero and most of the options included. So, for the 35 K I could add EX500 kit, oil, gearbox coolers, even the XTRAC sequential and still have enough money over to buy any carbon tidbits I might dreeam of.

I'll be the last one to say the Cup 430 is overpriced and Lotus needs/deserves the money, but anyone who bought one of the recent editions  (Cup380, etc.) can easily get the same performance for less money.

[chumaxa]

To me the most interesting comment about lotus strategy here is the fact that they do not respect the customer at all anymore. So they delivered the 380 cup a moment ago, to people who agreed to pay the price, and release just that after, even if your 380 cup is limited, it won't hold its value against this one, I am sure 380 cup owners do not really care about that, but they really think sales more than anything else, ready to dry out its customer range. We knew about that Exige 2 years ago when the 3 eleven appeared, I will never buy a new Lotus, no way I buy something which will be obsolete a month after ... 

[TBD]

So you will certainly never buy a Porsche, who have perfected this approach.

[Bibs]

Just to add a bit of balance, the Cup 380 was announced on April 20th, over 6 months ago, not last week. 

https://www.thelotusforums.com/latest-news/lotus-cars-news/lotus-reveal-exige-cup-380/

Also, and very importantly, there will only be a limited number of Cup 380's. The 430 is now the 'range' car and will be available for some time. Which one will command the interest in years to come, a la previous limited run cars. The prices of S2 Exige 240, Cup 260, RGBs are now pretty much back to their initial RRP! 

The Elise Cup 250 was announced a month later and the Cup 260 a few weeks ago, a couple of months shorter time frame and less people seem aggrieve with this? Are Elise owners just more zen than Exige owners?

[LotusLeftLotusRight]

Also on the modded 350 vs. original 430 argument, wouldn't you only get paid out on a 350 if you had a total loss, rather than the much higher value of a 430? In which case you might have been better off getting the 430 in the first place?

[geartox]

* reminder for myself :

we are in a capitalism world which postulates that the sense of the life is to consume useless things. all of these things are obsolete before to be released on the market. the consumer must be kept frustrated in order to maintain the dynamic to consume new things.

If you don't want to be crazy, stop buying useless things (like a sport car)... or stop buying something by thinking that's the perfect thing, that is THE ONE.  because it will never be the case.

it's a never end story... unless something different happens...

 

 

 

[Gashead1105]

20 minutes ago, LotusLeftLotusRight said:

Also on the modded 350 vs. original 430 argument, wouldn't you only get paid out on a 350 if you had a total loss, rather than the much higher value of a 430? In which case you might have been better off getting the 430 in the first place?

You can get an agreed value policy. But I suspect you are right, although clearly one would hope not to ever get to the position of writing either one off in the first place!

[The Pits]

If Lotus waited 4 years to update the cars the mob with the pitchforks would be saying the cars are too late, development too slow!

If Porsche made updates more regularly, most people would welcome that. The GT4 would have come out years ago. There would already be a GT4RS, everyone would be happy. As it is Porsche are serving speculators better than they are driving enthusiasts. Their cars are massively over subscribed, people have to pay over the odds to get one, lots of unpleasant nonsense going on in the queue, the cars have become more about the enjoyment of making money than the enjoyment of driving cars.

Why should Lotus change their model update plans to suit fragile egos? There's a lot more to driving cars that 'having a top model for 4 years'. My Exige was superceded by the 360 Cup, 380 Cup and now 430 Cup. Did that stop me enjoying it? I can assure you it didn't. Keeping up with faster more expensive versions on track actually added to the fun. It was a great feeling driving home after a trackday realising that the original V6 Cup was still very much on the pace.

No doubt there will be an Evora GT450, maybe a 460. Why should I let that stop me enjoying what promises to be a truly epic year ahead? I could waste time and energy wishing for Lotus to stop developing the Evora now I've got the latest, greatest one but isn't that a bit of a douchebag move?

We know the score now with Lotus, why is anyone still acting shocked?

[scotty435]

Anybody think that Geely have said to Lotus, get the most out off the V6 and 4pot now , because we want to take engine manufacturer i.e. Volvo in house, asp, surely they can not modify the Toyota engines much more with out starting to change the internals which is a big investment.

