2010 Lotus Evora: Not an Ancient Roman City

The 2010 Lotus Evora is a remarkable creation by Lotus, hand crafted from aluminum and fiberglass, it sits somewhere between a scaled down version of a Chevrolet Corvette ZR1 and a Ferrari 430. We're not really sure why Lotus named their 2010 sports car the Evora, after all; history tells us that Evora was a city in south central Portugal occupied by Romans. However, with so many new names for automobiles one would have to consider that Evora just sounds exotic and is pleasing to the ears. The 2010 Lotus Evora is a sports machine of a different breed, for starters it's a four seater, it utilizes a rear engine V6, and it gets an amazing 27 mpg combined fuel economy. So, with these facts in mind, the Lotus Evora is effectively a new hybrid breed of affordable sports cars. With the brand new design of the Lotus Evora, its aluminum chassis and steel integrated motor compartment is surprisingly rigid in both bending and torsion strength. In fact the torsional rigidity of the Evora's frame is 60% stronger than the Elise. Adding in the outside body components for even more strength and the rigidity figures are upped to over 150% which is just slightly better than the Porsche Cayman.

The Lotus Evora is the world's first four seater sports coupe that is mid engine, and an interesting engine it has. The Lotus Evora is powered by a 3456cc DOHC Toyota V6 with variable valve timing. The Lotus Evora's engine produces 276 horsepower at 6400 rpm and a decent 258ftlbs of torque at 4700 rpm. With these power figures the Lotus Evora ultimately rockets from zero to 60mph in 4.9 seconds. Not bad for a 3000 pound car that uses a Toyota Camry power plant. The Lotus Evora has a fairly lop sided weight distribution, 39% front/ 61% rear; this was no doubt a plot by lotus to make sure there was a considerable amount of weight over the rear tires in order to gain traction. The Lotus Evora is almost Porsche-like in its design, a six cylinder engine in the back and rear wheel drive. The Lotus Evora has a governed top speed of 150 mph. Helping the Lotus Evora get to these speeds and put the power to the pavement is an Aisin six speed manual transmission; which utilizes a new clutch and single mass flywheel that were built specifically for Lotus by AP Driveline. There are plans for a six speed automatic transmission that uses shift paddles, but it won't likely be an available option until 2011. The Lotus Evora rolls with stiff Bilstein suspension and 225/40z/18 in the front and 255/35z/19 Pirelli P Zero rear treads. Stopping is done by a set of AP Racing four piston callipered cross drilled and vented rotors. The Lotus Evora will come to a complete stop from 60 mph in only 110 feet. So what do you get for the Lotus Evora's base price of $74,000? Performance, the ability to seat two extra friends, and teeth pulling brakes, not a bad deal for the radical body styling and the impressive acceleration.

Source: http://www.insideline.com/lotus/evora/2010/2010-lotus-evora-first-drive.html