Lotus Elise Cup 250

[BiggestNizzy]

I take your point woody but with the Alu tub the design will always be constrained by the sills as that is where much of the stiffness comes from. Composite technology has got to be the way ahead if only for the flexibility that it gives you in both design and strength.
The elise was innovative in it's day and the basic engineering concept hasn't changed that much.

Hasn't the Alfa 4C got an carbon tub, that isn't a great deal lighter or stronger than the elise?

[campbell]

Call your mate Jean-Marc. He built you all a 3-11. I'm sure he'll come up with something

[ryallm]

You miss the point, a company has to move forward, any company has to do this to survive which is probably more relevant to a small niche manufacturer like Lotus. For them I think they need to innovate to attract sales. You can't keep churning out variations on a theme for ever more. At some point you have to move the game on and I fear that they are been caught by the competition. They have been surviving off of a 20 year old design. How far can they take the same basic ingredients and still keep it fresh.

Exactly. If anyone needs any further evidence that Lotus can't survive just evolving the Elise as it is, look at the sales figures: 347 Elise sales in Europe in 2015, down from 1754 in 2002, the year I bought my Elise S2.

Incidentally there is a short piece by Matt Prior in Autocar this week on the Elise 250, the general gist being that the interest generated for yet another minor Elise variant inevitably gets less and less - something all new is needed.

[campbell]

Rarity value though!