[Swiss380Cup]

When for Lotus it's a big challenge to sell any cars anyway, so they must stay in business and Mr Galès did a great job doing just that... by showing their "créativity" and will to develop further the actual platform showing the world they are not at the end of the potential is a great ting I believe.

Porsche has used the same engine for the GT3 for more than 20 years and we've had minor improvements of the same plateform for the same period of time... every car manufacturer does that...

[DarrylV8]

4 hours ago, French Frie said:

apart from the price that puts me off (the price tag in France is 128.600€  !), what makes me wonder is the announced torque ... the info I read is that it is announced the max torque is still 400Nm (gearbox being the limit factor) ? if so, how can you produce more HP without rising whether the torque or the max RPM, as bhp is the product of torque X Rpm  ? 

I love the car and hope they'll sell a lot of them, but I won't be a prospect for that ... how can a still very similar car be sold almost twice the price the original Exige S was sold ? 

Either I need to change my reading glasses or Olivier you need to pop over the channel and read the English version of the Lotus statement:  440Nm of torque!

[Neal H]

2 hours ago, Bibs said:

The Elise Cup 250 was announced a month later and the Cup 260 a few weeks ago, a couple of months shorter time frame and less people seem aggrieve with this? Are Elise owners just more zen than Exige owners?

Obviously

I don't buy cars for their 'investment' value, I buy them for the love of driving them. If Lotus bring out better versions along the way, then great - I'll switch to the latest when I'm ready to change. In my case hopefully that will be a new generation Elise 320 Cup.

[BAS]

33 minutes ago, DarrylV8 said:

Either I need to change my reading glasses or Olivier you need to pop over the channel and read the English version of the Lotus statement:  440Nm of torque!

Also at 1k rpm earlier

4k (430cup vs 5k rpm (380cup)

[The Pits]

Interesting figure is 440Nm from 2600 to 6800!

I'm also intrigued by the move away from barge boards on both this and the Elise 260 Cup. Also the return to aluminium rear diffuser, which does look great I think.

[Snoopy1969]

Is the Aluminium diffuser the answer to - I think - @Jokke Vlo "melting Problem" as a subsequence of the heat of the exhaust?

[Likuid]

3 hours ago, scotty435 said:

Anybody think that Geely have said to Lotus, get the most out off the V6 and 4pot now , because we want to take engine manufacturer i.e. Volvo in house, asp, surely they can not modify the Toyota engines much more with out starting to change the internals which is a big investment.

I have to imagine its part of it.

[NedaSay]

4 hours ago, scotty435 said:

Anybody think that Geely have said to Lotus, get the most out off the V6 and 4pot now , because we want to take engine manufacturer i.e. Volvo in house, asp, surely they can not modify the Toyota engines much more with out starting to change the internals which is a big investment.

They could raise max rpm to 7200 if not 7500 without having to fiddle with the internals of the engine. I think they've actually done it already on their dyno and yes I think it is safe to say that a 460 bhp tune of the engine will be introduced at some point. The problem is the gearbox, its max rpm is 7000 and max rated torque number has been reached already... Hence the oil cooler on the gearbox. I wonder if there's a small skunkworks band of misfits at Hethel doing mad experiments with the BG6 and the U660E, pushing them past their theoretical safe limits.  I think Lotus will get the new 8 speed auto which is ubiquitous on Volvo cars these days, this will solve part of the problem, but the manual gearbox needs something, because Lotus drivers pretty much enjoy their manuals.

As  for the 4 cylinder in the Elise, it is an astonishing engine. The 2ZZ was a crazy almost bike like engine, and the 2ZR was supposed to be a workhorse and it is, but it does have 2ZZ DNA it doesn't have quite the top end madness but it is so tough, I think if Lotus wants to get a bit more hp from it there's room to play.

It all depends on timetables really. Do they want to move to Group powertrain before the new products arrive Elige and Evora do get new powertrains within the next 2/3 years or do they want the new products to come with the new powertrains and  we get to wait for 4/5 years.   

Edited November 10, 2017 by NedaSay

[scotty435]

Some more revs would be a great move forward for both engines having come from a Exige sprint 240 to the Elise 250 cup similar power levels the 22Z just gives you a sense off occasion and at times made the hairs on back of your neck stand up, the 2ZR just can not match that and is a bit of a disappointment in that regards, thanks to yours thoughts on the engine front it's a interesting debate and me personally looking forward how it pans out.

