No. They're great cars. Buy one.

If it isn't quick enough out of the box for you, add a turbo. With ~350 hp they'll rape and pillage most heavy 500-600 hp cars.

So long as you're not a broken, useless old man who whines when a little bump or two disturbs his latte, you'll love it.

 

What about straight line (say exige s 220)? I live in an unfortunate part of the country where we have nice straight flat roads as far as the eye can see. Just kind of seems like it might not be the ideal place to own this car if you really get 90% of the joy from the bends?

Can it still be fun to blast around in around town/small road trips?

Also - how underpowered does it feel with the A/C on in the summer? (Supercharged?)

 

The cars definitely shine on twisty roads. I don't know how fun it would be on a straight line. Ride quality is decent with the base Elise suspension. Sport/Exige suspensions are very hard. Ergonomics are terrible. Seats ('06+) are comfortable but have almost no padding.

Driving normally I rarely go above 3k rpm, 3.5k at the most. If you want drive quickly, keep it at 4k-6k. If you want to drive fast, keep it at 5k - redline. I would consider supercharging the car some day, but I think I'm just going to do a tune to lower the cam switch-over point for now. The only complaint is the dip in torque before the cam switches. Otherwise it's a linear increase in power.

With the A/C on you definitely need to rev it more. Feels pretty weak below 3k. Above that you don't really notice. AC on my car is perfect. I've heard the 08+ cars are much better than the older ones - mine's an '08 and works fine.

People get these cars and think they are going to be rockets. They aren't. They have to be wrung out to go fast, and you better drive it well. If you don't drive it that way, it's going to respond like any other torque-less 4-cylinder car. Yes, a racing driver in one of these will keep up with cars with more than double the horsepower. A more average driver will embarrass themselves.

 

Out of the box they're "quick" and fun to blast around in even on boring highways, but if you're used to 500+ hp you'll find it lacking. Boost fixes this. With a turbo they're hilarious fun in all conditions.

Never noticed a power dip on a stock one. Mine is far from stock and I've used the A/C exactly twice, so that's not much of a yard stick. It isn't really a car to putter around in traffic with the A/C on to begin with. Take the top off, and drive.

The biggest attraction of the car is the simple pleasure of driving the thing.

With some boost, a few reliability and endurance mods, and a halfway decent audio system they're as close to one can get to my idea of a perfect car without blowing well north of 100k.

 

 

Have you considered the Exige S? From what I've read, it seems to solve any under-powering issues -- 345hp supercharged V6. Pretty damn nice looking too...

 

Thanks for the input gents!

 

Have you guys put any ADV wheels on an Elise? Maybe I'll be the first !

 

Simba you have an exige or an exige a?

 

The car is simply amazing ---- wow -----