The Lotus Emeya is the fastest charging electric car at the moment and will be taken on a road trip through Germany during the test.
Let’s get the most important thing straight: it’s a relief that a new EV isn’t an oversized SUV for once. Range, efficiency and driving characteristics all benefit from it. Slowly, some sedan-like, hatchback and station wagons are trickling into the EV market. With the Emeya, you don’t have to think long about the fact that the British (and Chinese) are clearly aiming their arrows at the Porsche Taycan.
The Emeya is also much more spacious than the Taycan, which is surprisingly cramped, especially in the back seat.
How does the Emeya drive?
When you read the documentation on the Emeya, you are bombarded with one-liners and horny jargon. That is always a time to be careful, but for now let’s go with this story. The electric Lotuses are “Born British, Raised Globally”. Feng Qingfeng is the CEO of the Lotus Group and he believes that “electric cars do not have to be boring at all”. And that is noted.
Some more nice terms then? The Emeya is a fully electric hyper-GT with porous aerodynamics, because there are a few holes in the bodywork. That in itself is a nice bridge to the ideas of Colin Chapman. On the rather large Emeya with a rather large battery pack, however, it has no measurable impact on the weight, the Emeya is just under 2.5 tons ready to drive.
The aerodynamics are impressive: in low drag mode the cW value is 0.21. The active aerodynamics can also generate up to 150 kg extra downforce, but then the cW value becomes 0.38. All this thanks to the Active Air Dam, Active Grille, Active Rear Diffuser and not to forget the Floating dual layer rear spoiler that has three positions.
The Lotus Emeya is definitely fast: there are two versions of the drivetrain. The Emera R has three engines that deliver a total of 918 hp. The Lotus Emeya S that we got for the road trip test has to make do with two engines that together deliver 612 hp / 715 Nm. The 0-100 is done in 4.2 seconds, 0-200 takes 12 seconds. At 250 km / h the limiter puts an end to the party, before that time the Emeya already starts to warn you that you are driving too fast. Which is again noted.
The battery pack is in both cases 102 kWh and works with an 800v architecture. At a 350 kW charger the battery should charge from 10-80% in 18 minutes. During our fast charging test and also during this road trip the Emeya proved that this can be even faster.
If you would like to use 612 hp, the Emeya obviously does not come close to the WLTP range of 610 km. It remains a bit of an Achilles heel of the EV: yes, they go fast, but on long distances you have very little use for it.
Are there any negative points?
When we drove the first meters in the Lotus Eletre, that SUV did not yet have Apple Carplay (and Android Auto). Lotus now provides that and the Emeya has it too. Fortunately, because we needed it during the road trip.
When leaving Munich we set the destination Schiphol Airport. According to Lotus’ software we have to make three charging stops, the first after almost 250 kilometers. Before we can reach that destination, the navigation screen remains anxiously black. Figure out the route yourself, the Emeya seems to think. Today we can top off the range anxiety with some navigation stress.
But luckily the Emeya has Apple Carplay and with the help of my co-driver Martijn Gizmo we construct our own route. You wouldn’t make it up, but after the first charging stop Apple Carplay also decides to stop. It becomes old-fashioned navigation with the phone in the cup holder. And calculating ourselves how much range there is left and which charging station we should choose. It is undoubtedly a temporary issue, but especially for a road trip with an EV it is particularly annoying.
The Emeya makes manual navigation a bit more difficult than it should be. When asked how much range is left, the Emeya gives three different answers. The most optimistic (and totally unrealistic) number is right in front of you, it seems to indicate the remaining WLTP range. In any case, it is a completely useless number, hopefully Lotus will solve this soon with a software update.
In the infotainment system, after some digging, you can find yet more information. The first number is based on the driving behavior of the last 10 km, the second on the last 100 km. That last number is the most realistic and sometimes deviates 50% (!) from what you see in front of you. That is the difference between coming to a standstill or making it to the next charging station.
Is it a real Lotus or just a Lotus for our times?
Lotus founder Colin Chapman was obsessed with the weight of cars. The classic Lotus sports car is therefore compact, lightweight and in many cases far from luxuriously equipped. If you are a principled person, the Emeya is not a real Lotus anyway. Fortunately, principles are there to be broken, if it suits you.
