Hello all…just joining the forum here and wanted to say hi and possibly get you fellas(and ladies ) to chime in on a few questions that i had.
As you may know, we are now fortunate enough to have the Exige and Exige S coming to the US. I am considering putting in an order for an 08 Exige S (currently driving a corvette z06), so i have been reading the forum getting as much information on pros, cons, issues, etc on the new supercharged model. couple of my questions include:
what are your all’s thoughts on the stability of Proton/Lotus? i have recently read some more bad news on Protons financial situation.
in the states, we are supposed to be getting 3 option packages (touring, super touring and sports packages). do you have the simliar options in EMEA and what are there prices?
i have been reading about some of the overall air flow issues to the intercooler… is the heat soak issue bad? noticed only on track days or in general spirited driving?
on the side intakes… are they both “functional”… or is one blocked off?
how do you like the overall power delivery? any comparisons you care to share?
thats about it at the moment gentlemen. if there are any other points (pros, cons, etc) that you care to share…i would certainly appreciate it.
hi dean,
the forum can sometimes take a bit to ‘warm up’ shall we say
there are a few exige s owners on here and i’m sure they’ll be happy to offer help when they see this post.
welcome anyway…get your order in for the exige…you wont regret it!
Dean
Yup agree with Dean. By posting in the ‘General’ section you will get more views but many of them will be from S1 owners like me that cannot answer you questions.
Welcome and just get on and order it - an Exige S will be even more extraordinary in the US - it is the antithesis of the last car I drove in the US (a Lincoln Town Car )
Sorry for the slow response. There actually aren’t very many ‘S’ owners around here yet.
I have a standard Exige, but I’ll do my best to answer your questions.
Lotus has always had a turbulent past. They’ve regularly cycled between brief profitability and big losses, and they’ve been passed around quite a few different owners over the years. Proton has been very good for them, and even if things go really bad for Proton I can’t see it hurting Lotus too much. Lotus is a strong brand and I can’t see them struggling too long to find a new owner.
2). We have those packages though I guess the actual contents of the pack will vary in the US. You can find details of the UK options HERE. Sorry, I don’t know the prices.
I’m not sure what you mean by this.
The side intakes are both functional. The one of the left feeds the intake for the engine. The other provides ventilation for the engine bay.
I’ve driven an Exige S, and I found the power delivery to be great. There seems to be just a moment of lag when you hit the throttle, but the power builds very progressively right through the rev range. It has excellent mid-range torque compared with the standard Exige. I can’t say how it compares with a Corvette. I guess that thing has masses of torque everywhere!
The intercooler or interwarmer as i should call it is not ideal. It is in a good location for the intake system, the intake system is nice and short compared to say the bemani. The interwarmer is however not in the best place to be cooled. It does not recieve enough cooling air from the undersize roof intake. This could be solved with a different roof like the carbon one that eliseparts sell. It has a larger intake and its located much further forward at the top of the screen were it gets higher pressure air. However this will not solve its problem completely, thats because when the car is parked the heat from the engine rises and heats the interwarmer. This means after a few laps on track and then half an hour in the pitlane the interwarmer is too hot to touch! how its meant to cool air in that state i do not know. Finally its not ideally located for the centre of gravity.
However having said all that its not all doom and gloom. The only time i have felt the fall off in performance due to the charge temp being too high was when i was flat out on the german autobahns for about half an hour, towards the end i had the feeling that the top speed was falling off a bit. It was over 30 degrees on that day aswell.
The other thing to consider is that as more S models are sold the specialist companies will start to come out with upgrades and solutions to common problems. its this development that made me decide to stick with the Lotus product and not go down the aftermarker supercharger route.
The ecu on the S does not allow the DBW throttle to open more than 60%. This was the easiest way for Lotus to reduce the performance, for warranty or to distance it a bit from the cup cars. So there is a great opportunity for the future to upgrade the car.
