awesome! i cant wait to buy a ford that looks like an elise!

It’s often been said that Lotus has the best suspension and handling characteristics available.

I think that if they were to improve the cars from other manufacturers while offering the Elise, Exige, and the forthcoming Esprit (2009) that would be absolutely amazing! — I just hope they select half-decent cars to begin with, unlike the crappy Isuzu sports car they did in the early ’90’s.

Thats pretty neat, shelby powered mustang with a lotus suspension, hopefully. =P

Lotus wouldn’t touch a mustang to heavy and they would have to engineer a IRS system onto it as well.

I’m sure Lotus will make more interesting versions of ‘regular’ cars for automakers, but I doubt they’ll be in the same league as BMW’s M series, unless they charge double the amount for the Lotus-tuned car to account for huge re-engineering changes to these cars’ chassises.

Why do I think this? BMWs are designed ground up with a very solid engineering philosophy of keeping the car’s weight balance and suspension in-step with the drivetrain. This means RWD on all of its cars (MINI being the exception, but MINIs are also relatively very very light), with short overhangs, motor stuffed waaay back in the engine bay, and world-class suspension geometry (look at the current 3 series’ 5-link independent-suspension).

So BMWs already have an advantage, as the ‘base’ cars are already designed to handle the track. Throw in a more powerful motor, sturdier and stiffer suspension parts, and the amazing M limited-slip differential, and you have an M.

Try doing this to a FWD, nose-heavy Opel Vectra… you might as well make a new car.

Just my $.02…

–tony

Sigh…

Ok: Lotus wouldn’t get to choose which cars it modifies, it would have to modify whichever Ford / GM car Ford / MG gave them to modify. And this can’t be akin to BMW’s Motorsports or Audi’s S division because, well they are each based on BMW’s and Audi’s, not crappy Ford’s or GM’s. If you tune a crappy car, how much better do you think you can make it? Lotus may be good, but they aren’t miracle workers.

And YES, I know that Lotus (on Top Gear) modded a Lada and turned it into a lean mean Russian racing machine, BUT it cost 100,000 pounds to modify the car. Even at ¼ of that price, do you think anyone’s going to pay $47,060 (25,000 pounds times 1.88) more on top of a base $30,000 (price of the car) for a Ford? Or a GM car? I mean almost $80,000 is Porsche territory. Plus, for way less than that you could get a Lotus…doesn’t make a lot of sense, does it?

Jon.

Not a bad idea

Remember the articles on Lotus selling the versatile architecture chassis they engineered and had going around the car shows? Its probably just that they are going to liscence their engineering and sell that for the volume companies to use.

Lotus sunbeam lol, what a piece of pooh!!!!

I’d love to see a stripped Caliber with lotus tuned suspension

A Lotus tuned Caliber would still be a Lotus tuned piece of ****, like the Lotus tuned Proton Gen2 is a piece of crap

If they want to take the fight to BMW then they should look to Mercedes. Mercedes have brilliant speed but not the cornering like BMW. This is where lotus can help out. I can imagine it now Mercedes-Benz AMG C55 Lotus. The E63 AMG would be even better

stuart – I like the way you’re thinking.

Stuart– do you really think a German firm with the history of Mercedes would hire a small British firm to help them?

Germans only think other Germans are up to the task.

Renton: McLaren is British right?

Renton: why do you think that? Still have certain reservations about Germans? :-/

They’re doing to the next generation for Nissan Skyline no?

British engineering leads the world. All the racing engines are made in UK. I bet even a few Nascar engines come from the UK

THey are help not doing it for them. Why would they because soon they will have a direct rival with the espirit

Mclaren should start that on Mercedes cars

“British engineering leads the world”…. wow…. that is a bold statement…. wow … you better have some serious proof to back that up … you must be british…that kind of arrogance doesn’t spawn from just anywhere

? that kind of arrogance is almost justified. If you know anything about the automobile industry, then you’d know that the technology and engineering involved with F1 racing is the pinnacle of the industry. F1 teams have budgets larger than some countries, and due to the strict management structure involved, they are very effective at getting the most for the dollar. All this ensures that F1 cars are performing at levels unrivaled in any other motorsport. But this should be common knowledge to any auto enthusiast, as is the following information. Almost every F1 team is based in the UK including and the UK produces almost every F1 car. cool huh?

Not really. The UK sucks. Period.

Lotus Carlton rocked, Lotus Cortina rocked… Lotus rocked… and they can still… Elise etc all too small – let’s see a return to Lotus’s big saloons