 

[suffolk009]

It's an interesting point. Presumably Lotus will be using Volvo engines and gearboxes. Question is will it be in the next generation cars, or will they be dropped into the current range? I've no idea. I don't even know what the current Volvo engines are like? Is there anything suitable?

Whilst I'm interested in the the top end Exiges it's just passing interest. I hope to be buying an Exige 350 next year some time. It would be nice to know when to expect the newly installed Volvo powertrains to arrive.

[PhilT]

5 hours ago, Neal H said:

Obviously

I don't buy cars for their 'investment' value, I buy them for the love of driving them. If Lotus bring out better versions along the way, then great - I'll switch to the latest when I'm ready to change. In my case hopefully that will be a new generation Elise 320 Cup.

hitting the proverbial on the head with the above. 

[NedaSay]

57 minutes ago, suffolk009 said:

It's an interesting point. Presumably Lotus will be using Volvo engines and gearboxes. Question is will it be in the next generation cars, or will they be dropped into the current range? I've no idea. I don't even know what the current Volvo engines are like? Is there anything suitable?

Whilst I'm interested in the the top end Exiges it's just passing interest. I hope to be buying an Exige 350 next year some time. It would be nice to know when to expect the newly installed Volvo powertrains to arrive.

Are the Volvo engines suitable? I would say so:  2l 4cyl turbo and supercharger for the top end version, with either 200hp, 250hp , 300hp , 320hp or 360 bhp on tap.

And they all can be mated with Aisin 8 speed auto or Aisin 6 speed manual. So are they suitable I'd say yes. JMG seemed enthused about the upcoming 1.5l 3cyl turbo and its 180bhp. Can they be dropped into the engine bay of the Elise? I'd say certainly. 

It would probably require some rewiring and possibly some relocating and reengineering the engine mounts but it should be possible. I actually anticipate more issues with the electrical loom and other ancillaries than the powertrain itself. And only because they produce so few cars. If Lotus produced 2 to 3000 Elises, I don't think they would hesitate too long but at a few hundreds does the math still work? I think as long as Toyota is okay with the deal they have Lotus will keep using the 2ZR. 

The rear subframe of the Evora which is also used by the  Exige V6 has been designed around a V6 layout, so 4cyl which are longer, are not suitable for transplant. However Geely has a suitable V6 in its stable ... Then again would reengineering make sense if you only sell a few hundreds a year.

Volvo kept its Ford engine for nearly 5 years after Geely purchased the company so it's totally possible that Toyota will feature on Lotus cars until the models are replaced.  

Toyota is probably happy to sell some engines, these have paid for themselves many times over by now, there's no high level trade secret.They will probably go out of production at some point though which could be a reason why Lotus would stop using them.

As for the gearboxes, they are mass produced, Volvo is an Aisin client, Geely is also an Aisin client and they own their own transmission company too.

So it comes down to ROI how much would it cost to drop the new powertrain in the current range of product vs how much money will be made?  If the goal is to keep production at around 1500 cars per annum... It would be logical to think that no current product on offer will get the new powertrain. It's almost 2018, so if the goal is to start replacing cars by 2020 the ROI may be to small. Again I'm using Volvo as template for potential logic here. But there are counter example not the least is Jaguar which have been using Ford engine until very recently.  So who knows  the 2019 MY Elise Sport (current gen) may come with a 1.5 3cyl turbo.

But back to the Cup 430, it may not be a limited production but I can only suggest to people with enough money in their wallet to not wait and go buy the thing while offer lasts. 

[Swiss380Cup]

Porsche has used the same engine for the GT3 for 20 years or so. I believe that the potential of the Toyota V6 is around 500 HP, so there's plenty of time to come up with new versions for quite some time.... IMO a Volvo power plant would only come into the picture with a totally new car version..... thought the émission standards could speed up the process, like Porsches did with its new Turbo engines for the 911... waite and see, but I'm happy to waite for the 500 HP Charge cooled Exige with the Camry engine....

[mcx]

 

old vid.... also doesn't noble use Volvo v8 engines..?

[Likuid]

Good engine for a new Esprit.