There are also varous solutions to the heat problem under discussion/development. They range from bigger intakes, fans (like the haas turbo kit) to water jackets with a cooler mounted at the front of the car a la bemani.Komo Tec do this already and with an ecu upgrade which presumably just opens the throttle all the way, they are getting 250hp.
very much appreciate the detailed background. very informative. i guess we’ll see what the aftermarket groups do to improve the intercooler efficiency as well as lets hope Proton/Lotus manage the business end of things more efficiently as well.
The ecu on the S does not allow the DBW throttle to open more than 60%. This was the easiest way for Lotus to reduce the performance, for warranty or to distance it a bit from the cup cars. So there is a great opportunity for the future to upgrade the car.
Where did you hear this??? At 60% max throttle openning surely you’ll end up with less power than a NA car???
As far as the intercooler issues, I’ve run my 240R for over a year now at various tracks, one interesting fact is after two days at Silverstone, one it 2 Deg C and one at 28 Deg C my hand timed laps were still within a second of each other so I’m not convinced the effect is anything like as big as people say. If the car has been parked hot and you head out there is a slight feeling of less power for the first warm up lap or so but once at speed everything quickly seems normal.
I’m sure it could be improved, but I’ve not really found it an issue. As for centre of gravity, the intercooler is very very light, so honestly don’t beleive anyone would feel the difference with or without it.
Whatever they say about the efficiency or otherwise of the intercooler, the power delivery is absolutely linear right from about 2000 rpm up to 8000 rpm when the change up light comes on. As a road car, nothing much else can beat it on acceleration or going round corners. However, my wife doesn’t like it because of the harsh suspension - and I have got adjustable shocks. On the track (with the shocks adjusted accordingly) it is superb. My son who has done some go-cart racing says it handles like a go cart.
Because it is so much lighter, I should imagine it will be very different from a Corvette but faster round a track unless the straights are very long.
The ecu on the S does not allow the DBW throttle to open more than 60%. This was the easiest way for Lotus to reduce the performance, for warranty or to distance it a bit from the cup cars. So there is a great opportunity for the future to upgrade the car.
Where did you hear this??? At 60% max throttle openning surely you’ll end up with less power than a NA car???
As far as the intercooler issues, I’ve run my 240R for over a year now at various tracks, one interesting fact is after two days at Silverstone, one it 2 Deg C and one at 28 Deg C my hand timed laps were still within a second of each other so I’m not convinced the effect is anything like as big as people say. If the car has been parked hot and you head out there is a slight feeling of less power for the first warm up lap or so but once at speed everything quickly seems normal.
I’m sure it could be improved, but I’ve not really found it an issue. As for centre of gravity, the intercooler is very very light, so honestly don’t beleive anyone would feel the difference with or without it.
Lotus told me this when i asked why my ecu printout claimed i had never used more than 60% throttle.(when i definately had) The dealer and i also checked the car with the diagnostic tool and sure enough, full throttle at the pedal opens the butterfly 60%.
I never claimed that anyone could tell the difference due to the weight of the intercooler high up. I simply stated, for the sake of a considered and fair debate on the pros and cons of the various installations, that its not in an ideal place for the vehicles centre of gravity.
Just incase i gave the wrong impression…i love my car
Well,
I used to be a C5, with few mods on it… I just got this w-end an exige S, even if I am still in the brake-in period the main difference is that C5 feels like a limo, the exige just like a go kart!
I really love vette , I had a C2 C3 and C5, but they extremely different.
C5 is a comfortable high performance car. The exige S is like a go kart. I live in Mexico and for the roads around here the C5 was OK, however the exige you could feel the difference if there was a mosquito on the road.
If you like go karts then buy and exige, like comfort stick with the Vette.
Even if I am still in the brake in period, the handling of the exige is amazing, I was completely off all the braking points and entering and exit speed of turns !!!
I have to get used to it, and I regularly race go-karts.
