Emira Review Index [V6 FE]

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For those looking for the latest Emira V6 FE reviews scheduled to be released today, I've self-volunteered to maintain a quick reference index here.
Please let me know of any missing articles and I'll update accordingly. (y)

ReviewerTypeDirect Link
EdmundsArticle
Harry's Garage (Harry Metcalfe)Video Review

Harry drives the Sports and Tour suspension back to back on the same road and shares his thoughts.
Schmee150 (Tim Burton)Video ReviewPublished 21st June
Carwow (Mat Watson)Video Review
TopGearArticles and VideoPublished 3rd July
Chris Harris talks about the Lotus Emira

Published 20th June

AutoTrader (Rory Reid)Video Review
EvoArticle and Video Review
CARArticle and Video ReviewPublished 22nd July


Lotus Emira vs Cayman 718 GTS vs Alpine 110s
AutocarArticle and Video Review
PistonheadsArticle
KHTVVideo Review
The DriveArticle
AutoExpressArticle
Pictures:
WhichCarArticle
CarBuyerArticle
HagertyArticle
Road and TrackArticlePublished 1st September
Lotus Emira Road and Track Drive

GoodwoodArticle
The IntercoolerPodcastReasonably good post-embargo Emira discussion on The Intercooler.
MotortrendArticle
DriveArticle
AFRArticle
ParkersArticle
CarExpertArticle
Caffeine & MachineArticle
Photos on Instagram:
The Sunday Times DrivingArticle
Car and DriverArticle
The SunArticle
AutoCar UKArticlePublished 2nd July

 
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Harry Metcalfe = forty years of reviewing cars whilst owning a £10million farm in the Cotswolds and a gorgeous house. Doesn't need to give a shit and is nearly 70.

Jethro from EVO, a struggling magazine and him in his 40's trying to pay a mortgage and the BULK of their advertising monthly cheques comes from A certain German car company whose most profitable brand is Porsche.

Well. Hmmm. Sniff. You join the dots.
 
Harry Metcalfe = forty years of reviewing cars whilst owning a £10million farm in the Cotswolds and a gorgeous house. Doesn't need to give a shit and is nearly 70.

Jethro from EVO, a struggling magazine and him in his 40's trying to pay a mortgage and the BULK of their advertising monthly cheques comes from A certain German car company whose most profitable brand is Porsche.

Well. Hmmm. Sniff. You join the dots.
Why I gave up my Evo subscription... it has become a bit shit recently - and seems very influenced from outside..
 
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Harry Metcalfe = forty years of reviewing cars whilst owning a £10million farm in the Cotswolds and a gorgeous house. Doesn't need to give a shit and is nearly 70.

Jethro from EVO, a struggling magazine and him in his 40's trying to pay a mortgage and the BULK of their advertising monthly cheques comes from A certain German car company whose most profitable brand is Porsche.

Well. Hmmm. Sniff. You join the dots.
You say that, but I don't think Harry would want to be particularly unkind either being a Lotus enthusiast himself. I think most of us as enthusiasts want to see Lotus succeed. I'm sure Jethro does as well, but cant knock him for having an opinion. Pretty sure EVO isn't solely supported by VAG marketing!

I will also just say that Porsche bias comes across as bias because they do tend to be that good a product... Why its exciting when something like the Emira comes along to challenge the status quo and add some differentiation into the marketplace!
 
  • Thread Starter
  • Thread starter
  • #85
New road and track review added.
 
I first watched the Evo review and I do like that guy, or I did before, and he is probably the "best" driver of the reviewers Ive seen so far, Harry, Carwow (horrible accent) and Autotrader, so in theory you have to take what he says seriously.
However, this guy, as with most reviewers do love porsche (with good reason) and as previously mentioned here, these companies/groups do have a lot of sway with these magazines. I would never suggest anything out of order, but for porsche and their 718 sales, which are NOT great, especially in the US, to lose 100 - 1000k $ by the EMira not getting good reviews, would be nothing.... However, I doubt anything like that would occur, this is not Dallas surely!

