I agree, the ratios were good - though I'm sure the NSX will do 90 mph in second gear?

I forgot to add that the Evora is supposed to easy to repair if you prang it, the chassis in parts that can be easily swapped, apparently. Quite important to me given my recent experience!

One of my mates has suggested GTm as a possibility - looks a bit hair-shirt though...

http://www.gtmcars.com/index.php

The Cayman will get a look once the dealer comes back to me...

 

You're thinking of the offset-barrier test; they unbolted the front chassis frame, stuck a new one on & re-tested the same car within about three hours. It passed again.

Comparing gear raios to an NSX is a bit unfair; one has a boring old Totoya engine that will barely struggle to 7,000 whereas t'other has a mental Honda lump that will scream to 8K. Expect an extra 14% on each ratio!

 

I was merely quoting as much as I could remember of the Lotus salesman's description of the chassis.

Yes, I agree totally about the comparison of the engines. I was a bit disappointed that the salesman didn't know what an NSX was when I raised it as a comparison. Maybe it was feigned ignorance? It is a bit disappointing that the rev counter in the Evora displays 9k but it only actually gets to 7.2k...

The salesman was good though, he was working very hard to get an answer to every question I had.

In the Evora's leaflet it lists the "core competitors" as; Porsche 911, Nissan 370Z, an Aston Martin, Nissan GTR (!?)...that's all I can remember.

Maybe someone ought to hold one of the top brass at Honda at gunpoint and get them to continue with the abandoned projects.

 

Here's how it's built
[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IHlr5wWqgXw [/media]&feature=player_embedded

 

Thanks Mark!

Really brilliant tutorial.

 

Great find. This modular approach seems to be taking some cues from the aircraft industry, Panavia springs to mind.

 

You should be able to refit one after you stuff it at Eau Rouge then.
Jonny has some spanners....

 

I think you missed a trick there.

The Europa might not set your pants on fire in standard guise (although it drives exceptionally well and far better than the S2000), but there's a reliable 350bhp in there just waiting to be let loose, in a car as light as the Europa, that could be something seriously fun.
It's the Exige you can use everyday, and being a GM turbo engine, it could be a proper Cayman-basher with the right fettling.

Good writeup of the Evora though, pretty similar to my experience, though i got to test it out into Northumberland and it turned out to be a superb A to B car and seriously entertaining. But the car I drove was £70k as specced. As you say, at £40k there'd be queues out of the dealers.

 

There are loads and loads of demo launch edition cars up at 49k. It's a shame to see, but apparently some of the dealers are getting twitchy and have panicked.

Lotus haven't clamped down on it which they prob should have.

A new Cayman S is c50K, and at that price the Lotus wins - no contest (for me anyway)

 

>>Maybe the best idea would be to get a stopgap for a year, say an Exige, then >>re-evaluate things.

How about this:

http://www.pistonheads.com/sales/1598118.htm

Or this:

http://www.pistonheads.com/sales/1576087.htm




A Honda S/C S1 Exige (or Motorsport Elise replica based on an S1 Elise) is on the list of "must haves" for the future