The Hard-Core Caterham Seven
By Jethro Bovingdon
The Caterham Seven has given us some of the best drives in our memory, which is not something you hear said about any other car based on a Lotus design that dates to 1957. From the modest Classic model to the fire-breathing CSR, the Caterham Seven is the purest performance car of them all.
We can still remember driving the first-generation Carterham R500 in 2004. Manic yet controllable, with the pure anger of the engine harnessed by a chassis so playful that you'd actively provoke lurid slides just for fun. What an intense, all-consuming little car.
At the time we couldn't think of a single way to improve the R500, but apparently Caterham has a better imagination than we do. Now the 2008 Caterham Lightweight R500 has a 263-horsepower 2.0-liter Ford Duratec inline-4 and lightweight bodywork, and its power-to-weight ratio is better than the 1,000-hp Bugatti Veyron.
Although the sophisticated Caterham CSR 260 is technically superior and even more powerful, the tiny, narrow-bodied 2008 Caterham Lightweight R500 is in another league when it comes to fun.
No flab, no fuss, just a pure ball of energy.
Too Hard-Core for the Road?
Now that the Rover K-series engine has been replaced by the 1,999cc Ford Duratec, you might think the 2008 Caterham Lightweight R500 is more mainstream. But consider that this car now weighs only 1,116 pounds with its thin-gauge aluminum bodywork and carbon-fiber nose and fenders. And for the first time the R500's options list includes a racing-style gearbox with straight-cut unsynchronized gears and dog-ring engagement, a sequential six-speed unit. It seems inconceivable, but the R500 has just become even more hard-core, especially with a price of $68,975.
Some things are eternal, though, and when you're squeezed down into the R500's thin carbon-fiber seat where you're compressed between the transmission tunnel and door sill and you're looking over the long, heavily louvered hood and seeing the cycle-type fenders hanging above wishbones, you feel immediately at one with the Seven.
Press the starter button and the R500's new, racing-type Stack electronic display flickers to life. Press once again, the starter engages and the engine catches with a boom! It doesn't crackle with the venom of the old Rover K-series, but it still sends sharp stabs of rage from the exhaust outlet on the right side rocker sill.
Now there's also another layer of mechanical noise from the Quaife sequential gearbox. Pull the lever toward you and the box clunks into 1st. The effort level of the short-travel clutch pedal is weighty but the clutch itself is easy to modulate and the 2.0-liter engine has a relatively brawny torque curve with 177 pound-feet available at 7,200 rpm, so it's easy to get the new R500 rolling.
Power To Thrill
It's cold and the road is glistening with moisture, so it seems prudent to short-shift through 2nd and into 3rd. The gearbox action is short and precise. Get the steering wheel dead straight and then nail the throttle. Bam! The engine snaps to attention, the revs rising rapidly, power building quickly through 4,000 rpm and then starting to climb hard toward the real fireworks. At 5,500 rpm, the tires start to slip and shimmy, and then at 6,500 rpm the car needs a lift of the throttle and a twist of opposite lock and the noise and power jump into fast-forward. Now the road is rushing toward you in great chunks and the final rush to the power peak of 263 hp at 8,500 rpm is mind-scrambling in its intensity.
It's not over yet. Thanks to the unsynchronized dog-ring gearbox, full-bore upshifts can be executed without the clutch and with barely a lift of your right foot. Just load pressure onto the lever and just as the last shift light burns red, a tiny throttle lift and a firmer tug backwards slots 4th gear and the acceleration continues without interruption.
Right now we're scrapping with the road, flicking the R500 into corners and then trying not to unleash too much power too early, thinking hard about every braking input (there's no ABS to lean on, of course), yo-yoing up and down the thumping power curve and just occasionally dialing in a correction as the tail steps out under power or maybe occasionally riding out the slide for the length of a gear because the R500 wants us to.
