At 11:03 AM 9/3/2004, Jay Mitchell wrote:
>That's not too big a surprise to me. How much improvement do you
>think you'll be able to find with changes to front bar, shocks,
>and alignment, lighter exhaust, etc.? There's got to be some
>additional time there.
Hard to say. Consider that Lotus has done a lot to this car as it is. It is
the one with the Lotus Sport Package option, so the springs, shocks, rims,
and alignment have all been "upgraded" and the car is lowered from a stock
Elise. According to Lotus, they have optimized the car to be close to
perfect out of the box, but that of course does not mean optimized for
autocrossing and with Hoosiers.
I am putting a lighter exhaust from Lotus on it (8 pounds less). Perhaps I
should not have gotten the "luxurious" Lotus Touring Package, that would be
10 pounds less.
The car may benefit from a stiffer front bar. And some adjustable shocks
and a look at alignments. I expect over the next 6 months we will be
researching these things.
I do think that we were running times close to Jason Isely in his AS
Corvette, with no additional prep than tires, we should be probably be
classed in Super Stock. And that also should take into consideration I was
a bit ham-fisted in my driving of the car. I need to get used to it.
Randy Chase
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