Is It All Bad News???

[wats]

just read a buyers guide (on the net)its all doom and gloom!,it cant be all bad owning a elise can it.if i get a Elise it sounds like it will spend most of its life in the garage on the ramp!!and dont even think about the 111s you will never get the bits for the engine!!and then it wont pass the emisions test for the MOT....looks like its a fiesta 1.1 for me..please tell me its not true

[adrianr]

Remember, people complain more than they praise and good news is no news. Imagine a web site full of "car worked faultessly today, no problems" type reports?

It is a low volume car, so will never be as thoroughly debugged as a Mundano but I've owned mine for 3.5 years, and managed to do 30K in it so must have been working some of the time.

Checkout the "Fleet" section of PH for real ownership stories.

AdrianR

[CJN]

all doom & gloom? - er no!

I owned a 99T for seven months now & covered 7k in it. You may sit at work & think about all of the money that you would save by not owning one (£18-20k is a lot of money, servicing is not the cheapest & insurance can be expensive) BUT the moment you get outdoors, look at, sit in & most importantly drive the car every previous thought drops from your mind. There is no better car for improving your mood on a sad day. They leak (sometimes) but so did my MX5 & my VW Golf -buy a towel! Some have engine problems - it's a Rover engine, so do all Rovers, MGs etc. Bits break off, so do bits off our company VW & it's only 40k & 3 years old. It uses petrol but not half as much as a Scooby or anything anywhere near as fast. It's not cheap to insure - it's a sports car!
It's noisy - you won't be able to hear your wife or girlfriend! 7k, no breakdowns, no problems except dirty underwear now & again.



CJ

[wats]

thanks guys that what i wanted to hear!!!!!!
about the 111s is it going to have problems with getting bits for the engine in the years to come ,is it best to go with the standard(if you can call a Elise standard) Elise????

[Nightmare]

in my opinion (and dont want to offend any existing owners), the 111s is a bit of a pointless choice. depending on what you can afford a 160 is a much faster car, and the 135 version is supposed to be excellent. I dont think that the 111s offers enough to be worth it - and getting parts is definitely more expensive for the engine.

I have little doubt I will now be lamnbasted by someone who has one

oh, and they are fantastic. Unless you're really unlucky and get a 'Friday afternoon' model, it will be cheap to run, fairly reliable and bloody brilliant fun!

Night

Edited by Nightmare on Friday 9th November 22:10

[timh]

get one, it's not nearly as bad as they say, mine's never (yet) missed a beat, alarm drained the battery recently as we hadn't used it for a while on the sunniest day in October, slid home from work early, opened the garage door, took the roof off, opened the door and slid into the seat, smelt the leather, put the key in the ignition , turned the key waiting for the baby to fire up...........BAS@@@D, as for the 'Friday afternoon' model', I thought Lotus only made cars on friday afternoon!

[bigchef]

Just to clarify - some people might not have guessed this from certain Lotus's past reliability records, but all the shop floor shuts up shop on Friday afternoons - I've seen them all leaving Hethel at Friday lunchtime not to return until Monday morning.

So, suprisingly enough there are definitely no Friday afternoon cars (in theory!).

[scribbler]

Mines fine, but the Elise can ruin your sex life....

I accelerated hard on to a German roundabout in my left-hook Elise when the aftermarket solid alloy window winder handle came off the passenger door, flew the width of the interior at speed, then landed (at said speed) in between my legs. Ouch!

The thing had'nt been fitted by the previous owner properly and my nads took the brunt... Swine!