fiznat wrote:relax man, I was just sayin that I think the styling is a little bit overdone for what kind of power it has. even the fact that the price is reletavly cheap for a lotus makes me wonder if we kinda got the bogus lotus, ya know? I'm sure the handling is great- and #2 in road and track's test is fairly impressive, but the American market is typically all about the power these days. Why do you think every 4 door sedan like the maxima is pushing around 250 horses or more? hahaha think about it! what happens to all that expensive weight savings when you put an obese American inside??? lol
Fiznat-This car is probably the best handling car in the world, bar-none.
If you've seen the magazine articles, the frame/suspension of the thing is a work of art-truly beautiful-everything is extruded aluminum and forged/cnc goodies abound. Looks like it was plucked right off of a race track. it's supposed to have some of the best balance and handling out of any other car---And when it was neck and neck with the 360 modena in that magazine, it had about 60 less horsepower.
It most definitely IS a supercar, simply because it KEEPS UP with supercars. So the styling is radical for us traditional americans--but it should be, because it's a very radical car, the essence of a sports-car in its truest form. No bs on that thing. 0-60 in 4.7 seconds is pretty impressive--0.2 seconds quicker than an '03 Porsche 911 Carrera.
I'm a FIRM believer in the advantages of a lightweight car.
My dad owns a 1960 Austin Healey sprite with a race-prepped Alfa Romeo 1.9 liter engine--the car weighs 1492 pounds with fluid and has about 190 wheel horsepower. Accelerates like a bat out of hell and is easily the best handling car I've ever been in-perfect 50/50 weight distribution. Lighter IS better.
I wonder if any of you have ever seen this pretty long (9-11 minutes, maybe) video of a race-prepped lotus-elise racing a Z06 Corvette on a VERY long track. Sure, the vette wastes it on the straightaway, as it should, but the second the track starts bending, the lotus is right on the vette's a s s and comes VERY close to passing it numerous times, and with about 1/2 the hp.
The thing that I don't like is that cars like the 1992 Honda Civic or CRX, which hover just around 2000 pounds for weight need only drop in one of the JDM spec 160 hp motors and they have a very fast car already. Too bad they'll still suck at handling.
Go lotus!