This might sound a bit irresponsible, but it isn't. The 2008 Caterham R500 is so narrow that you need never cross a white line in a corner, and it's so fast that overtaking on a straightaway is completed as quickly as the decision to squeeze the accelerator. It's a stark reminder of the benefits of lightweight engineering, and despite celebrating its 50th anniversary last year, the Seven's formula seems more intelligent than ever, especially now that manufacturers will have to start reducing weight to maintain the fun factor in smaller, more fuel-efficient cars.
R-E-S-P-E-C-T
Our immediate future is a more pressing concern right now, and we mean the road ahead. In slippery conditions the R500 demands respect. It's brilliantly controllable, but it also has much, much more power than grip, and even when you're pointing straight it's not always possible to just mash the throttle to its stop. Let your mind wander and the R500 can easily bite, the frights usually come when you think a corner is over and you want to feel the full force of that engine again.
But as the highland glen of Glencoe opens up ahead of us, trees melting away from the road's edge and dry stone walls no longer hemming us in, we can relax and enjoy the view. We're in a tiny missile, its engine gargling cold air and super unleaded. The mountain of Ben Nevis beckons and we rush past, and the corners tumble through jagged rocks and then sweep alongside lochs so close that road and water nearly touch. The road is a relentless challenge and perfect for the 2008 Caterham Lightweight R500.
Finally the road stops dead at the North Sea and the Sound of Arisaig. There's no one around, so we try the new launch control, which Caterham claims will get the R500 to 60 mph in 2.9 seconds. You simply select 1st gear, then press and hold a small black button on the dash. When we floor the throttle, the revs are held at 4,500 rpm and the engine splutters and crackles.
Take a deep breath, brace yourself and release the clutch. Torque thumps to the rear tires and the 205/55R13 Avon CR500s begin to spin. With a good armful of correction from the 175/55R13 front tires the R500 screams through 1st, 2nd and then is into 3rd gear before you've remembered to suck in some cold air yourself. It's a mark of the R500's raw power that even into 4th and 5th gear the acceleration isn't dimmed. A solid 150 mph is within reach.
Pure Acceleration
The way the 2008 Caterham R500 just puts on speed is shocking, and it's when we stick with it into 4th gear that things become overwhelming, the wind smashing over the cockpit's carbon-fiber wind deflector and the engine still shrieking over the rush of air and the road seeming to jump at us as our eyes struggle to deal with the acceleration. The speed at which you can attack corners is astonishing, too.
There's no weight transfer to speak of, so the tires are always working at their optimum and you never, ever find the limit of the front end on the road. You hardly seem to use the brakes either, because the combination of poor aerodynamics and high speed means you find yourself altering the car's pace with just the throttle.
It's incredibly easy to fall into a hypnotic rhythm with the R500, scaling the engine's power curve and descending again on the way into corners, using more revs and feeling that unbelievable zing at the top end, edging the car sideways when the road opens out and occasionally indulging in another manic two- or three-gear lunge just to make sure all that power is still present and correct. The chassis wriggles and writhes underneath you, the R500 skipping over big ridges and rumbling over ragged sequences, but it never gets unsettled. The beauty of light weight is that the suspension can be supple yet still easily control the mass it supports. Building a car to be light in weight really is the most virtuous of circles.
In a Trance
But by now we're deeply immersed in the noise, the sensations and the sheer thrill of exercising the 2008 Caterham R500. We dig deeper into the car and ourselves, and despite being bombarded on all sides by sounds and sensation, what's unfolding in front of us seems strangely distant.
We're totally calm, reacting to the Caterham's shifts almost before they happen. It's the closest we've come on the road to that strange trance that washes over you in a race, when you're running on instinct and totally focused. The road just keeps flowing like chopped-up rapids under the R500's wheels. We're in a little bubble of heat and noise and fury, skipping and sliding and buzzing along God's own road.
Right now, though, this road is on loan to this Caterham R500 and us.