This car is just like a big go kart,
The ecu on the S does not allow the DBW throttle to open more than 60%. This was the easiest way for Lotus to reduce the performance, for warranty or to distance it a bit from the cup cars. So there is a great opportunity for the future to upgrade the car.
Where did you hear this??? At 60% max throttle openning surely you’ll end up with less power than a NA car???
As far as the intercooler issues, I’ve run my 240R for over a year now at various tracks, one interesting fact is after two days at Silverstone, one it 2 Deg C and one at 28 Deg C my hand timed laps were still within a second of each other so I’m not convinced the effect is anything like as big as people say. If the car has been parked hot and you head out there is a slight feeling of less power for the first warm up lap or so but once at speed everything quickly seems normal.
I’m sure it could be improved, but I’ve not really found it an issue. As for centre of gravity, the intercooler is very very light, so honestly don’t beleive anyone would feel the difference with or without it.
Lotus told me this when i asked why my ecu printout claimed i had never used more than 60% throttle.(when i definately had) The dealer and i also checked the car with the diagnostic tool and sure enough, full throttle at the pedal opens the butterfly 60%.
I never claimed that anyone could tell the difference due to the weight of the intercooler high up. I simply stated, for the sake of a considered and fair debate on the pros and cons of the various installations, that its not in an ideal place for the vehicles centre of gravity.
Just incase i gave the wrong impression…i love my car
As an Exige S owner this sounds rather strange. 60% ? Is there anything we can do then to release more power? Would it require a different map if it was opened nearer 100% ? Confused Alric.
As an Exige S owner this sounds rather strange. 60% ? Is there anything we can do then to release more power? Would it require a different map if it was opened nearer 100% ? Confused Alric.
Oh for the good old days when it would just mean adjusting the stop bolt
As an Exige S owner this sounds rather strange. 60% ? Is there anything we can do then to release more power? Would it require a different map if it was opened nearer 100% ? Confused Alric.
If you would like to confirm that it is infact the case, go to your dealer and ask for a ecu print out like they do at the first service. Then look at whether you have spent anytime in the 65%-85% or the 85%-100% throttle position ranges. You will see that according to your ecu you have not…i assume that you have!
The answer to your other question is yes, fit a cup map the throttle will open fully. You may need to change the injectors aswell though…this is not yet clear.
As an Exige S owner this sounds rather strange. 60% ? Is there anything we can do then to release more power? Would it require a different map if it was opened nearer 100% ? Confused Alric.
If you would like to confirm that it is infact the case, go to your dealer and ask for a ecu print out like they do at the first service. Then look at whether you have spent anytime in the 65%-85% or the 85%-100% throttle position ranges. You will see that according to your ecu you have not…i assume that you have!
The answer to your other question is yes, fit a cup map the throttle will open fully. You may need to change the injectors aswell though…this is not yet clear.
Thanks it seems its more difficult than I first thought. Nevermind eh, still frustrating tho I have cash waiting to spend on tuning my exige s. One of the reasons I bought it was because I thought there would be loads of easy tuning options with it being charged. Guess i’l have to spend my money on coilovers instead.
The newly announced limited edition Exige S in Cadena sport colours is supposed to have upgrades available…maybe Lotus has something already.
Just checked the lotus info, its called the GT pack and basically upgrades the motor to 243hp (cup car spec)
It also comes with brake upgrade, accusump etc
It would be interesting to know if Lotus Motorsport would do this to existing S cars.
The newly announced limited edition Exige S in Cadena sport colours is supposed to have upgrades available…maybe Lotus has something already.
Just checked the lotus info, its called the GT pack and basically upgrades the motor to 243hp (cup car spec)
It also comes with brake upgrade, accusump etc
It would be interesting to know if Lotus Motorsport would do this to existing S cars.
wow lets hope so thats exactly what I’m looking for. Plus i wanted to get an accusump fitted aswell.