Attention all Lotus Esprit owners!.

Am possibly looking at a 1985 Lotus Esprit Turbo, I have always liked these. This one is in "For your eyes only" colours, quite low milleage 51 000 km's and at the moment am doing some due dilligence with a view of possibly buying the thing.

Every single piece of logic is saying this is a bad idea but one looks at the shape, there is the Bond connection and its a supercar of sorts built by arguably the 3rd most famous F1 constructor. I just think walking out and looking at this thing would feel so special, by todays standards it wont be fast but does the experience make up for that, is the handling as good as one reads?

Unfortunately this one is located about 1000 miles away so test driving at this stage is out of the question.

Dare I ask how reliable these are and how easy are they to work on for a skilled mechanic?One read absolute horror stories about Lotus cars of this vintage, fact or fiction?

 

I owned for 12 years one of the first 100 Esprit Turbos with dry sump engine. A very solid car compared to earlier Esprits. The car was virtually redesigned for the Turbo and S3 and many of the earlier niggles were gone including the half-assed rear suspension. The Turbos were the first to have galvanised chassis and they were way ahead of Ferrari on this, who were still coating their chassis with rustproofing gunge and hoping for the best.

The only major issues I had were the wastegate jamming either open or closed, which meant regular dismantling and cleaning of the valve, and the exhaust manifold and wastegate adaptor cracking. That required engine out.

Changing the cam belt is a bit of a nightmare, lying on a mattress on top of the engine and going everything by feel. The rear luggage compartment can be removed which helps access as you can climb into the engine bay.

I didnt really have any other major issues with it other than the usual Lotus electrical niggles etc and everything is do-able for an experienced mechanic.

The gear linkage was a terrible design on the car and I managed to do some mods to eliminate rubber bushings in the linkage and replace with solid which improved it greatly.

Later Esprits had secondary door seals fitted which filled in the rather large gaps between the window frames and body, but these seals fit the earlier cars and well worthwhile fitting to reduce wind noise and water ingress.

I much prefer the Guigaro design over the later rounded off Esprits.

 

This is my 1985 TE, my other one is a dry-sump car from 81, same color, black on tan
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like the door panel retrim. no more lazy boy tucked leather...

lower ride height is nice too. any problems encountered in the front? I recall there are geometry issues with the triumph base uprights if your drop the car too much.

i would like to do that with mine


anymore interior pics you can share>

 

My first "exotic" when I was just a punk kid about 23 years old. Sure was a rare sight back in 1982 when I owned it. It was a 1978 S1, just before the S2 came out.

Mike
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when did u sell that car? i think i remember it after you sold it. he was having problems with it and it was pulled over in a vacant parking lot in skagit valley. black tan with aftermarket sunroof as i recalled. could it have been yours?

the fellow that bought it says he needed to get married hence the flashy ride...lol.

cheers

hf

 

You are really taxing my memory! LOL! I actually traded it to a guy in downtown Seattle for a 1977 Jaguar XJ-S and a (don't laugh) 1977 FIAT X1/9, plus cash. If memory serves me correct, I think it would have been around 1983. He kept the car for a short time and then sold it to some guy up in Lynnwood that worked for a furniture store (Levitz maybe...). Anyhow, shortly after that guy owned it, he called me and said he had the engine out of the car and was doing a rebuild on it. Not sure what happened to it after that.

It had a god awful color interior. I think it was probably tan, but a lot of it had faded to this "army green" color!

I always loved the Esprit. Years later, I almost bought a 1987 Turbo Esprit HCi.

Mike

 

yes it must have been the early to mid eighties... a long while ago. the levitz guy said to me "you know..james bond drove one of these". lol i got a kick out of that.

im not sure about here but in the uk, early S1 are currently the rage and properly restored ones are worth 2x to 3x what S3's are going for despite being a woefully underdevelope car. the pure wedge shape is getting cooler by the minute.

cloth or marcasite S1 interiors are like chameleons. The once frog green tartan interiors become dark navy blue with a good dose of sunlike even the drab uk weather

all the best

 

No problems encountered up front. The car was lowered by a Pro, not by me. Here are some more interior pics, during reconstruction, also, not done by me. The car was like this when I bought it. Interior done by Styles Upholstery shop in Victoria BC, cost $10k for the interior.

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many thanks for additional pics...

cheers

 

Hey guys this is my 87 HCI. Sorry these are theonly two photos i have
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Its been a great car o far. My 5th esprit
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PSA, no affiliation...thought this might be of interest, Copart

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Here's my 93.5, I absolutely love this car
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David, are you in Denver? I think I have seen your car a few times on the road.. Looks similar to mine.

 

Yep, I am in Denver, I never see any other Esprits though...

 

Yeah I rarely do too, but saw what I thought was yours going down 225 about a month ago. I live in the springs but drive to Denver daily. About once every two weeks I drive mine to work.

Cheers!

 

Here is a S2, friend of mine's car that I get to sell.
It was first reg'd in 1979 and was made late 1978. Great car, absolutely gorgeus, drive is soft and yet real sport car. There is spirit in such dept's I would not know'n from previous meet's with the car. Does anyone have pictures of Countach next to original Esprit?
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That photo is absolutely gorgeous, Samuli! I prefer the S1 over the S2, but in the right colors -- such as this car -- the S2 looks incredible!

 

Saw Samuli´s Esprit yesterday. Quite original example of a S2. Mine was originally gold as Samuli´s, then it was converted into a Turbo replica and painted red, then metallic blue, and I painted it white, when I converted it back to the original S2 look. The funny thing is that now all the Finnish Esprit S2´s reside within 300 meters from each other..

 

Here are some pics, not the greatest but its rare to see an S1 parked next to a countach.
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cool shot after washing the car today
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My S2 gets the upper bunk.

Beev

 

a fiat coupe too???

 

Yes. And a few more oddball cars.

B