Back to the future.Once again reaching into its past for the name of a car in its future, Lotus will call its latest vehicle "Europa." Only this time it adds the suffix suf·fix n. An affix added to the end of a word or stem, serving to form a new word or functioning as an inflectional ending, such as -ness in gentleness, -ing in walking, or -s in sits. tr.v. "S" to a car that, unlike the previous model, won't be coming to North America North America, third largest continent (1990 est. pop. 365,000,000), c.9,400,000 sq mi (24,346,000 sq km), the northern of the two continents of the Western Hemisphere. . Originally developed for Lotus's parent, Malaysian carmaker Proton, this car is an amalgam of the Lotus Elise The Lotus Elise is a roadster conceived in early 1994 and released in September 1996 by the English manufacturer Lotus Cars. The car has a hand-finished fiberglass body shell atop its aluminium extrusion and bonded frame that provides a rigid platform for the suspension, while and the Elise-based Opel Speedster The Opel Speedster is a British-designed and British-built roadster produced from 2001 to 2005 by Lotus for General Motors's subsidiary Opel and was also badged as Vauxhall VX220 for the UK market. . It stretches the Elise chassis and lowers the side sills in order to liberate room for people and cargo, and borrows the Lotus-designed turbo-charged Ecotec inline Four and Getrag five-speed from the Opel. The 2.0-liter produces 200 hp@5,400 rpm, 194 lb-ft@4,200 rpm, and Lotus claims the 2,194-lb car is capable of 0-60 mph in 5.5 seconds and a top speed of 140 mph. Priced at $57,000, the Europa S launches in July 2006. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] |
|
||||||||||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion