Some might be aware that my Elise (affectionately known by many as "UJI") left the road near Inveraray a few weeks back. It struck the verge, hard, and spun a couple of times. Came to rest further down the road, still on the verge and away from oncoming traffic. But it was beached and the left rear wheel was folded under.
Fellow members Dark and Victor Meldrew came upon the scene a few minutes later and found me wandering back up the road, somewhat bewildered, trying to work out what the hell had happened. Cut a long story short, recovery was swift and professional and the car was delivered promptly to CMC for assessment. Opinion is divided as to whether a toe-link failure caused the accident or was caused by it. Two people whose expertise I value hugely have opposing views. Anyway we will never know.
One thing is for sure. The car has, sadly, been written off by the insurer. It's taken nearly two months to reach a settlement with them. It's not nearly enough to buy another one-owner S1 Elise, but it's around 20% more than their opening position. So I have to take some heart from that. I may write up some of the insurance claim experience I've just had, as it may help others (Craig Moncrieff and Robin Iddon both helped me hugely with their insights and experiences). But that's for another thread in another sub-forum. This one is to mark 18 great years!
Originally, I wanted an Elan. The modern one with drop-top roof and fizzy 1.6 turbo engine from Isuzu. But they were too expensive for me and in any case Lotus stopped making them before I could even start my savings project to try to get one. But one day whilst at the local Vauxhall dealer in Aberdeen, picking up a wiper blade for my '96 Tigra (cue laughter), I spotted two other-worldly looking cars with Lotus badges on. Which turned out to be some of the first Elises (the dealer had the Lotus franchise as well).
The salesman was fair excited about them and offered me a seat on one of them. What a feeling. Even sitting still. And that was it. Had to have one. Even without a test drive. Made even more appealling by the price tag - way less than an Elan, at a fiver under £20k. Many months later, I did get a test drive, at Murray Lotus in Edinburgh, courtesy of then salesman Patrick Turnbull. The engine-behind-your-head experience and the go-kart like behaviour of the car were giggle-inducing.
Shortly after, I was at Knockhill for a single-seater experience with my brother. It then dawned on me that the Elise was the closest thing to those race cars. And when I got a modest payrise later that year, plus an award of a car allowance, I started the savings plan that became a sizeable deposit to buy UJI. (The much-mocked Tigra also provided a mighty sum - it held its value rather well and yes I did sell it to a secretary with blonde hair).
Back then there was a waiting list for Elises. 10 months. Yep really. So I paid my £1,000 deposit in autumn 1998 and started ticking off the days. In March 1999, Lisa and I booked a Lotus factory tour, timed just before we had to provide the final spec for the car. After a great trip to Hethel, and the chance to see Elises in build and in just about every colour, we spent the entire drive home debating New Aluminium, Yellow or Azure Blue. Yellow was ruled out pretty quickly as too toy-car, Azure Blue was a nose in front until around the Scottish border, but eventually New Alu with blue hood won through and I've no regrets on that. Especially since I had the privilege to own an Evora in Persian Blue (very similar to Azure) for a couple of years!
It was around that time we founded this very group, too. Many new and future owners were trading insults and speculation on the Usenet newsgroup alt.cars.lotus, and around six of us realised we were all based in Central Scotland. The first ever "meet" was in Linlithgow's Star and Garter hotel / Tesco supermarket car park, in April 1999. A few of the guys already had their Elises (Nick Rossi, Kevin Smart, Kelvin, David "Del" Darling), Nick's mate brought his Impreza Turbo and Colin Tinto brought his Impreza 22B and stole the whole show
Great evening and the start of something very special.Picked the Elise up in pouring rain on 2nd July 1999, the day after the Scottish Parliament reopened after a long absence. Historic times. Immediately drove off to the Borders to watch the Jim Clark Rally (which may now be defunct, sadly...more history) and spent the weekend tiptoeing around in the wet on those infamous Pirelli P-Zero tyres chanting "brake in a straight line, gas in a straight line" under my breath.
Took the car on the Stelvio 99 tour of Europe with 50 other Elises (made many friends), and again on the Stelvio 2001 tour of Spain (some old friends and more new ones). These are well documented elsewhere.
Donington for the Club Lotus Festival in 2001, one of the first long-distance outings with fellow Scottish Elise members - quite a riot. Ironically also got a drive of an Elan on that trip, when our own Rossy Boy Taylor was too tired to drive it back north and offered me the keys while he paxed with Lisa in UJI and snoozed. Peter Bennet and others bought the entire stock of Moto Build Racing stainless steel exhausts for the S1 too, several of which went in the Elan for transit. Good boot.
