The Mystique Is Slipping

By PAUL DEAN

June 11, 1993 12 AM PT

In Homer’s “Odyssey,” the lotus was a forerunner of Magic Brownies, and anyone eating the fruit developed euphoria and the galloping dumbs.

Maybe that’s why grown men sigh and women wilt when a Lotus Esprit burbles and scampers by.

Possibly we’re all weird for mutts, macho excess, exotic diversions, different drummers, anachronisms, pleasurable pain, Anglophilia, flaunting norms, screaming metal or being seen in a machine that a minority of the public is incapable of driving and the majority chooses not to.

Maybe that’s why motoring magazines continue to give a damn about the Lotus Esprit.

Somehow, they have elevated its gross shortcomings to character quirks and interpreted the car’s highly restricted purpose as some form of exclusivity. They salaam over its out-dated, over-stressed four-cylinder engine turbocharged to produce 264 horsepower, which happens to be a huff away from disintegration into shrapnel.

Even the 1993 Esprit Turbo is a meltdown of comfort, value, ergonomics and driving ease, a very coarse car that continues its British tradition of pomp and circumstance alongside flaws and negligence.

And this was supposed to be a revival year.

Lotus--with a battered balance sheet further wrecked by 1992 U.S. sales of only 375 cars--cut 1993 Esprit prices by almost $20,000. But even at $67,345--bloated to $72,000 by luxury tax--wouldn’t you rather have an Acura NSX?

This ground-scraping two-seater has been pumped out to give four inches of extra headroom, two more inches of legroom and three additional inches between seat and steering wheel. That still isn’t enough to provide six-footers a ride that doesn’t feel like a year in solitary.

The pedal box has been modified to prevent drivers stepping on their own toes when tromping brake, clutch and throttle. It’s still feels like two feet crammed into one sneaker with just enough room for a left foot to dangle and cramp in the dark between clutch pedal and the wheel well.

The rear wing has been relocated to provide greater downloading and a lower coefficient of drag. Unfortunately, this fiberglass plank reduces visibility through the mail-slot rear window to virtually zero. Lane changes should be preceded by a quick recitation of the Lord’s Prayer.

Our test car was in Grenadier Guards scarlet and had 5,000 miles on it.

Rubber stripping below the chin spoiler had already separated from most of the attachment points as a penalty of impudence. For one should not point an extraordinarily low car into ordinary driveways.

The turn signal indicator always quit after half a dozen clicks. A balky shifter was often reluctant to let go of early gears or released its hold, then stubbornly refused to re-engage another cog. And despite a 15-degree widening of the door openings, entrance or exit remains a task for auditioning stuntmen.

A day spent booting the clutch produces shinsplints. Braking offers more resistance than kicking in the back door to Buckingham Palace. There is no power steering, luggage space for only one medium duffel and the air bag bulges in a steering wheel borrowed from GM’s Camaro/Firebird line.

And at a time when some car builders are offering ashtrays as options, installing two cigarette lighters in the Esprit seems hardly in the esprit du jour .

Lotus likes to claim that the Esprit’s elan is with its large percentage of hand assembly. It shows up as inexact stitching around the leather and the poor fit of the removable sun roof: the difference between hand crafting (as in Mercedes and Rolls-Royce) and homemade (as in Aunt Jessica’s Butterick dress patterns).

It probably is the only production car anywhere in the world with seven minuscule gauges and a jumble of markings crammed into a too-small dash. Even if you don’t use glasses, bring a pair of Thrifty plus-2 bifocals to read the numbers.

And the car rides over Botts’ dots as if they were potholes.

So why would anyone bother with a Lotus Esprit?

Because it is a seductive witch, without doubt the most exquisitely shaped, magnificently proportioned thing since the P-51 Mustang.

Beautifully designed by Giorgio Giugiaro as an Italian show car, it is an original sculpture whose lines have wisely been allowed to survive--even adapted by Lamborghini for the Countach and by Acura for its NSX--as high tribute to occasional immortality in a cruelly ephemeral field.

