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Francisco Franco

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Everything posted by Francisco Franco

  1. Personally I think they will have who they want there regardless of Quali’s, they will soon find ways around that if it suits them. I can’t help thinking all the IP is going east and the European governments are falling over themselves to give out all sorts of incentives to help them do it. Not looking good long term for the likes of Ford, GM, BMW etc. I don’t have any sympathy for the large car makers but they employ many hundreds of thousands of people and these jobs will end up lost
  2. Sorry, I wasn’t clear, I meant businesses that have been attached to the marque. I am in the same boat with my Elise, it may be that I end up keeping it. I will make my mind up once all the Emira details are in black and white.
  3. It seems some people are going to end up feeling like Les Dennis did a few years back It’s a shame, but as they say “ Business is Business”
  4. Reminds me of my 520 Eclát, four speed Ford box instead of the 5 speed Lotus with Marina chocolate internals, single exhaust instead of the heavy twin exhaust set up, unassisted steering and no air conditioning, I added the Lotus alloys, a beautiful car and reliable to boot. I will only be interested in a base model 4 pot, and am not too interested in all the bells and whistles. To some people, less is more.
  5. I understand what you are saying, but I would never of thought an Emira with an AMG engine for under sixty thousand would be possible. At £100-110k that leaves £40-50k for a more powerful engine, better brakes and suspension and a bit of profit. surely it is doable?
  6. Thanks Tom some good reasoning there. So if the base Emira in both guises may sit around £58-65K I would like to think that a version with serious power priced around the £100-110k mark or even a tad more would have a market and be profitable. After all quite a few Evora’s were this sort of money towards the end. It would be nice to see Lotus’ final ICE car ending up being the car that set the standard, but perhaps that is just wishful thinking on my part. Anyway, there needs to be a lot of base Emiras to be sold before any radically new model could be financially justified. I personally think it’s going to be a global success, fingers crossed.
  7. Just read through this thread, it seems to me that the Toyota V6 is the weak link in the Emira package for some people, ie BHP/Torque, may be there are contractual or financial reasons why they are using it, or maybe it was a safe bet. we all know that all Lotus models have steady increases in power through their production runs, and I would say that the AMG option has had it’s power output held back so as not to embarrass the V6 as it would impact sales. Radford are suggesting future outputs of 500BHP for the V6 although they did not actually say it would be the Toyota unit, I would imagine this would involve great expense and the upgrading of all important internals parts, then there are the gearbox limits to think about. Thinking out loud, Lotus did not know how much demand there would be for the Emira, and could not throw absolutely everything they had at it in one go, so far it has been well received and if all the deposits translate in to sales things will be looking very good at Hethel. I think the tie up with AMG Mercedes is good news and if the Emira continues to sell well I would not be at all surprised to see a larger displacement AMG engine available for a top of the range model in the next two years or so which would put the cat amongst the pigeons This would give us three model choices, The sub £60k 4 pot with sub 400 BHP The V6 Toyota £70k 400+ BHP The flagship model at £100k 550+ BHP Personally I am in the £60k 4 pot bracket and that car would give me everything I wanted. Although we have had no firm prices as of yet,I personally don’t see the reason for the talked about £10-15k premium for the Toyota over the Mercedes, as other than sound and manual box there is very little in it performance wise, and I wouldn’t think that much money wise either.
  8. It’s good that you are having first class treatment, but plenty of people aren’t, it all comes down to where you live and who is treating you, bit of a lucky dip really. I have met the head of Oncology at my local hospital and would liken him to Coco the clown. Whereas my Father in law was treated at The Royal Free and like yourself has had excellent treatment…. Shouldn’t really be down to where you live or who is treating you, but unfortunately it is
  9. Clickbait, the more people that view it, the more money he gets. also, the Emira is not a reworked Evora, people saying this seem to be a bit salty to me
  10. The NHS is rotten on all levels, for a start, conscientious full time nurses have to work alongside work shy uninterested agency staff who actually earn more money per shift than the regulars, you can imagine the effect that has on morale. Then there is the Covid thing which has allowed the workshy even more opportunities to skive, and that is on all levels, from the cleaners to the senior management. As for your sister, obviously I know nothing of the facts, but I do know that their is a two tier hospital system in most other european countries, there are hospitals that will do nothing without payment first, then there are the hospitals that work in a similar way to ours, ie treatment first. These hospitals are on the local government lists, I realise that in an emergency it would be easily overlooked. As for the Bollocks side of things, I stand by my original comment, and the unfortunate thing is a few of us on here are getting to the age that we are going to find out how fu**ing useless they really are
  11. I’ve had two operations in Spain, both on the EHIC card, I count my blessings as Spanish hospitals are miles better than the average hospital here. Other than A and E, the majority of the NHS is not fit for purpose
  12. Like you say, one deal after another, JB comes across as a nice fella with a clean image, so why not. It could be a lot worse, a woke Lotus and Hammie😂
  13. Only thing I preferred on my S1 compared to S2 and S3 was no servo on the brakes. As for the FE, can’t help but think the digital dash is out of place, but like you say, you can’t have them exactly how you want them.
