Esprit for sale...no affiliation

[cal44]

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Lotus-Es ... 3a77e811d6

I don't care what some say about these............I think it is about the neatest thing on planet Clair.


Mike

[stugilmour]

Cool car Mike. Run that interior by the better half before bringing it home though.

[elanern]

This one's been listed several times, never reaching reserve price. I wish the lottery fairy would drop off a winning ticket, I'd go for it.

The Lotus dealer I worked at in St. Louis delivered a new one exactly like this one - same color, same interior. It was very exquisite looking. The Tartan plaid went very well with the exterior color.

[Mazzini]

A dramatic looking car, I think it looks better now than it did back in the day, though I'm still not entirely convinced by the interior.

Elanern - can you recall how the car drove? I've never driven an Esprit, I've had a few Europa's, including a couple of 5 speed Specials, great cars for motorway journeys, but I hated the 'guess a gear' change.

[elanern]

Mazzini,

I don't recall issues with shifting the transmission, I think the linkage was a combination of rods and cables and seemed to work well.

I put a few miles on a new Esprit - I picked up a new one in Iowa that one of our customers in St. Louis wanted, a distance of about 350 miles. It was white, I don't recall the interior color. But I do remember it drove well. It did not have "bottom end" so was a little sluggish on take off, but once into the revs it accelerated well. It handled great although I recall some understeer. The sound from the exhaust was exhilarating, and it was a fairly "civilized" car - for a Lotus - with little to no wind noise and excellent fit and finish.

Cheers,

Ernie

[Mazzini]

Hi Ernie,

Thanks for sharing your memories, it sounds like a great drive. If I were in the States and had the money...but then again that interior, my children would question my sanity (again).

Your comments about the lack of noise made me chuckle, I'm in the process of taking my S2 Elan apart and I've been surprised by the amount of sound deadening material that Lotus put behind the dash on the various glass fibre surfaces - Its a Lotus Elan, it hasn't got a roof, it's made out of GRP, it's going to be really noisy - why did they bother?! I'm sure my S3 didn't have as much.

All the best,

Mazzini