It is at once a fighter plane, a cigarette boat and a two-door luge. From the rear it is coquettish, from the side majestic, from the front all mountain lion. Many have chosen spouses for lesser attributes.

The Esprit must also be considered in context, as an extravagant toy to be played with on weekends then parked lovingly next to the Harley-Davidson, the Jet-Ski, the Lionel layout and your eight cases of Merlot awaiting significant occasions.

Such an occasion may very well be the first shriek of exhilaration at the Esprit’s formidable performance.

Yet there is absolutely no indication of what is to come when one wriggles for comfort in the leather-covered racing bucket and keys the ignition--and is surprised by a rough rumble of a small engine somewhere abaft of the right ear.

Around town, in its early gears and with no room to play, the Esprit is a dullard. Basic maneuvering during bread-and-butter commuting is a wrestle against that leaden steering and Renault gearbox with its awkward throw from here to the next block.

For groceries, take the Accord.

But get physical. Pump up the revs. Snap out the clutch. Sniff the melting Goodyears and hang on as the Esprit smokes in five seconds to 60 m.p.h. and is punching through 100 m.p.h. six ticks later. While just getting out of third.

Suddenly, the Esprit is in its element. Steering lightens as speed overcomes drag. Even gears seem slicker as engine revolutions rise. Or maybe smoothness comes with a driver’s undivided attention to the way things should be done at this furious rate of knots.

Do not attempt this in the suburbs. But on a closed circuit, arriving at adhesion limits, the Esprit starts to push. It’s nothing brutal, nothing that can’t be soaked up by backing off lightly to regain steering. But inquiring minds usually prefer more neutral handling.

Under hard maneuvering, the Esprit also displays roll--odd for a machine with half a dozen world constructor’s championships in its bloodline. Steering, although very readable in the mid ranges, becomes a little vague around the edges under aggressive conditions.

But as a dragster, as a car that under freeway conditions will pass others as if they were chained to an underpass, the Esprit is a superlative.

This is a 2,953-pound car, so the secret of its pace is not in Kevlar cladding and foam-filled panels. Look to that power plant, a 2.2-liter, 16-valve, aluminum alloy in-line four with its chambers inflated to bursting by a Garrett turbocharger.

It winds up early and is water-cooled for greater efficiency. The quicker the shift, the higher the revs, the shorter the turbo lag, and sometimes that’s barely a sniff. And 12.5 psi of boost producing 264 horsepower translates to 2 horsepower per cubic inch--the highest specific output for any production engine.

Put another way: If a Ford Mustang GT engine was tuned to this level, it would be issuing 600 horsepower.

Lotus, understandably, trades hard on mystique and the wonderful legacy left by Colin Chapman, the Englishman who 40 years ago rebuilt an Austin Seven Special into the racing dynasty of Lotus. It conquered Formula One. It won the Indianapolis 500. But that heritage may be a little overdrawn.

In 1991, the last year for which figures are available, Lotus recorded a pretax loss of $23.5 million. Only a research and engineering group keeps the parent alive.

GM, which purchased Lotus in 1986, has the company up for sale, and a group of managers is negotiating a purchase.

All of which carries a familiar whiff of insolvency.

Sadly, that would tag this latest of the Esprits as the very last of the Mohicans.

1993 Lotus Esprit TurboCost

* Base, $67,345

* As tested, $72,574. Includes luxury tax, driver’s side air bag, leather upholstery, JVC CD, antilock brakes, air conditioning, central locking, detachable sunroof.

Engine

* 2.2 liters, 16-valve, double overhead cam, turbocharged inline four developing 264 horsepower.

Type

* Mid-engine, rear-drive, two-seat sports car.

Performance

* 0-60 m.p.h., as tested, 5 seconds.

* Top speed, estimated, 165 m.p.h.

* EPA fuel consumption, city and highway, 17 and 27 m.p.g.

Curb Weight

* 2953 pounds

The Good

* Best-looking car in first century of motoring.