2006 Lotus Exige Supercharged With Tons Of Extras. Under 12k Miles on 2040-cars

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The Caterham Seven Sprint is a perfect retro-style British roadster

A Caterham Seven oozes retro style. Modern engineering may mean the car no longer shares any parts with its original Lotus counterpart, but one look at the little roadster and it's easy to see the car's heritage. Caterham loves pumping out variants of the Seven, and the 2016 Goodwood Revival seemed like the perfect place to announce the latest version, the throwback Caterham Seven Sprint. Caterham calls the Seven Sprint a design "that was seemingly planned in the mid-1960s but never launched." It's apt then that the company is using it to kick off its "60 Years of the Seven" celebrations. The Seven Sprint is based off the European-only 160 model, meaning it's powered by an 80-hp turbocharged three-cylinder Suzuki engine. While the bonkers Seven 620 R may be the biggest and baddest Caterham available, the bare bones Seven 160 just feels more appropriate here. There are a number of retro styling touches throughout the car. The limited edition Seven Sprint comes wrapped in one of six colors originally offered by Lotus in 1966 and 1967. The Chassis is powder-coated grey, just like the Series 2 Lotus Seven. The cream-colored wheels feature polished hubcaps, while the interior features a wood-trimmed wheel and the interior is trimmed in a wonderful shade of red. The body has been slightly reworked to look more like the original Lotus designed car. Mechanically, not much has changed. Power from the Suzuki three is fed through a five-speed manual. Some of the suspension bits are similar to Colin Chapman's original design, but that's true of the standard 160. The car should be just as much of a riot as any other Caterham, just packed to the gills with style. The Seven Sprint is available only as a fully-complete factory car. It's unknown if any of the 60 produced will make it to the US. Prices in the UK start at GBP27,995, or about $37,000. Related Video: Featured Gallery Caterham Sprint Image Credit: Caterham Cars Design/Style Lotus Automakers Convertible caterham seven

Lotus to produce new crossover in China

Lotus and its parent company recently signed a joint-venture agreement with Chinese automaker Goldstar to build vehicles in China for local consumption, and according to the latest report from Autocar, it'll all come down to a new sport-ute. That's because the market for C-segment compact crossovers in China is huge. So big that it's impossible for Lotus to ignore. Porsche is reportedly selling 30,000 Macans in China alone each year, and is expected to reach 50,000 per annum there in the near future. "Six million SUVs will be sold in China this year, and more than half of those are C-segment models," Lotus chief Jean-Marc Gales told Autocar. "That figure is forecast to rise to eight million in four years. C-segment SUV sales alone will be bigger than the entire German market." Little wonder, then, that Lotus and Proton are keen to dive in. Technical details for the new Lotus crossover are still being worked out, but we'll likely be looking at a steel monocoque chassis clad in composite and aluminum body panels, riding lower than a Macan and weighing a good 400-500 pounds less. Power will likely come (at least initially) from the same 1.8-liter four and 3.5-liter V6 that power Lotus' sports cars, but driving all four wheels. A hybrid system could follow, and the finished product is likely to adopt a nameplate starting with the letter E – in the grand tradition of the Elise, Exige, Evora, Esprit, Europa, Elan, et al. According to Gales, "Our car will drive beautifully. It will be supple and comfortable but the emphasis will be on handling. It will be the lightest and fastest of its class on the track." This would be the first crossover Lotus would design, engineer and actually bring to market, but not, strictly speaking, the first time it has toyed with the idea. There was the APX concept (pictured here) it showcased in 2006 and the T5 that Proton essentially licensed Chinese automaker Youngman to build with Lotus' name on it. But the former was never put into production and the latter wasn't a proper Lotus. The design is currently being worked out before a prototype can be put together so that the joint venture can get the manufacturing license it needs from the Chinese government. So we're likely looking at another year or two before we see something solid. "Let's get the design right, then make a prototype," said Gales. "Let's make it beautiful and very light.

James Bond Lotus submarine sells in London for $966,560

With the $966,560 sale ($863,000 plus a 12-percent buyer's premium) of the white 1977 Lotus Esprit S1 submarine used in the 1977 James Bond film The Spy Who Loved Me, we now know "the Roger Moore discount."
Recall that Sean Connery's silver 1964 Goldfinger Aston Martin DB5 was sold by RM Auctions in London in 2010 for $4.6 million. Three years later, the same auction company in the same city has sold the aforementioned Lotus for just under $1 million.
An unscientific poll of those in the room showed that people preferred Sean Connery's Bond to Roger Moore's by a rate of four to one. And thus it translated into the bidding for their respective cars. No word on the identity of the buyer or his plans for what is, in fact, a working submarine.