Suspension: Touring and Sports options

[Evotion]

What is right then?

Still undecided myself.

Which did you choose?

It is well known I am a Sports suspension advocate.

I keep meaning to put my short video out.
Touring is a compromise too far. I will explain shortly.

 

[Scruff111S]

It is well known I am a Sports suspension advocate.

I keep meaning to put my short video out.
Touring is a compromise too far. I will explain shortly.

Test driving the touring, having come from 2 Caterhams and an S2 Elise, I felt is was a bit to soft for me. Sports suspension, I think will be perfect for me, as the car will be mostly doing service on track days with Lotus on Track. I do think though, if someone is new to Lotus, the touring would be a good choice.

 

[TomE]

He's going to say he should have gone for sports suspension

Only if I need to road test my fillings

 

[TomE]

Having test driven a touring, i am glad I opted for sports.

You can’t just say that, you need to explain….

 

[TomE]

What is right then?

Still undecided myself.

Suspension: Touring and Sports options

Lotus promised us a further note on suspension choices. But as that still hasn't arrived, here's my attempt. This draws on discussions with the Lotus team, published info and some of my previous posts. The tl;dr version You've got two suspension options and one of them also has two tyre...

www.emiraforum.com

 

[TomE]

It is well known I am a Sports suspension advocate.

I keep meaning to put my short video out.
Touring is a compromise too far. I will explain shortly.

I think you need to substantiate that statement, rather than just keep repeating the unhelpful “Sports = good, Touring = bad” cliche.

 

[Magicman]

Having test driven a touring, i am glad I opted for sports.

Having test driven sports I'm glad I went touring

Can you imagine if the technology existed to he able to switch between the two settings

 

[Toomanyloti]

For anyone who ends up picking the "wrong" suspension for themselves, buying a set of springs and dampers isn't particularly expensive. Not particularly a ton of work either I'd imagine.

Exactly - I have gone for tour as my S1 exige is shaking my fillings out.

My mate has swapped everything on all his modern sports motors for Ohlins and says the cars are transformed. The install done by the guy who sets cars up for Lotus.

Lets move on...

 

[Scruff111S]

Having test driven sports I'm glad I went touring

Can you imagine if the technology existed to he able to switch between the two settings

In the Harry's video, he did ask Gavan about that. Gavan told Harry that it would not be a true Lotus using that system. Given Gavans 32 years at Lotus, he knows what a Lotus should be, the DNA, and trained by the late great Roger Becker among others, i think he is more than qualified in this area.

 

[duff]

In the Harry's video, he did ask Gavan about that. Gavan told Harry that it would not be a true Lotus using that system. Given Gavans 32 years at Lotus, he knows what a Lotus should be, the DNA, and trained by the late great Roger Becker among others, i think he is more than qualified in this area.

Although they did pioneer active suspension with a view to using it on road cars

 

[Mistral]

It is well known I am a Sports suspension advocate.

I keep meaning to put my short video out.
Touring is a compromise too far. I will explain shortly.

Ade, suspension choice is subjective, dependent on how the car is to be used. As you own other cars, including the 430, your Emira is presumably going to be an occasional car where Sport suspension will undoubtedly suit you best. For others, including me, who will use the car regularly and for long trips, Tour suspension will be more suitable. For you to say that Sport is the only real choice, is to ignore how buyers will use the car.

 

[kitkat]

The Emira has the Evora had passive and non-adjustable suspension setups for one reason and one reason only: cost.

 

[Magicman]

Ade, suspension choice is subjective, dependent on how the car is to be used. As you own other cars, including the 430, your Emira is presumably going to be an occasional car where Sport suspension will undoubtedly suit you best. For others, including me, who will use the car regularly and for long trips, Tour suspension will be more suitable. For you to say that Sport is the only real choice, is to ignore how buyers will use the car.

Not only that but the condition of the roads in their area, my experience of how I've used adaptive set ups from porsche, ferrari, M etc tells me the fastest most usable set up for me will be the touring. On my local cart tracks the sport just fidgets and bounces about to much. Given better tarmac I'd go sport.

 

[Pops68]

Odd you should say that. I ordered my Emira in accordance with recommendations from Lotus. I assume they know what they are talking about. They said I should get touring, so touring is what I ordered.
Who should I trust more than Lotus, since I can't try them both for myself before locking in my order?