Full Image Gallery
http://www.edmunds.com/insideline/do/MediaNav/articleId=131832/firstNav=Gallery/photoId=62873
By Jethro Bovingdon
The Caterham Seven has given us some of the best drives in our memory, which is not something you hear said about any other car based on a Lotus design that dates to 1957. From the modest Classic model to the fire-breathing CSR, the Caterham Seven is the purest performance car of them all.
We can still remember driving the first-generation Carterham R500 in 2004. Manic yet controllable, with the pure anger of the engine harnessed by a chassis so playful that you'd actively provoke lurid slides just for fun. What an intense, all-consuming little car.
At the time we couldn't think of a single way to improve the R500, but apparently Caterham has a better imagination than we do. Now the 2008 Caterham Lightweight R500 has a 263-horsepower 2.0-liter Ford Duratec inline-4 and lightweight bodywork, and its power-to-weight ratio is better than the 1,000-hp Bugatti Veyron.
Although the sophisticated Caterham CSR 260 is technically superior and even more powerful, the tiny, narrow-bodied 2008 Caterham Lightweight R500 is in another league when it comes to fun.
No flab, no fuss, just a pure ball of energy.
Too Hard-Core for the Road?
Now that the Rover K-series engine has been replaced by the 1,999cc Ford Duratec, you might think the 2008 Caterham Lightweight R500 is more mainstream. But consider that this car now weighs only 1,116 pounds with its thin-gauge aluminum bodywork and carbon-fiber nose and fenders. And for the first time the R500's options list includes a racing-style gearbox with straight-cut unsynchronized gears and dog-ring engagement, a sequential six-speed unit. It seems inconceivable, but the R500 has just become even more hard-core, especially with a price of $68,975.
Some things are eternal, though, and when you're squeezed down into the R500's thin carbon-fiber seat where you're compressed between the transmission tunnel and door sill and you're looking over the long, heavily louvered hood and seeing the cycle-type fenders hanging above wishbones, you feel immediately at one with the Seven.
Press the starter button and the R500's new, racing-type Stack electronic display flickers to life. Press once again, the starter engages and the engine catches with a boom! It doesn't crackle with the venom of the old Rover K-series, but it still sends sharp stabs of rage from the exhaust outlet on the right side rocker sill.
Now there's also another layer of mechanical noise from the Quaife sequential gearbox. Pull the lever toward you and the box clunks into 1st. The effort level of the short-travel clutch pedal is weighty but the clutch itself is easy to modulate and the 2.0-liter engine has a relatively brawny torque curve with 177 pound-feet available at 7,200 rpm, so it's easy to get the new R500 rolling.
Power To Thrill
It's cold and the road is glistening with moisture, so it seems prudent to short-shift through 2nd and into 3rd. The gearbox action is short and precise. Get the steering wheel dead straight and then nail the throttle. Bam! The engine snaps to attention, the revs rising rapidly, power building quickly through 4,000 rpm and then starting to climb hard toward the real fireworks. At 5,500 rpm, the tires start to slip and shimmy, and then at 6,500 rpm the car needs a lift of the throttle and a twist of opposite lock and the noise and power jump into fast-forward. Now the road is rushing toward you in great chunks and the final rush to the power peak of 263 hp at 8,500 rpm is mind-scrambling in its intensity.
It's not over yet. Thanks to the unsynchronized dog-ring gearbox, full-bore upshifts can be executed without the clutch and with barely a lift of your right foot. Just load pressure onto the lever and just as the last shift light burns red, a tiny throttle lift and a firmer tug backwards slots 4th gear and the acceleration continues without interruption.
Right now we're scrapping with the road, flicking the R500 into corners and then trying not to unleash too much power too early, thinking hard about every braking input (there's no ABS to lean on, of course), yo-yoing up and down the thumping power curve and just occasionally dialing in a correction as the tail steps out under power or maybe occasionally riding out the slide for the length of a gear because the R500 wants us to.
