Lotus confirmed this week that it has been working on its own engine family since December, with the first fire-up scheduled for Aug. 18 (go ahead, mark your calendars). Intended for the redesigned Esprit, the first engine will be a 4.8-liter V8 that produces 562 horsepower at a screaming 9,000 rpm. A turbocharged version will produce at least 612 hp in an Esprit R model.
"Our engine is 80kg lighter than the Lexus V8 we were going to use," Lotus Engineering Director Wolf Zimmerman (an AMG veteran) told CAR Magazine. "It's also very compact with its dry sump -- it's 40 percent smaller, just 612 mm long. At 170kg, it's more like a race engine."
Indeed, it's been hinted that the new engine will make it into a racing application before the 2013 Esprit is launched. The next step would be dropping cylinders from the V8 to create an engine line-up that would include a 3.6-liter V6 and a 2.4-liter four-cylinder destined to be in the 2015 Elise. According to CAR, an automated single clutch automated manual will be used rather than a dual-clutch set-up and a hybrid is possible.