At the same time, Ive spoke to a small car manufacturer, the boss of said company, who had their cars reviewed by a magazine and they said never again. If you don't wine and dine them and who knows what else, you don't get a fair crack at the whip and they focus on the small negatives instead of the overall picture and often get slated.
Harry is my fav reviewer, but as mentioned above, he is very emotional, like a kid with a new toy, grinning constantly that he has made the right choice in buying this car. I love this! DOnt get me wrong... I would do the same. THe thing is he started out WANTING the lotus to work, wanting to be able to say good things, but the other guy, from the outset, from the first sentence or so, you could see he didnt, that is a big difference. He loves the GT4 and with good reason, although the gear box is not all that if you drive a real sports car.... ANd I felt he didnt want anything to get close to his all time favourite car.
WIthout going into great detail, which I will after seeing all the reviews, I think its what I too expected....
Lotus are not going to beat Porsche ... not with an NA engine, that is one of the best in the business, that has been developed each couple of years and has millions thrown at it. They cant, not with a gear box and engine from 10 or more years ago, without much if any development. If you want a track weapon, this is NOT the car for you, get the GT4 and be done with it, or a caterham if you want a real REAL drivers car.... there is a gear box from the heavens..
But if you want the best looking car out there, which wont do 0-60 in even 4.5 seconds I am pretty sure (i timed carwow at over 5 seconds and thats the second time Ive seen the figure around there) and a very good handling car, with good quality interior and a great sound and what looks like a SOLID gear change to me, especially for road driving, and to support british industry, and have a badge thats NOT a porsche, and that means lot, even though I am a Porsche owner, then get the LOTUS, I certainly will!!!!
I do believe Lotus will make some final alterations to be honest, Gavin may have to and it may not be hard to do, as they have not produced any customer cars yet, so why not alter the suspension a little IF what Evo say and others, is true, although on the wrong tyres. You would at least be calling them up OR inviting them to Hethel, surely you would do that?? Evo used to be owned by Harry, ironically and now look. haha 2 opposite ends.
Anyway, before I wattle on, I will take heart from an excited Harry and I am sure MOST of us will be the same when we get our cars, excited and happy... but again, if you want a tracker, I'd go else where..... Get an exige, cheaper and rawer...or a caterhammmmm or wesfield or atom.....
 
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Not to be too biased on this enthusiast forum, but I do think there's a lot of latching on to the negativity and negating some solid positives. I think what you can separate out from the reviews is the track vs road bias; which I appreciate for some people looking for that hardcore track machine may be a bit disappointed.

What I'm interpreting from the multitude of reviews is the chassis is primarily set up for the road as a high priority, and that even in the sports suspension, it's natural home isn't the track. In the UK at least, it makes sense as our roads are generally a little twistier and pretty poor surface. There seems to be a lot of positives about it's road handling characteristics, even briefly from Jethro and EVO. However there's no denying it may not be as at home on the track as a GTS or a GT4.

For me personally, this is good enough news. I adore the looks, I'm excited by the noise and the interior. I love a good thrash down a British B road and I'll do maybe 2 trackdays a year; where I'll concede no doubt a GTS may be better, but the other 98% more than makes up for it.

It also helps that I was never cross shopping any other car, it was either do I want an emira or not... The reviews (especially Harry's who I'd probably align my priorities with more so), have just reinforced this.

(this is coming from someone who's had 2 caymans and a 991.1 911 GTS )...

ALSO GOD DAMN MAGMA LOOKS GOOD.
Have you seen this forum, its basically 10k pages of complaining about something or other.
:ROFLMAO:
 
Pretty straightforward, if you put all your trust in car reviewers then fair enough, they're paid to dive into the detail and tell you their opinion based on hundreds of cars they drive but also personal preferences.

Get a test drive, make your own decision, it'll either be the car you hope it would or it'll be a miss and you'll have to find something else. It is too expensive a purchase not to be perfect for all of us though.

One thing that I find interesting, choose the best car you've driven, or owned, search those reviews and see how many agree with your opinion entirely or sing the praises as much as you do...
 
Anyone have a TLDR “All Review Summary” written-up yet?

#ForTheTLDRCrowd
 
One thing that I find interesting, choose the best car you've driven, or owned, search those reviews and see how many agree with your opinion entirely or sing the praises as much as you do...
Pretty much all of them tbf ;)😋

Mondeo 2.0Si
Corrado VR6
E30 M3
Mitsubishi Evo 6 Tommi Makinen
E46 M3
E90 335i Manual (I needed a commuter)
Golf Mk5 Edition 30
Golf R Mk7
Boxster 981 S
Golf R Mk7.5
M2 Competition
GR Yaris

😇
 
Hmmmm, Harry's reaction and opinion aside, I don't sense an overwhelming love or 'must have' buzz for the car, or the use of lots of over-enthusiastic superlatives to get the juices flowing. 😁 Although someone surely 'dropped the ball' by allowing EVO to test a sports chassis with Goodyear tyres on a notoriously tight track, when Cup2's would have given a far more favourable impression. And up against a GT4 was a pretty unfair comparison, in my book.

