2008 Best Car Series: Nissan GT-R vs Lotus Exige 240 S

[exigeracer]

Famine, the car posted is toting the long roofscoop, exclusive to 240-optioned cars. What can I say, they used the photo for the performance pack press release and features a key identifying feature only available on that certain model, which the license is registered otherwise. However the car was registered/doctored image is beyond my knowledge. Can you find an image of a 2008 non-240/Performance Pack that as the long scoop?

The more adamant you get about it simply cements the fact that even you, someone who loves the car, cannot tell some variations apart even when presented with quite clear data that show the company who built it and the official register of all UK vehicles do not agree with you.

Could you share the site which you use to get you registry check? The one I've been using is terrible.

 

[Famine]

I use a combination. The RAC (rac.co.uk - go to Vehicle Check) is good, as far as it goes. The DVLA's own site (which is now at www.taxdisc.direct.gov.uk for some inane reason) is also useful, but you need the reg and make (in this case, no issue, but in mystery car identifications, use the RAC first). There's Askmid (askmid.com), the Motor Insurer's Database, which shows if the car is insured and as what. But occasionally the only way to get full details is to try an insurance quote for the car (confused.com is a good one, as they have quite comprehensive trim levels).


There's also the possibility that the car in the picture really is what Lotus registered it as but for the press release they didn't have a suitable vehicle available and simply stuck the scoop on... They're not the only manufacturer to do this.

 

[Venari]

Well, so the Exige is a ponced up Elise.

Fair enough.

I like Elises. Driven a few. I like coupes, so driving an Exige of any type would be fun.

Now, I think the concept of the original Elise, and (to a lesser extent) every subsequent Elise/Exige/340R/etcetera...

If you drive one, you are pretty much experiencing driving at it's most intimate.

The GT-R, on the other hand, is rather contrived. Don't get me wrong, the end result is a starling motorcar. When I drive one, I'm sure I'll let you know what I think. But, any car with 'hack proof engine software' and a video game developed centre console may not be the be-all and end-all of the most involving driving experiences.

Just for this... I'm voting Exige.

 

[forza2.0]

 

[niky]

Clearly you haven't.

I'm sure I make absolutely no sense to you but I'm talking about a certain technology in a car that restricts it from doing what it would normally do without those electronics. Yes, obviously it takes technology to run and balance almost everything in a car but I am narrowing the electronics to one area. That which is the electronics like Traction Control, Stability control, blah blah blah.

Defeatable, defeatable, defeatable. The thing is, 99% of the safety net for a high end sporstcar nowadays comes from the fact that it has AWD at all, and from the fact that it has tires with an unconscionable level of grip.

Traction Control, per se, does nothing but stop wheels spinning... Stability control, on the other hand, is probably what you're thinking of... and it's not Stability control that makes a car faster... far from it... and there's no escaping the fact that everything on the market besides the Viper comes with some form of Stability control (which is still defeatable in most high-end sports cars).

Now grip... there's something I have a gripe with. Grip itself is fine, but the plateau of grip and the razor edge of adhesion are a big problem with modern sports cars.

In an old sports car, you could chuck yourself around a bend and have a reasonably good idea of whether it would kill you or not, and as it started to go sideways, you always knew where you were in relation to the tires. In these new cars, the grip is so high and the breakaway so sudden (as it is with the GT-R), that you need reflexes like Kimi Raikkonen to stop yourself from spinning (and aids don't mean squat when you hae no grip)... or at least have the smoothness of Lewis Hamilton to keep from spinning in the first place.

New sportscars are nice, mind you... but they're all too bloody fast for you to have real fun with them with any degree of safety. which is a good commendation for a basic Elise, which is just quick enough and grippy enough... (of course the Exige is a different animal).

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RE: Soul:

Soul is in the driving of a car... when it is a car that can kill you for not knowing how to drive, then, arguably, the GT-R series has more soul than many cars out there... ...whatever Clarkson says. He's great fun to watch, but sometimes you have to take what he says with a grain of salt.

Then again, verdict is reserved for the (unlikely) day that some fool actually hands me the keys to a GT-R and gives me permission to turn the aids off.

 

[gator of kana]

New sportscars are nice, mind you... but they're all too bloody fast for you to have real fun with them with any degree of safety. which is a good commendation for a basic Elise, which is just quick enough and grippy enough... (of course the Exige is a different animal).

Suprised people didn't say that when the Mclaren F1 was in production, what's not so fun about going too fast? Are you trying to kill yourself just because you want to go sideways? You don't like to get your face ripped off as Jeremy Clarkson would say?

 

[niky]

Depends on what reviews you read. If all you read... or watch... is Top Gear, "ripping your face off" is probably all you'll know about the F1's dynamics... but more serious reviewers griped about the wooly rear end, which was prone to snapping around... the worrying lack of downforce at high speeds, which was fixed with the later "GT" version (which couldn't hit the standard Macca's 240 mph plus top speed)... the crazy heavy steering... all of which made it difficult, in the words of some reviewers and owners, to drive the McLaren hard on the road... but they all made it a very challenging and rewarding car to drive.

Many modern cars are too fast to drive to their absolute limits on the road... the new 911 GT2 (or even the old one)... most non-AWD supercars... in fact, most sportscars... when you set the limits too high, the line between 10/10ths and dead becomes razor thin.

In a car like the first generation Miata, though... you're going at 10/10ths of the car's ability while you're still at 9/10ths of yours... and when you're driving at 10/10ths, the car is already over the edge... which makes it much more fun than a car that's still holding a neutral line at speeds where your balls are trying their best to crawl back up into your stomach and up into your throat...

 

[JCE]

I missed the deadline. But, obviously I would of picked the GT-R.