Numbers

[bash]

Im just curious, activity on this site seems to be very low. I know we have the various facebook groups ( peoples front of judea etc), which seems a bit ridiculous for such low vehicle numbers, and Im still of the opinion that this group should never have been renamed and its not attracted other types of Lotus as was envisaged, but, am I wrong ?

Bash

[MetBlue]

Share your concerns Bash.
There seems to be about a dozen of us who post something fairly frequently and I'm sure there are a good few others who look in, but don't post - exactly what I do with those Faceplant sites.
We've seen it with Tanz struggling for photos for this year's calendar also. I'm also seeing it by limited response in the request for cars and people for NEC Classic show in Nov.

@Stu : can you see the usage / visiting stats for the site?

Much to my better judgement i'm feeling the need to swallow my pride and actually start posting to Faceplant. If I do though, I think I'll use links to this site so we can actually keep content together. The calendar and planning for NEC would be two ideal opportunities.

[bash]

Photos is an issue and fb is easy to post when it comes to that but I do understand why it is like it is here.
When it comes to the calender we could perhaps use that to our advantage in that we could say on the fb groups that we are going to produce one and submissions can be done by ..... Wether the group admins on there would allow that I don't know but one of the sites is there to sell stuff.
As predicted there is an element on fb who cant be bothered to find out for themselves and just ask the question and gets an answer, often without any thanks afterwards or feedback. I have answered a couple of queries on there but I've stopped doing it because all of the answers are on this site if they looked. I know some of us have directed them to this site but the sort if people who cant be bothered also cant be bothered to post here either so I don't know what the answer could be.

Bash

[AlSmith]

I suppose I’m one of the lurkers .

View the site most days, but only post occasionally if I have something I think worth saying. Being a relatively new Lotus owner (almost 4 years now) most of my questions have been asked/answered, hence why I like this site, lots of info, easily to search for when I’m stuck.

This is my go to Lotus site, friendly and informative.

FB - I’m even worse, view occasionally and hardly ever post - I’m a social media dinosaur.

Al

[Pete Boole]

I'm not on faceplant and don't really want to be - I like the format of forums. I spend more time on TLF now. I'd be happy for LGT to be swallowed up by TLF to be honest, and I don't mind the subscription charge - it's small.
As said there arn't many Elite/Eclat/Excel owners to start with - be nice to be all on one forum (faceplant notwithstanding).
Just my 2p.

Pete

[MetBlue]

. I spend more time on TLF now.

It's long been discussed that we can sit under the The Lotus Forum servers, but still maintain the look and feel (and importantly history) held in this site. Bibs is open for it anytime we wanted to pursue.
IIRC, elan central is exactly this way.
It might hold the benefit that picture posting becomes easier, which could help draw in some input to the likes of Calendars from our Faceplant brethren.

[Zag]

The "problem" is that there are only so many issues with these cars and thanks to the excellent archive they are all covered and easily searchable.

Would you want a Facebook esk page where every other day a newbie asks about water leaks?

As for the expansion to other models it was always on a hiding to nothing in my opinion, most Esprit owners will pay to fix or go on other Esprit specific pages which if I owned one I would too. I was poo pood when i suggested where to stop, the esprit is a revised europa which shares a lot with the elan. The Jenson Healy has the same engine in the right place and without it there would be no 907/ 912. Don't even go there with the Sunbeams because apparently they are up themselves and the M100 even though it has the engine in the same place and was produced at the same time time as another which is ok is an inferior product despite often being quoted as the best handling fwd car.

Do i want to be best buddies with you lot on here and talk every day, no.

If someone asks a question that I have an answer to yes I will respond and hope i can be of help.

When I have a problem with my car is this the first and best place for me to find an answer. Absolutely.

[KevW]

I think Al Smith sums up my situation too. I try to post as much as I can on this site but I don't post just for the sake of it.

I'm not a skilled mechanic, just a keen owner, so I like to be sure any advice I do offer is pukka. Couple that with the fact that Excels are one of the most reliable classics to run and it means I often don't have anything useful to add to the database.

I'm not into Facebook but I do think this site is great. It's a friendly and invaluable resource for owners like me.

[TAR]

I'm another lurker. I don't post much but do drop in almost every day to see what's new. I'm a little more involved on TLF but again, not prolific.