After the electric SUV (Eletre) everything Lotus did afterwards could only be a success, the Emeya is a beacon of lightness compared to its big brother. On the other hand, three Elises also fit on the scales and are then approximately in balance with the Emeya. Long live progress.
Partly there was no way around it, a small battery pack of an electric car weighs 600-700 kg. Then the rest of the car has to go around it and so the weight always shoots through two tons.
If you still have lightweight as a heritage in mind, you shouldn’t build a car with too many (unnecessary) gadgets and (too) much space. Everything with “too” in front of it is not so good, except satisfied, according to mom Karssen. In retrospect, we mainly differed in opinion about what was too much beer and too little sleep, but that wisdom came with age. At most, it can lead to being distracted a bit too quickly and forgetting what you were doing.
Anyway: an abundance of space in the back seat and the power doors are more suited to an S-Class killer than a Taycan competitor.
Killer features of the Lotus Emeya
It is never fast enough, but the Emeya comes close. I am talking about fast charging, the Emeya was the winner in our fast charging test. The road trip from Munich was the perfect opportunity to try out how it works in practice on long distances. In short: quite brilliant. At the appropriate posts, the Emeya regularly shows charging figures well into the 300s. During the first pee break we also get some refreshments (Haribo of course) for the rest of our trip. And you guessed it: the battery is already well above 80%, so waiting for charging is no longer necessary.
Alternatives to the Lotus Emeya
The competitor is that EV from Zuffenhausen. The Porsche Taycan charges less quickly, but is available with more different drivetrains and steers better. If you go for more space, then the Mercedes-Benz EQS and BMW i7 are clear competitors. In addition, the i7 excels in being a 7-series, but then coincidentally with electric drive. In short, in terms of comfort and space, the i7 is in a class of its own, if it has to be electric at all. Otherwise, just buy an Audi A8 or Mercedes-Benz S-class
Conclusion road trip Lotus Emeya S
With these fast charging speeds, the threshold for driving electrically is almost removed. Almost, because Lotus itself uses the term HyperGT. In my opinion, a hyper grand tourer should combine high averages with few (mandatory) stops.
The picture is somewhat distorted by my obsession with touching the limiter (250 km/h), but over a distance of 923 km we had a driving time of 7:46 hours. Add to that four charging stops and some time to drop off the cameraman at his car and the total travel time comes to 9.5 hours. The real average is below 100 km/h, while the trip computer shows 118.8 km/h. The average consumption was 35.6 kWh, but that would certainly have been much more favorable without my leaden right foot. The travel time would also probably have been shorter, because then you save a charging stop.
What was also true: the trip was not really frustrating, despite the glitchy software. Only once did we guess wrong and just kept driving because the fast charging station was only a 50 kW model. Still, the comparison with our own holiday trip from Andorra with the 530i comes to mind. With the whole family, with an extra (lunch) stop, the first part through the mountains and still the average was much higher than this trip with the Emeya. The real hyperGT is still a car with a combustion engine for the time being.
Just like with the Eletre, Lotus has a special pricing tactic with the Emeya. The basic Emeya is available from € 109,685, the technically identical costs € 130,585. For that you get Lidars, softclose, bigger brakes, hands-free boot lid and more choice of colours and rims. Personally, I would skip all that and look for an Elise for the saved 20k.
What is the conclusion of the road trip? With a little car with a combustion engine, every long trip is much more doable. EV enthusiasts will say that you should stop and have lunch anyway, but the comparison is obvious. Driving an EV is like being in prison: you can still do a lot, but everything goes according to an imposed schedule. The charm of road trips for many lies in the fact that you don’t have to plan everything.
If you have to drive long distances electrically, the Emeya is a brilliant companion.
Comments
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Allison Burgers say
I have no idea what Lotus exactly wants to be with this Zeekr Huracan.
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814Diecast say
“What is the conclusion of the road trip? With a little car with a combustion engine, every long trip is much more doable. EV enthusiasts will say that you should stop and have lunch anyway, but the comparison is obvious. Driving an EV is like being in prison: you can still do a lot, but everything goes according to an imposed schedule.”
In one paragraph the malaise in the automotive world summarized and explained. The plug-in EV is a niche product.
