Almost Great: M100 Lotus Elan

Are the greatest cars a product of the heart, or the head? Are they driven by emotion, or by engineering excellence? I’m an engineer, so I would of course argue that it’s the latter. I love to think of cars as machines, first and foremost, and to imagine that depth of engineering brilliance will, in the end, win over subjective items like brand, history and even – yikes – great design.

I hate to think of cars becoming like watches – completely emotive choices. I’m not a watch person, but nobody will convince me that they really buy an expensive Rolex or Breitling for the engineering of its escapements or balance wheels (whatever they are). I myself occasionally wear a cheapo analogue Tissot, which I bought for utterly irrational reasons – I like the vague ‘Frenchness’ of the brand, it feels nice on my wrist, and it looks smart with a suit jacket. If I bought a watch for pure functional engineering quality it would obviously be one of those digital quartz Casio G-Shock jobbies that only soldiers can get away with wearing.

But of course I know I’m fooling myself. Modern cars are like watches – the engineering is secondary. What really counts is an almost indefinable mix of subjective feelings and impressions that include history, brand, design and perceptions. And it’s very easy for product development teams to forget this.