This might sound a bit irresponsible, but it isn't. The 2008 Caterham R500 is so narrow that you need never cross a white line in a corner, and it's so fast that overtaking on a straightaway is completed as quickly as the decision to squeeze the accelerator. It's a stark reminder of the benefits of lightweight engineering, and despite celebrating its 50th anniversary last year, the Seven's formula seems more intelligent than ever, especially now that manufacturers will have to start reducing weight to maintain the fun factor in smaller, more fuel-efficient cars.
R-E-S-P-E-C-T
Our immediate future is a more pressing concern right now, and we mean the road ahead. In slippery conditions the R500 demands respect. It's brilliantly controllable, but it also has much, much more power than grip, and even when you're pointing straight it's not always possible to just mash the throttle to its stop. Let your mind wander and the R500 can easily bite, the frights usually come when you think a corner is over and you want to feel the full force of that engine again.
But as the highland glen of Glencoe opens up ahead of us, trees melting away from the road's edge and dry stone walls no longer hemming us in, we can relax and enjoy the view. We're in a tiny missile, its engine gargling cold air and super unleaded. The mountain of Ben Nevis beckons and we rush past, and the corners tumble through jagged rocks and then sweep alongside lochs so close that road and water nearly touch. The road is a relentless challenge and perfect for the 2008 Caterham Lightweight R500.
Finally the road stops dead at the North Sea and the Sound of Arisaig. There's no one around, so we try the new launch control, which Caterham claims will get the R500 to 60 mph in 2.9 seconds. You simply select 1st gear, then press and hold a small black button on the dash. When we floor the throttle, the revs are held at 4,500 rpm and the engine splutters and crackles.
Take a deep breath, brace yourself and release the clutch. Torque thumps to the rear tires and the 205/55R13 Avon CR500s begin to spin. With a good armful of correction from the 175/55R13 front tires the R500 screams through 1st, 2nd and then is into 3rd gear before you've remembered to suck in some cold air yourself. It's a mark of the R500's raw power that even into 4th and 5th gear the acceleration isn't dimmed. A solid 150 mph is within reach.
Pure Acceleration
The way the 2008 Caterham R500 just puts on speed is shocking, and it's when we stick with it into 4th gear that things become overwhelming, the wind smashing over the cockpit's carbon-fiber wind deflector and the engine still shrieking over the rush of air and the road seeming to jump at us as our eyes struggle to deal with the acceleration. The speed at which you can attack corners is astonishing, too.
There's no weight transfer to speak of, so the tires are always working at their optimum and you never, ever find the limit of the front end on the road. You hardly seem to use the brakes either, because the combination of poor aerodynamics and high speed means you find yourself altering the car's pace with just the throttle.
It's incredibly easy to fall into a hypnotic rhythm with the R500, scaling the engine's power curve and descending again on the way into corners, using more revs and feeling that unbelievable zing at the top end, edging the car sideways when the road opens out and occasionally indulging in another manic two- or three-gear lunge just to make sure all that power is still present and correct. The chassis wriggles and writhes underneath you, the R500 skipping over big ridges and rumbling over ragged sequences, but it never gets unsettled. The beauty of light weight is that the suspension can be supple yet still easily control the mass it supports. Building a car to be light in weight really is the most virtuous of circles.
In a Trance
But by now we're deeply immersed in the noise, the sensations and the sheer thrill of exercising the 2008 Caterham R500. We dig deeper into the car and ourselves, and despite being bombarded on all sides by sounds and sensation, what's unfolding in front of us seems strangely distant.
We're totally calm, reacting to the Caterham's shifts almost before they happen. It's the closest we've come on the road to that strange trance that washes over you in a race, when you're running on instinct and totally focused. The road just keeps flowing like chopped-up rapids under the R500's wheels. We're in a little bubble of heat and noise and fury, skipping and sliding and buzzing along God's own road.
Right now, though, this road is on loan to this Caterham R500 and us.
Full Image Gallery
http://www.edmunds.com/insideline/do/MediaNav/articleId=131832/firstNav=Gallery/photoId=62873
