Lotus Exige 350 Sport – adding lightness is the Lotus ethos

Colin Chapman, founder of the Lotus cars company, was an engineer, and to make his cars faster, the Lotus company ran by the ethos “performance through lightweight”.  To make a car faster and more nimble, it does not need more power, but needs to be made lighter.  He is believed to have said they need to “add lightness” to the cars.

Lighter means faster

The Lotus Exige 350 Sport is the ultimate incarnation of the Exige lightweight sports car, so, in keeping with this, Colin would be pleased to learn that the Lotus Exige 350 Sport is 51 kg lighter than the previous Exige S.

The Sport naming re-introduction follows the Elise Sport and Elise Sport 220, where Sport models offer lighter and even more performance-focused driving experiences.

Concentrating on what the company does best (how refreshing to not hear of how a car company ventures off into new territory to expand its product offerings) Lotus keeps focus on pure performance.  The 2-seater has been further developed to be sharper and more direct than previous models.  Drawing on core design elements of the Exige, which have made it a driving enthusiast’s favourite, the Exige Sport 350 combines a lightweight extruded aluminium chassis structure with composite bodywork.

51kg may not sound like much on today’s cars, but needs to be seen in context – the new car weighs jut 1125kg, and is a result of the “Lightweight Laboratory”.  The lab added lightness items like the louvred tailgate panel above the engine (which the company says is reminiscent of the Lotus Essex Esprit Turbo).

Heritage trim

Lotus colours are green and yellow.  The exterior of the car pictures is in verdant Racing Green.  The heritage trim theme is part of a trim option pack of tartan cloth, available in black with yellow, as photographed here, or in black with red.  Lotus says the tartan theme was introduced on the Lotus Esprit S1, originally in keeping with the tartan fashion at the time.

Now the specs

Lotus delivers on its performance promise.  It does not use the 1.8 litre engine its used in so many of its small cars, but a 3.5-litre V6, with supercharger, good for 258kW / 400Nm.  In a car weighing just 1125kg, remember?  This means its power-to-weight ratio is a supercar-challenging 300+ hp/ton.

A 6-speed manual is standard, which covers the 0-100 in 3.9 seconds, and runs to a top speed of 274 km/h.  An automatic (shock to hardcore Lotus fans) is also available – it is fractionally quicker off the mark, reaching 100 in 3.8 sec, though top speed of the 6-speed auto is 261km/h.  The lightness also off-sets the V6 engine’s fuel consumption, quoted at a reasonable 10.1 and 9.4 combined for manual and auto.

Added lightness – mission accomplished.

No more local imports

The local importer has stopped local Lotus sales, so not this nor any other Lotus will be sold here, and also no longer in USA. 

The Lotus Elise, Exige and Evora (versions of these were once available in South Africa) have now been been updated.  Lotus is also an engineering company, so if you want to head directly to the cars website to see some more Lotus lightness, go to www.lotuscars.com