I'm fortunate in that I have a 981 GT4 as my B-road weekender, a track-fettled Caterham for the circuit and an A45S as my daily, so I'm familiar with the AMG engine and DCT, in its higher state of tune, and saw no point in going down the I4 route. The Emira was therefore going to be my last, manual ICE car, (in touring spec), so it had to be something really special dynamically as well as very engaging and satisfying, where driver inputs were concerned. I wasn't looking for, or expecting, GT4 levels of 'specialness,' and in all honesty that car can still be a pretty hardcore experience and frustrate on the road, long gearing included, when conditions aren't favourable, at least in 981 guise, although a good geo, some suspension hardware and ARB tweaks, do significantly help the ride, and what can be a twitchy rear end.

But, and maybe this was wishful thinking on my part, I was hoping for something that would at least better the 4.0 GTS and potentially represent a sweet spot between the two Caymans. And considering their age, I was again hoping the Emira would move the game on and elevate itself above its closest competition, even just a tad. In the eyes of some, it may well have done that but, in some key areas, it appears that some pretty important compromises, at least to me, remain.

Maybe I'm being disingenuous and overthinking things but I wanted to be 'blown out of my socks' by the reviews after waiting so long and I've probably come a bit unstuck as a result of setting my expectations too high. The reveal has been a bit of an anti-climax BUT, if I hadn't been spoilt by my Cayman experience, then I'm 100% certain that I wouldn't be wobbling. Instead, I have to admit that I'm 'on the fence' right now although I'm not gonna jump off just yet, as I've seen and heard just about enough so far to keep me interested.

Ideally, I'd therefore like to take a test drive in a final production car, which could yet address some of the issues I have, (another 'own goal' by Lotus not to have them ready for review), before I make a final decision and commit fully. But, with an August delivery muted, the clock is ticking.
 
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I always enjoy Harry's reviews and this was no exception. Although I've now seen at least 2 instances of the car doing 0-60mph in OVER 5 seconds and 0-100mph is over 10 seconds, which is my only serious concern. Driving experience is the main factor in this purchase, but for me, power and acceleration fall into that equation equally with feel and engagement.

I'd accept 4.2-4.5sec with the Lotus handling DNA to make up for it, but at near $100k purchase price, that was about as high as I was willing to accept. Hopefully some proper measured stats will be out soon, but currently 50/50 on whether I'll follow through with my order until proven otherwise. I expect this may be less important for those driving on UK roads.
 
I first watched the Evo review and I do like that guy, or I did before, and he is probably the "best" driver of the reviewers Ive seen so far, Harry, Carwow (horrible accent) and Autotrader, so in theory you have to take what he says seriously.
However, this guy, as with most reviewers do love porsche (with good reason) and as previously mentioned here, these companies/groups do have a lot of sway with these magazines. I would never suggest anything out of order, but for porsche and their 718 sales, which are NOT great, especially in the US, to lose 100 - 1000k $ by the EMira not getting good reviews, would be nothing.... However, I doubt anything like that would occur, this is not Dallas surely!

