The Evora 400 Sounds Like the Carbureted Lotus Roadsters We Love
You’ve never heard a Camry V6 sound like this.
Behind every Lotus Evora is a great Toyota. The Camry’s 3.5-liter V6 sits where children ought to, blatting and spitting rudeness Toyota engineers knew it could if mufflers and fuel economy didn’t matter. On this English 2+2 sports car, the new Evora 400, it’s cranking out a supercharged 400 horsepower and singing the finest exhaust note impressions of Hethel’s best carbureted roadsters of the Sixties.
The promo video below shows a yellow Evora 400 ripping apart the company’s test track, drifting and doing all the usual business designated to handbuilt sports cars. Compared to the Evora S, there’s more power, greater downforce, lighter wheels, larger brakes, and fewer pounds. There’s also a new limited-slip rear differential and manual gearbox (the latter sourced from a lowly diesel Toyota Avensis sedan) has an updated clutch and better shift feel. The door sills are thinner and lower, making ingress less of a yoga maneuver. Nama’ste on the twisties.
Lotus pulled last year’s Evora from the U.S. market in order to comply with federal airbag regulations. There are hardly any Lotus dealers to speak of, either, and the $90k asking price of the upcoming 400 is what Porsche asks for a loaded-up Porsche Cayman S.
The last time one of us drove an Evora S, the door handle snapped, the second gear synchro failed, the trunk wouldn’t unlock, the alarm system would fire off upon ignition, and the entire interior smelled like glue. Still, a glorious thing to drive. Hopefully this new one just sounds like a 50-year-old and isn’t built like one.