  14. Funny enough was talking about this engine earlier tonight with a Mitsi Guru, he told me that the last Evo engine, although powerful had many flaws, including the liners and that they basically shot themselves in the foot much to Subaru’s pleasure, no opinion, just saying
  15. That’s what I was thinking too, would be a shame for that sort of car to disappear
  16. What a lovely looking car, well done all at Hethel. The power figures seem ok to me and are far higher BHP/Ton wise than the first S1 Elise’ so I am sure there is fun to be had in this model, although I realise they are two very different types of car. I realise some people want more BHP and a little less weight, and I am sure that will come along in time. As I get fatter and older this car is very appealing to me, auto box, low door cills and a few gadgets, But if I was a youngster I would feel truly cheated that I had missed out on the Elise/Exige range. It would be great if in the future Lotus could make an MX5/ 60’s Elan type budget sports car, but realistically I think those days have been and gone. Disappointed to see the Toyota V6 still hanging around, But pleased to see they are using the AMG which I believe has many relatively cheap upgrades available to it. I felt for Mr Windle, I thought he looked exhausted
  17. I reckon the 4 pot will be the one to have, could be a shed full of V6 engines to use up before it is replaced, a bit like the 90’s Elan S2.
  18. I’ve got a good feeling about the Emira, and I think it is the first Lotus that will be underpriced as opposed to overpriced. The luxury market in China (and the rest of the world) is ruled by the German marques and Geely know they need a non chinese brand to brake the German stranglehold. I believe that this is why Lotus was “ chosen” by Geely. In my opinion the 131 is going to show the world that Lotus is now a complete package and lacking in no quarter. I think it will be outstanding in every area. I think Geely are prepared for the UK arm of Lotus to run at breakeven or even a loss as they build consumer confidence in the brand, with the ultimate aim of producing many hundreds of thousands of cars/SUV’s from their Chinese factory's. This is where they will get their money back. so in a nutshell I think the Emira is going to offer great value and become a global success. But I for one, will be a little upset that the mixed aroma of fibreglass, petrol and damp will start to become a mere memory of times gone by.
  19. Well they say history repeats itself, bit of Déjà vu with the Lotus 7 here, then again perhaps they are sharing the Emira platform already??? I am starting to think that a bit too much is going on at once. Time will tell
  20. Well, in my opinion, a pretty poor show on the sellers side of things, personally I would have took the £12k and been glad that it had gone to the museum.... but hey that’s his business. delands, how much was paid for the one they bought in the end?
  21. It seems we are bidding against an early riser with deep pockets, hopefully the reserve is not met and the owner can speak with the museum and come to an arrangement, lets be honest £4k is enough for that cup and the museum is it’s rightful resting place....fingers crossed
  22. Mercedes once again showed their inability to change strategy mid race, something Red Bull are very good at. I would imagine Honda are working tirelessly to get the engine right, even more so since Alonso bad mouthed them publicly the other year, the Japs take things like that very personally. I believe Red Bull are capable enough to build a great chassis as they have done in the past, when Red Bull and Honda eventually get it right Mercedes will have lost their dominance which will be refreshing in itself, as long as it doesn’t become 4 or 5 years of Red Bull dominance as before As MG4Lotus said “just watch the racing”. The rest of the F1 model is broken. Political and social opinions have been introduced (to a sporting event) and it is becoming increasingly harder to watch without being financially ripped off. As for taking the knee (or not) and wearing T-shirts with various slogans on, none of which have anything to do with motorsport WTF is going on.The American owners have pandered to certain teams and drivers and there will be a price to pay through future revenues. I used to see Bernie and think what a slippery fucker he was, but on reflection he had it right, he understood all the aspects and knew how to handle things. I’m starting to see similarities between F1 and Iraq, both fucked up by American meddling
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