Manual DV Collected from Hethel

[Emirahep]

 

[Emirahep]

Collected my manual DV from Hethel today with my 17 yr old son.

Had a great day hosted by Scott who, as others have mentioned, is a fountain of Lotus knowledge.
Really enjoyed the factory tour. Great to see how the cars come together from chassis components, new engines still in wrapping straight from Toyota, body panels, seats etc into the finished article.

Two others collecting their FEs - one in Seneca and the other in Nimbus. Both looked great. Great to chat to other owners. One of them straight onto Eurostar heading for the Ring ! Big respect.

Had one challenge with the car that Scott immediately got sorted.

Recommend anyone picking up has a very thorough look round inside and out before final acceptance. Best to check the paintwork outside if the weather allows.

I’ll post some thoughts on the drive home later (had all sorts of weather including heavy showers so I have some wiper experience to post on that thread) - M25 was chocka so not the nicest first drive.

I also looked out for production numbers, wheel gaps etc so will look where best to pop those.

Overall, a great day and would thoroughly recommend the factory pick up if you can do it.

 

[VL3X]

Excellent! Congrats and looking forward to more feedback. How's your son like it so far? Keep us posted and enjoy!!

 

[Emirahep]

Excellent! Congrats and looking forward to more feedback. How's your son like it so far? Keep us posted and enjoy!!

He loves it. Big petrol head. Probably going to do engineering at college so in his element seeing the factory.

Loves the interior and styling of the Emira - as do I.

In fact when I was considering cancelling he was very persuasive in me staying in. I am glad I did !

 

[Speedluvver]

Think that yellow car might be mine ! Collection tomorrow pm from factory.. is certainly my spec

 

[Speedluvver]

Can you share the issue you found ? I will defo check the AC as well as panel alignment and paint

 

[JohnHoward]

He loves it. Big petrol head. Probably going to do engineering at college so in his element seeing the factory.

Loves the interior and styling of the Emira - as do I.

In fact when I was considering cancelling he was very persuasive in me staying in. So gar I am glad I did !

Looks great, my turn tomorrow (home delivery)!

Does your son drive already or are you teaching him in the Emira?

It was my son that actually got me interested in performance cars. He was in the army at the time and was posted in Germany so could buy new UK registered cars VAT free + military discount. He bought a new F-type 5.0L which got me hooked on performance/sports cars.

Enjoy your car, look forward to hearing more.

 

[GetawayDriving]

Collected my manual DV from Hethel today with my 17 yr old son.

Had a great day hosted by Scott who, as others have mentioned, is a fountain of Lotus knowledge.
Really enjoyed the factory tour. Great to see how the cars come together from chassis components, new engines still in wrapping straight from Toyota, body panels, seats etc into the finished article.

Two others collecting their FEs - one in Seneca and the other in Nimbus. Both looked great. Great to chat to other owners. One of them straight onto Eurostar heading for the Ring ! Big respect.

Had one challenge with the car that Scott immediately got sorted.

Recommend anyone picking up has a very thorough look round inside and out before final acceptance. Best to check the paintwork outside if the weather allows.

I’ll post some thoughts on the drive home later (had all sorts of weather including heavy showers so I have some wiper experience to post on that thread) - M25 was chocka so not the nicest first drive.

I also looked out for production numbers, wheel gaps etc so will look where best to pop those.

Overall, a great day and would thoroughly recommend the factory pick up if you can do it.

lol at the NB shot

 

[TomE]

Congratulations and look forward to reading more feedback. The factory is a fascinating place and Scott a brilliant host.

I’m also amused you both wore green, but not matching or DV!

 

[Emirahep]

Think that yellow car might be mine ! Collection tomorrow pm from factory.. is certainly my spec

Looked awesome ! Enjoy 😉

 

[Emirahep]

Congratulations and look forward to reading more feedback. The factory is a fascinating place and Scott a brilliant host.

I’m also amused you both wore green, but not matching or DV!

Thanks Tom. Will post more tomorrow. Knackered ! The green look not planned !

 

[Drlonline]

Love the spec of your car. I imagine you are over the moon about how great it looks. Although I was initially thinking Magma Red, after seeing how good DV looks with the tan interior, I think I may change to black and tan, assuming black will be one of the new exterior colors coming later this year. And good to see you had decent weather for the pick-up, even if you had to drive through some nastier stuff on your way home. Enjoy and we look forward to hearing more about your return trip. Get some rest

 

[Superman]

The NB photo is just utter class... Well done the man! 🤣

 

[Emirahep]

Looks great, my turn tomorrow (home delivery)!

Does your son drive already or are you teaching him in the Emira?

It was my son that actually got me interested in performance cars. He was in the army at the time and was posted in Germany so could buy new UK registered cars VAT free + military discount. He bought a new F-type 5.0L which got me hooked on performance/sports cars.

Enjoy your car, look forward to hearing more.

He is learning at the moment. Test in August. He is angling for a drive…can you imagine the insurance ! Will be quite a while before he is let loose in something like an Emira 😃

 

[TomE]

Take him to a track day, then you don't need to worry about insuring it...

