doublearon21–imageWIS caught that I was essentially paraphrasing Clarkson. I’m pretty sure it was a joke of sorts on his part. I’ve actually heard the material referred to as a “paper-honeycomb sandwich” on bmwworld.com. I never assumed it was like the corrugated cardboard from a filing box, but more of a paper-based substance that one might find on a space ship. that being said, if you’ve seen the car–which i have not–and say it’s carbon fibre, i’m not going to argue with that.

amanda–I must absolutely take issue with your classification of TVR as a kit car company. what exactly are the kit components in a TVR? I mean, TVRs are definitely love-’em-or-hate-’em cars, but they are pretty much completely original. As far as I know they develop all of the components on their own and only sell the vehicles in their fully assembled form, so I don’t see anything “kit” about that.

I’ll begrudingly give you everyone else. Although I’m kind of curious as to what is and what is not a kit car. The Exige, for instance, uses a Toyota engine, but everything else is Lotus. The Ariel Atom uses a Honda engine, but everything else is Ariel. The Noble uses the engine from the Mondeo, but everything else is built by Noble. While the Noble can, in some bizarre technical sense for legal purposes, be bought as a kit, it’s also purchased as a complete car. The Exige, and even the Atom, I believe, are both sold only as complete cars. If we call these cars kit cars, then we’d have to call a good number of the cars being sold today by various manufacturers kit cars. The Pontiac Vibe is a kit Toyota Matrix; the Ford Fusion is a kit Mazda6; the new Audi S8 is a kit Lamborghini Gallardo; most of Chevy’s small cars are kit Daewoos; the Maserati MC12 is a kit Ferrari Enzo; the Pontiac GTO is a kit Holden Monaro, which is itself a kit of the Chevrolet Corvette; and everything built on Chrysler’s LX platform–300, Magnum, Charger–are kit E-Classes, and in some cases, kit Dodge Rams; the Koenigsegg is probably still a kit Ford; oh, and the Saleen S7 is definitely a kit car.

anybody have thoughts on what qualifies as a kit car?

/no

Start in 1949 and work upwards. Learn your history, THEN come back and troll.

Sooo, anyone want to buy a liver for $60k? I’ll chuck in a working left testicle for free!

Jon.

The Euro and now (yippe!) US supercharged models draw intake air from the roof scoop.

BTW I think most folks buying this car will able to have a 335i AND and an Exige.

Comparisons to Westfields and Atoms are OK, but those cars are even more impractical than the Exige. Consider this is the only 2000lb road car with a roof in the US. (I’m not counting kit cars, only new I-can-walk-into-a-dealership-and-drive-it-away models).

Jon.

Any of these cars with the Honda S2000 motorwill do very well. That engine dominates.

I’ve had the opportunity to drive it and, yes, it’s a harsh and rough and tough ride and it’s sooooo cool, and honestly I don’t really think it needs a supercharger or a turbo, unless, of course you want to take it to the racetrack and race it for real.

B) It’s not so much the individual weight savings of the electric windows and carpets and so on, but the sum total of all of those weight savings. It’s kind of analagous to the options list for a car. the options might not seem very expensive individually, but when you add them all up… yikes.

C) Do we know for sure the roof scoop does nothing? because the Exige, like all Lotuses (Loti?), is mid-engined. Therefore the scoop is actually well positioned to cool the engine. Given the observation regarding weight savings, i’d say the smart money is on a functional scoop.

D) BMW, which is really getting talked up in this particular thread, did build a car out of cardboard. The trunk floor in the M3 CSL, which was only sold in europe, was made out of cardboard in an effort to save weight

E) The Atom and the Westfield would most definitely spank the Exige. You can get a supercharged version of the Atom that does 0-60 in 2.9, plus it’s significantly lighter, etc. I’m getting the Westfield confused at the moment, but if I’m remembering correctly it’s either the Atom with an electric engine, and I’ve seen video of this beating a Carrera GT in a drag race, or it’s another car that ran around the Top Gear test track quicker than either the Enzo or the Zonda F, whatever happened to be on the top of the board. Personally, I think I’d rather have the Atom than the Exige. They basically serve the same function, but the Atom is just cooler… in my opinion.

F) Considering the engine is more than likely a Toyota engine–the one used in the MR-2S, among other things, I believe–I’m sure there’s a slough of aftermarket parts available for it. The Atom’s got a Honda VTEC, so there would be even more parts for it.

/no

Would much rather see the Europa come here.

The Exige S will be a track darling no doubt…… I hope the extra grunt helps, my freind is a PCA instructor and says that those Lotus Elises get destroyed in the straights. They just do not have the juice.

And the Exige S will drive in circles around the 335i!

Plus when you buy this car, you don’t need it for utility. 56K for the performance is fine IMO.

I know, the Exige is for the track and not for everday. I’d get one for sure!! But, it just seems expensive to me.

OK, got that cleaned up. Now I guess I need to get that retirement fund liquidated. Lotus where do I sign up?

Yes I would like an Elise S…or the Europa!