Think Tut Towers started that year too and I attended most of those. Usually with commensurate hangover the next day, but thankfully never left the road at any point unlike several other partygoers who got bitten by Scotland's finest cart tracks.
Did several trackdays at Knockhill in the early years and learned the car considerably. It's a great wee circuit for a relatively standard Elise and at one Murray Lotus event, a Fiesta racer was doing demo pax laps in a standard Elise. Dave Minter, Lotus suspension engineer, was doing likewise in a race tuned Sport 190. The Fiesta boy was reeling him in every lap
Spring 2003 - Nordschleife. What a weekend. 18 laps in total, lots of learning and brown pants moments but once again, drove it there, enjoyed it, kept it on the black stuff, and drove it home. Chief Instructors Robin and Giles looked after me that weekend.
Did a fair bit less when Eilidh was born (2005) but was privileged to keep the car at all, as many other associates had to sell their Elises when family came along. Getting UJI paid off in just 3 years probably helped there. As did amazing benevolence on spannering from Lawrence, Robin, Fergus, Neil, and several others. This not only saved some money, but avoided the dark days when Murray Lotus service was not what it should be. Without their time, skills and generosity the car would absolutely have been sold on a long time ago.
Robin helped me change the cylinder head gasket in 2007, just before James was born. Another inspired bit of helpful expertise way beyond the call of duty. This was a key bit of preventive maintenance against the famed Head Gasket Failure (HGF) which we all know can afflict the endearing K Series engine at random times. (UJI's gasket was changed just once more, again preventively, so just goes to show you CAN do big miles on a K-series if you treat them right).
Various other track adventures after then, to Donington, Oulton, Anglesey and Cadwell. Plus the growth of the legendary Campganza weekends, to Achmelvich, Clachtoll, Camusdarach and occasionally Dumfries & Galloway somewhere too. I think those are my fondest experiences (not least for the social side) and the aspect of the Elise I may miss the most. Its almost instinctive ability across some of the most scenic, twisty, bumpy and challenging roads in Scotland. Most of them are up "the north-west" and Campaganzas took us there two or three times a year. Still plan to attend, albeit no idea in what car...
A mega-milestone in 2010. 40th birthday presents comprising a track day at legendary Spa-Francorchamps F1 circuit in Belgium (pouring rain, hilarious) and a Carlimits driver training "Walshy Day" en route. Had to replace the radiator and other things prior to going, and after starting the project at Sanjoy's hangar in Fife, my chief engineer Robin had to duck out due to work pressure half way through. Yours truly was left with an Elise with no front clam, no radiator, and no skillz! But thanks to Sanjoy's kind hospitality and some remote support from Robin, I finished the job, bled the system, refitted the clam and the car never missed a beat through the whole trip. Quite something I thought.
Again, a quieter period through 2012 or so as I launched my business but we kept the Campaganza trips going, and Murray Lotus became my service agent of choice thanks to club discounts and expertise provided by living ledge Craig Moncrieff and his tech team. When Craig set up on his own it was logical to follow and he and the team including Calum, Willie, Jimmy and latterly Paul have all done great things to keep this 18 year old 120k-mile OAP rolling.
Oh and did I mention the trip Lisa and I took to celebrate UJI's 100,000th mile. Down the personal fave A701 to Moffat and back. And across the same "reservoir road" between Tweedsmuir and St Mary's Loch where we'd had our first ever drive in the car back in 1999 <wipes a tear from the eye...>.
I threw a small fortune at the car in the last 18 months to bring it up to scratch mechanically. Much like Trigger's Broom, nearly everything on it had been replaced and in many cases, for better parts than original, without losing the DNA of the car or over-stressing it in any way. This enabled us to hit our final milestone, taking the kids out in it for pax laps at a Knockhill trackday. They were finally tall enough
Had a lovely morning at Knockhill at one of John Stewart's impeccably organised SIDC days. Lots of fun, Lisa even drove with some co-piloting by Robin to show her the lines. And lots of fantastic photos from John.Then I headed off for this year's Sweeping Up the Leaves run, on 22nd October. I joked with Mark and Ferg that morning how proud I was that UJI had NEVER needed recovered. Then bang. And that was that.
Thanks for reading. And for allowing me to offload 18 years and 120,000 miles. It's been quite cathartic.
cheers
Campbell
PS - this is a really long post and I'm not sure it's displaying properly via Tapatalk. So if you are wondering where the rest is...log on via a regular browser!
Gutted to read about this, glad you are ok! 
UJI been part of SE for ever. I s'pose nothing lasts for ever, but sad none the less. Great post. Onwards and upwards to the next chapter now!