More seriously, if he's keen then get him onto the Lotus Driving Academy or Thruxton for their Emira experience. They may have an age restriction. There are also a few places like CAT Driver Training at Millbrook or AW Driver Training at North Weald (just north of M25 into Essex) where you can use your own car for instructed driver training on a private circuit.

 

[eclat2emira]

Collected my manual DV from Hethel today with my 17 yr old son.

Had a great day hosted by Scott who, as others have mentioned, is a fountain of Lotus knowledge.
Really enjoyed the factory tour. Great to see how the cars come together from chassis components, new engines still in wrapping straight from Toyota, body panels, seats etc into the finished article.

Two others collecting their FEs - one in Seneca and the other in Nimbus. Both looked great. Great to chat to other owners. One of them straight onto Eurostar heading for the Ring ! Big respect.

Had one challenge with the car that Scott immediately got sorted.

Recommend anyone picking up has a very thorough look round inside and out before final acceptance. Best to check the paintwork outside if the weather allows.

I’ll post some thoughts on the drive home later (had all sorts of weather including heavy showers so I have some wiper experience to post on that thread) - M25 was chocka so not the nicest first drive.

I also looked out for production numbers, wheel gaps etc so will look where best to pop those.

Overall, a great day and would thoroughly recommend the factory pick up if you can do it.

Congrats on your gorgeous Emira! Your experience of the day sounds very similar to mine, a great way to meet your new car for the first time.

Specs look almost identical, you'll find DV changes day to day depending on the light conditions, which I think you'll enjoy.

Would love to hear your first impressions over the next few weeks, have fun!

 

[Emirahep]

Congrats on your gorgeous Emira! Your experience of the day sounds very similar to mine, a great way to meet your new car for the first time.

Specs look almost identical, you'll find DV changes day to day depending on the light conditions, which I think you'll enjoy.

Would love to hear your first impressions over the next few weeks, have fun!

Thanks and will post more as I learn the car ! Initial thoughts below.

Agree on DV - one drove past at the factory and the colour seemed to change a lot as the aspect and light changed. Reminded me a bit of TVR fancy paint of old !

 

[eclat2emira]

Thanks and will post more as I learn the car ! Initial thoughts below.

Agree on DV - one drove past at the factory and the colour seemed to change a lot as the aspect and light changed. Reminded me a bit of TVR fancy paint of old !

Ahhhh, the old TVR "green one direction - purple the other" paint - mind you, those cars were wild enough to carry off that look...

 

[Emirahep]

A few thoughts from the drive home from Hethel;

Good bits;

Steering – lovely and very communicative as expected

Ride – glad I went for Touring as it was plenty firm enough for my taste and it soaked up many bumps and crap UK roads well

Gearbox – changes were smooth and pretty easy (except reverse – see below)

Looks – stunning car inside and out. Got some positive attention from a few other road users in the know. Very happy with my spec.

Interior – high quality, no rattles, felt good. Info screen was great and easy to use.

Stereo – plenty loud enough and my son (who plays a lot of loud music) gave it the thumbs up

Brakes - for brand new brakes I thought they were excellent. Plenty of feel and obviously powerful

Not so good bits;

Wipers – I’ll post more detail on the wiper issue thread, but in summary I did what I had been instructed by Scott, didn’t use automatic at all and still could not get high speed. Went into some torrential sharp showers and had to slow to 40-50 mph on the motorway. Really not good and Lotus need to fix this urgently

Seats – whilst they have a lot of adjustment and I got into a good position, they seem very hard to me and I got a sore behind after an hour and a half. Scott mentioned this and said they soften/give with time. I hope so as would not want to do a really long drive at present.

Steering wheel – as I posted from my test drive I really think this is an example of form over function. It is way too deep/thick just where I would naturally hold the wheel at 10 to 2 and has a “sharp” edge running on the surface of wheel facing the driver where the two halves meet. Had to move my hands to different places on the wheel to give them a break. Also, the haptic buttons are very touch sensitive and several times I inadvertently muted the stereo or changed the display by brushing them.

Reverse gear – Scott pre-warned those picking up that the gearbox can take some time to bed in. He recommended if you can’t easily get the car into 1st or reverse pumping the clutch a few times and moving the stick left/right in neutral and in and out of 3rd.4th before tyring again. I needed to do this to engage reverse when backing onto the drive at home. I am sure it will be fine, but I am glad I was pre-warned.

Gear knob - mine is not as bad as some ops but still scratchy under the palm of the hand. Given the whole point of a metal gear knob is to have this mechanical connection to the car this is a bit of a miss. I may try some polish or very fine wet and dry to take the scratchy edges off.

I also detected a slight left yaw to the car when changing up driving straight on a dual carriageway/motorway. I need to replicate this and see how it feels once car run in. I have never owned a mid-engine car before (although have had several rear engine ones) – I’ll call it “torque yaw” for now but would be interested if others notice the same or it’s a well known Lotus thing !

Looking forward to more good things to say on the engine/exhaust note/handling as the car is run in.

Still very happy I went ahead but also put more detail on the issues as probably of more interest to others.

 

[CDM1855]

It’s ridiculous they have not resolved the wiper issue by now, how hard can it be ?

I wonder what would be the implication if someone was in a serious accident as a result of them not working properly