You should ALWAYS trust the experts on forums!...

 

[TomE]

The Emira has the Evora had passive and non-adjustable suspension setups for one reason and one reason only: cost.

Not true. Read or watch any of the interviews with Gavan Kershaw. Lotus pioneered the development of active suspension in F1 but don’t believe the technology is the best solution for a road-going sportscar.

 

[Pops68]

Make a list of your wants/needs: Mine is like this; my wife thinks her Lincoln is bumpy. Ok, touring it is.

 

[SteveB]

Back in August I had the opportunity to drive an Emira with sports suspension and Cup 2 tyres around the Hethel test track. The mechanical grip was excellent with little noticeable roll even during aggressive cornering. However, the track is very flat & smooth so not really possible to judge how well sport suspension copes with ordinary (potholed) English roads. So today I had a test drive with Lotus Central in Nottingham. Many thanks to Charley for a great review of the Emira’s controls and guided tour of Nottinghamshire!

Car had sport suspension and Goodyear tyres. The route was a mix of city centre driving, duel carriageway and some country B roads. Traffic was quite heavy in the city so lots of stopping and starting but the car (and driver!) coped very well and no issues with clutch or gearbox. Most surprising was how well the sport suspension coped with ordinary roads, including uneven surfaces, off camber corners, potholes - even speed humps! There was no crashiness at all (not like my 435D on sport setting) and it passed over all obstacles with relative ease. But out of the city on more flowing, undulating roads it was noticeable that there was not much roll and the suspension felt quite firm. Firm but not harsh. This was almost the opposite of my BMW which feels like it has no suspension at all when encountering small sudden bumps but rides over dips and rises in the road reasonably comfortably. Presumably a reflection of differences in spring and damper rates.

I still want to try touring suspension to make a comparison and final decision on suspension before I am locked in. But after todays test drive I can definitely live with sport suspension as a daily drive (though its probably going to be a weekend car).

Also (unrelated to suspension), I only listened to the radio but the Kef sound system is rubbish (no base) and Lotus & Kef really need to get this sorted as its letting down an otherwise great car.

 

[VL3X]

Car had sport suspension and Goodyear tyres. The route was a mix of city centre driving, duel carriageway and some country B roads. Traffic was quite heavy in the city so lots of stopping and starting but the car (and driver!) coped very well and no issues with clutch or gearbox. Most surprising was how well the sport suspension coped with ordinary roads, including uneven surfaces, off camber corners, potholes - even speed humps! There was no crashiness at all (not like my 435D on sport setting) and it passed over all obstacles with relative ease. But out of the city on more flowing, undulating roads it was noticeable that there was not much roll and the suspension felt quite firm. Firm but not harsh.

This is comforting to read since I specced sport w/F1s. The demo I drove was tour with Goodyears and felt fine as well.

 

[kitkat]

Not true. Read or watch any of the interviews with Gavan Kershaw. Lotus pioneered the development of active suspension in F1 but don’t believe the technology is the best solution for a road-going sportscar.

Yeah and I don’t buy it — just because they say it doesn’t mean I believe them.

 

[emiraspain]

Yeah and I don’t buy it — just because they say it doesn’t mean I believe them.

yes I errrrr with you in this case, they dont mention cost, but its a big underlying factor for sure, as it is with every decision taken on the Emira, more so than with a Porsche let's say.
As I mentioned previously, a Toyota employee at my track day showed me several auxiliary elements around the engine that had been changed from Toyota provided, to Geely provided, and we can only assume this is cost related where I personally would prefer Toyota parts to Geely.
Maybe there is a 0.5% difference in handling on a track having the "perfect" set up, instead of a button press adjustable one, but for the person that is going to the track enough to really appreciate this, ie 0.5% of the customer base, they are probably adjusting their own direct suspension / camber etc settings anyway, so again, I totally disagree with making two identical cars, one being a bit stiffer than the other, a waste of time and effort and added confusion IMO.
The porsche sales model is so much better known and most customers of the EMIRA have been with porsche or certainly are familiar with the porsche PASM, base model and S set up, hence not using the same does add confusion, again for most Emira customers. I find it a decision I didn't want to take and I still dont know which way was best, but I figure for resale, sports is better just as a track pack on a Yaris was for value. Also, clearly its a sports car, well pretty clear, if I wanted a more GT type car, there are other options for that out there.