Paul C 944

Has any one seemm them,looks cool and 1975 lbs!!With a toyota engine sounds like a reliable car!

lilredpo

Hot car! I don't believe any are in the states yet, planned as '05 model I think.

R&T write up was great in Nov '03 issue.

erics944

There are a few that have made it here to the States. However, they are just for dealers to put in the showroom. A coworker of mine has a friend who saw one in ohio someplace.

hacker-pschorr

They are here, have to go through some weird channels to drive them. There's a silver one in the Chicago area that the is usually at Road America, not racing either.

claw

Having owned an Elan +2 S130, the problem with the car was never the engine, it was everything else in terms of reliability. When I wasn't on my back fixing whatever broke du-jour, it was an awesome ride.

Techno Duck

A very cool car, i have a friend that used to say "Who cars, its only got like 150 horsepower, my moms tauras has more than that". But they never really got the point that the car weighs in at about half of the tauras...".

oi-punx

Yes,

I've seen one. It was one of a few imported into the US before Lotus announced their domestic release. A guy in the Bay Area owns it and is a friend of a friend. He had the chassis shipped to Long Beach where a company down there installed an Integra type R motor into it. I saw it in person up at Skyline and 84 (a place where bikers and car aficionados often meet up) and talked to the owner. When I asked him how he liked the car he gave me a dirty look and in a cockney accent exclaimed "how do you think I like it, I waited 2 years for this car".

The interior looks very spartan and the car sits extremely low. It looks much more radical in real life than it does in magazines. My friend who has ridden in it says that the ride is very stiff and that you can feel every vibration. I think it will do quite well when it comes to the US.

By the way, when he took off the acceleration was unbelieveable, very sportbike like.

jabbadeznuts

I saw one at Road Atlanta for the Petit LeMans last year.
http://kaduck.ascelon.net/Spy

AWolf

There was a yellow one at the SCCA Nationals two weeks ago here in San Diego. It was very race prepared. I wish I would have seen it run. I cannot wait until the elise is released to the states I think it is going to be one of those cars that just revolutionizes the performance car market. The trend seems to be more HP and weight and this car is just the opposite.
-Andrew

C4TT

I sat in one of the demos at a Lotus dealer. I was amazed! The car is designed for aggressive driving with snug sport seats, a close ratio shifter which snicks nicely into each gear, and a sport momo steering wheel which is about F1 size!!!

I felt like I was in a miniature McLaren!

They should be getting the first toyota powered cars in the april may... I will be testing them asap!

G

Dave

Alex, you can't tell us that the range of numbers for those photos was an accident...

Z-man

The Lotus Elise is about the only non-Porsche toy car I would consider.

-Z-man.

iloveporsches

I was snapping some pics of one at the Chicago Autoshow about a month ago. Heard some interesting comments while I was standing there, went something like this:

"It's not a real sports car, it only has 190HP! I bet my [Pontiac]Grand Prix could smoke it!"

"Only 190HP? And a Toyota engine? Total ricer's car! I'd take a [mullet-mobile] over it anyday!"

"How can that thing be so quick with less than 200HP?" "You idiot, it weighs under 2000 lbs!" "So what! It still doesn't have any power, I still don't understand how it's fast."

theedge

If I had $40K USD id be in line to get one (you can preorder them for $500 deposit still I think).

Theres a movie around of it and a Ferrari going around a track... The Ferrari would tear away in the straights of course but every time a curve came up..... There was the Elise right on the Ferraris ***

Red 944

My old man has one on order, won't get it for another year though.