I'm not interested in sharing my life with the world.

I don't do FB and never will.

Forums in general are a dying breed. As mentioned, people can't be bothered to look stuff up when they can just ask. I bet AI would retrieve quite a bit of useful info these days (if you trust it)

[dancroft1984]

Forums in general are a dying breed. As mentioned, people can't be bothered to look stuff up when they can just ask. I bet AI would retrieve quite a bit of useful info these days (if you trust it)

I think this is the point, forums as a general "thing" are much less popular than they used to be.

I'm in once every few days, or daily if I have some jobs on I'm doing. I'd happily have this sit under the TLF banner if that was helpful.

[LotusMonkey]

I try to post, but more often than not to get advice, rather than offer it, though have been able to assist on a few occasions. Personally, I find this site a FAR FAR better resource than anything on Facebook. When I have posted a question and then find an answer, I try to add it to the post, as one day someone may need the same advice. The search features are much better here, and the knowledge base huge.

I have thought a few times about starting a thread for my restoration (G-Reg Excel SE), but it is a very slow moving project as the car is 70 miles from me in Northants. I'll take it on my shoulders to make the effort, given I am trying to document it for myself as much as anything. Especially now it actually runs and is close to having reconditioned brakes.

I've only joined in recent years, so don't really have an opinion on the name change, but the forum is extremely valuable. I'm generally here at least once a week to see what has been posted. If you ever want a picture of a semi-knackered resto for the calendar I am your man!

Duncs

[AndrewWebber]

I've only ever used this one forum and am not a FB person. I guess I grew up and old with my +2, bought in 1978, before such sites were there and the likes of Brian Buckland, Miles Wilkins etc wrote good detailed technical books on that era of car that cover more than I know or will probably ever need.
I did venture onto Piston Heads (classified) in the noughties to find doner bits (cars) for my 'V8 Europa' project and when I bought the Elite in 2021 soon drove it to an NEC CC show and met a few of you who explained the 'group' is really based around the forum, that concept was all very new to me. My competition exploits with the +2 and Europa are very 'physical' but scoring etc is on a web site but there is no 'chat' on there (but is apparently on FB). A 'merge' with one of the others is fine with me if it doesn't risk losing the accessible technical detail on here. As far as I know there aren't any books that cover the 'wedge' era cars in enough detail to do without the excellent forum detail....

Thanks Andy

[John]

The number of active topics has fluctuated lately, and occasionally it's looked like we could have hit zero.

Does that matter? I suppose it depends on what posters/visitors expect from the site, and how important the activity levels are to owner Chris.

As a regular poster I find the site invaluable. I'm on here every day, if I have work in progress on my Excel I access the parts manual regularly for reference, and I find the forum members to be very helpful and encouraging.

If we reach a point where the long term future of the site is in question, I would happily pay an annual sub to maintain access to this excellent advert free resource. If that meant the photos could be loaded to the server rather than a third party site even better.

John

[LotusMonkey]

The number of active topics has fluctuated lately, and occasionally it's looked like we could have hit zero.

Does that matter? I suppose it depends on what posters/visitors expect from the site, and how important the activity levels are to owner Chris.

As a regular poster I find the site invaluable. I'm on here every day, if I have work in progress on my Excel I access the parts manual regularly for reference, and I find the forum members to be very helpful and encouraging.

If we reach a point where the long term future of the site is in question, I would happily pay an annual sub to maintain access to this excellent advert free resource. If that meant the photos could be loaded to the server rather than a third party site even better.

John

Yes John, I would certainly do the same rather than risk the loss of the resource. Perhaps 'gently pushing' people with enquiries to the forum would be useful to from the Facebook page. I am in some musician groups on Facebook, and they all end up being the same dross of people being lazy and asking the same questions, with zero effort put into researching. One of the reasons I love the forum, is I can research expertise and experience - you can't do that on FB, especially public groups.

[John]

I don't do social media, but from what I've heard there's a lot of abusive and unhelpful posting. What I like about our site is that posts are rarely heated or off-topic. We share a common interest, and I've always found the members here to be very helpful.

In part that's probably because we are rather niche, the cars are getting older and we need to stick together!

John