Emira Criticisms vs. My Experience

[Pegasi]

Fan boy is not necessarily a bad thing but if you lose all sight of reality, then that is not good at all. You still need to be honest with yourself. But yes one should be a fan of the brand and champion it when possible. Porblem is Lotus has been an abject failure when it comes to this. Not one person in here can honestly say they are happy with the company as a whole. There is much room for improvement.

My deposit is still in, hoping for a base i4 but many things weigh on my mind as the closest dealer is 1.5 hours away and it is my DD. This dealer also doesn't have loaners so this also makes things more difficult. Anyhow, hope more of these issues get sorted as the possibilities are huge with the Emira.

Fair enough. I always like to separate the DD people from the weekend people. If you are a DD with a dealer 1.5 hours away, IMO, you are free to grind and be cautious all you want. And I am not being sarcastic. This is a weekend car for me so I can just take everything in stride. Dealer is local. Here is hoping your I4 is a screamer with no issues!

 

[netsinah]

My Emira is a DD and the closest dealer is 3 hours (1-way) away. My winter all-wheel drive vehicle is on top of a 4-post lift, parked until the snow is about to hit, and a hassle to unpark, both time and insurance-wise. So buying the Emira was a “leap of faith”, tempered somewhat by the dealer agreeing to pick it up and trailer it from/to my home, for any warranty claim, but that doesn’t give me a substitute vehicle to drive in the meantime, like most other new car manufacturers I’ve dealt with. I’m ++ pleased I’ve had no problems with my Emira and (easy for me to say, right now) even if I did, I may still find the enjoyable drive, worth the hassle but admittedly, up to a point. I ‘d hate any “lemon”, regardless of manufacture.

That said, I was a BMW fan for many years and owned several, including a 2005 M3 cabriolet stick, which was wonderful on the track with its 50/50 balance. But I had nothing but problems with my 740iL, both during and especially after its warranty expired. So much so, I’ll never buy another BMW. Too bad, because I find BMW is a mixture of luxury and sport, but more sport with its drive, which I prefer.

My current “winter beater” is a Mercedes E550 and after 8 years and about 150,000 km, it’s been a great car. I find Mercedes or at least this one, to also be a mixture of luxury and sport but with more emphasis on luxury, compared to the 740 BMW. But I’d buy another Mercedes, based on my experience over the past 8 years. Finally and if you’re still reading this (lol) I replaced the spark plugs on my 550 (hardest spark plug job I’ve done, and I’ve done many) and spoke with the Mercedes service manager at the time. He’d previously been the service manager at a BMW dealership. When I mentioned my displeasure with BMW’s reliability, he described replacing about 1 new BMW engine per month under warranty and sending them back to Germany for analysis, compared to only about 1 per year, with Mercedes. An interesting comparison and something to keep in mind if you see Lotus with problems. It’s not the only one.