At the same time, Ive spoke to a small car manufacturer, the boss of said company, who had their cars reviewed by a magazine and they said never again. If you don't wine and dine them and who knows what else, you don't get a fair crack at the whip and they focus on the small negatives instead of the overall picture and often get slated.
Harry is my fav reviewer, but as mentioned above, he is very emotional, like a kid with a new toy, grinning constantly that he has made the right choice in buying this car. I love this! DOnt get me wrong... I would do the same. THe thing is he started out WANTING the lotus to work, wanting to be able to say good things, but the other guy, from the outset, from the first sentence or so, you could see he didnt, that is a big difference. He loves the GT4 and with good reason, although the gear box is not all that if you drive a real sports car.... ANd I felt he didnt want anything to get close to his all time favourite car.
WIthout going into great detail, which I will after seeing all the reviews, I think its what I too expected....
Lotus are not going to beat Porsche ... not with an NA engine, that is one of the best in the business, that has been developed each couple of years and has millions thrown at it. They cant, not with a gear box and engine from 10 or more years ago, without much if any development. If you want a track weapon, this is NOT the car for you, get the GT4 and be done with it, or a caterham if you want a real REAL drivers car.... there is a gear box from the heavens..
But if you want the best looking car out there, which wont do 0-60 in even 4.5 seconds I am pretty sure (i timed carwow at over 5 seconds and thats the second time Ive seen the figure around there) and a very good handling car, with good quality interior and a great sound and what looks like a SOLID gear change to me, especially for road driving, and to support british industry, and have a badge thats NOT a porsche, and that means lot, even though I am a Porsche owner, then get the LOTUS, I certainly will!!!!
I do believe Lotus will make some final alterations to be honest, Gavin may have to and it may not be hard to do, as they have not produced any customer cars yet, so why not alter the suspension a little IF what Evo say and others, is true, although on the wrong tyres. You would at least be calling them up OR inviting them to Hethel, surely you would do that?? Evo used to be owned by Harry, ironically and now look. haha 2 opposite ends.
Anyway, before I wattle on, I will take heart from an excited Harry and I am sure MOST of us will be the same when we get our cars, excited and happy... but again, if you want a tracker, I'd go else where..... Get an exige, cheaper and rawer...or a caterhammmmm or wesfield or atom.....
by the way.WHY WHY would you give EVO knowing they are going on track, and you must know they would do it, a car without track tyres.... insane.... and yes, a GT4 is a bad comparison, but I agree, you want to see how it stacks up anyway.... we now know, I think we knew anyway.
 
I always enjoy Harry's reviews and this was no exception. Although I've now seen at least 2 instances of the car doing 0-60mph in OVER 5 seconds and 0-100mph is over 10 seconds, which is my only serious concern. Driving experience is the main factor in this purchase, but for me, power and acceleration fall into that equation equally with feel and engagement.

I'd accept 4.2-4.5sec with the Lotus handling DNA to make up for it, but at near $100k purchase price, that was about as high as I was willing to accept. Hopefully some proper measured stats will be out soon, but currently 50/50 on whether I'll follow through with my order until proven otherwise. I expect this may be less important for those driving on UK roads.

That 0-60 "test" on the carwow video certainly seemed slow.. Like 5s+ slow. I really want a $100k exotic sportscar to be sub 4s. I know 0-60 isn't everything, but it's certainly something.
 
That 0-60 "test" on the carwow video certainly seemed slow.. Like 5s+ slow. I really want a $100k exotic sportscar to be sub 4s. I know 0-60 isn't everything, but it's certainly something.
You would want sub 5 at least. Sub 4 with a manual isn't happening
 
That 0-60 "test" on the carwow video certainly seemed slow.. Like 5s+ slow. I really want a $100k exotic sportscar to be sub 4s. I know 0-60 isn't everything, but it's certainly something.
Extracting the best 0-60 time on a manual car requires a combination of skill and a willingness to be absolutely brutal with the drive train. The carwow guy didn't look like he was trying that hard. Lotus's claim of 4.3 seconds sounds about right to me.
 
Not to be too biased on this enthusiast forum, but I do think there's a lot of latching on to the negativity and negating some solid positives. I think what you can separate out from the reviews is the track vs road bias; which I appreciate for some people looking for that hardcore track machine may be a bit disappointed.

What I'm interpreting from the multitude of reviews is the chassis is primarily set up for the road as a high priority, and that even in the sports suspension, it's natural home isn't the track. In the UK at least, it makes sense as our roads are generally a little twistier and pretty poor surface. There seems to be a lot of positives about it's road handling characteristics, even briefly from Jethro and EVO. However there's no denying it may not be as at home on the track as a GTS or a GT4.

For me personally, this is good enough news. I adore the looks, I'm excited by the noise and the interior. I love a good thrash down a British B road and I'll do maybe 2 trackdays a year; where I'll concede no doubt a GTS may be better, but the other 98% more than makes up for it.

It also helps that I was never cross shopping any other car, it was either do I want an emira or not... The reviews (especially Harry's who I'd probably align my priorities with more so), have just reinforced this.

(this is coming from someone who's had 2 caymans and a 991.1 911 GTS )...

ALSO GOD DAMN MAGMA LOOKS GOOD.
Nicely put, one should always consider if any particular reviewers priorities and preferences in a car align with one's own, which you've summed up nicely above and sounds similar to my own wish list.
 

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