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Brooke Kensington Exhaust Review for the Elise

Hole in the original mild steel Elise exhaust

In the five years that I've had my Elise S1, I've just come to the end of the life of the second standard exhaust system. While travelling along a dual carriage way I saw a rather noisy Mitsubishi Evo pass by and realised that something was wrong when the burbling could still be heard, even though the Evo was now in the distance, I'd blown a hole in one of the tail pipes near the silencer.

Originally, my first exhaust gave up with a long line hole right along the tail pipes, but at the time, a friend had offered me his standard 111S exhaust for free with only 4000 miles on it and so I took the extremely heavy system and had it fitted. And now about 30,000 miles later I am at the same stage, but this time I've decided to go stainless.

Before I bought the stainless exhaust system I trawled the Lotus chat boards and the manufacturer web sites to get a full picture of what is available and what is most suitable for me. I use the Elise as an everyday car, so noise was an issue, but at the same time money isn't "no object" but it should also be well made and fairly light. After much battling with my senses I decided on the Elise S1 Stainless Steel System from Brooke Kensington. I have included at the bottom of this page a table with a rough outline as to what people generally think of all the systems on the market that I looked into. The BK (Brooke Kensington) system is fully stainless with a small silencer, a single large bore splitting to two large bore twin tail pipes. The main reasons I choose this system was down to two main factors. Firstly it's noted to be one of the quieter systems on the market, a friend of mine had one on his S2, so I'd heard this system in the past, and secondly it was also one of the cheaper at £275 excluding the VAT, postage and fitting.

The Brooke Kensington Large Bore Elise Tail Ends

So what is the system like?

It arrived well packaged in a large box, the twin tail pipes come separate on a welded Y split pipe going to the first bend. The large bore tail ends have honey combed interiors with wire mesh behind them and really do look the business, in fact they suddenly make the standard tails look rather small and boring. The tail endings are surprisingly heavy, but they are rather long, fitting the exhaust exit from the body work rather well. Also in the box is the silencer box with the rest of the piping attached and the mount hooks, compared to the standard system this is amazingly light and small. Also chucked in are a pair of black rubber exhaust mounts, you now only need two rather than the four the original system requires, and also a pair of new gaskets for the exhaust to cat end and the down pipe to cat end. I set the two mounts aside as I already have the stronger more durable blue silicon exhaust mounts from Lotus.

Inside the Brooke Kensington Exhaust Tail Pipe

The whole system is quite well made, nice welds though the tail split looks rather clunky (this sits behind the body work). The shape of the whole system that the gas flow takes makes a rather natural shape and should promote good exhaust flow, taking a smooth bend around from the side of the box, towards the engine and then back over the top of the box to the tails. One thing my helpful technician noted was the way the larger connecting pipe on the tail section had the inner pipe misaligned (see image). Whether it would make any difference as to effecting gas flow is debatable once the two pipes are connected and aligned, but if you feel that way inclined, this is easily rectifiable.

The Brooke Kensington Elise S1 Exhaust System

The worst part of fitting the system really is taking out the old one, heavy and often trapped on the down pipe or an exhaust mount, rusty bolts etc. The new system went in quite sweet and is fully adjustable so you can align it centrally. One thing to remember if you fit this system, don't throw away the old system or cut it up straight away, you need to reuse one of the brackets off the old box.

How does it perform?

I started the car while it was in the garage over the pit, it sounded much warmer but surprisingly not much louder than the old system at first. Once on the street with the roof on though, its quite boomy, but not unpleasant or deafening. In fact, when you are just cruising its very quiet and you only get boom during low rev load. A quick trip to the tunnel carriage way in Cardiff bay was in order. I slowed to around 40-50mph, dropped it into second gear and planted the accelerator, absolutely transforming the sound of the car while a race car noise echoed off the walls of the tunnel. People just get out of the way when they hear you coming, one car in front pulling over sharpishly into the left hand lane well in advance. Very anti-social.

The engine sounded as if it were running cleaner, but that could be just my imagination. The larger bore and smooth flow may also promote better fuel economy, though I have not yet been on a long enough trip to notice, plus the first few days does promote a heavier right foot during noise intoxicating sessions. It is easy to live with this system. At 70-80mph it's quite mild and only a slight extra noise over the old system with no problems in hearing the radio. Those of you who want something meatier would probably want to remove the catalyst, but for me this represents the perfect solution for a car in daily use, it also sounds the way the Elise should have always sounded from the factory, if a little boy racerish at times.

Craig's overall marks

Value for money : 8/10
Quality : 9/10
Sound : 9.5/10
Looks : Lovely
Fit/Alignment : 10/10
Service (phone+email) : Can't fault it.

A big thank you to Rob Carrier for his help and guidance while fitting the system.
Manufacturer : Brooke Kensington - www.brooke-kensington.co.uk
Cost for S1 Elise : £275, S2 Elise version available.
You can have it fitted by BK for around £80 or delivered for around £12 ex VAT next day delivery.

Retail Suppliers

PTP - Exclusive supplier for the Lotus application of Janspeed Exhausts
EliseParts.com - Elise Parts Exhaust system plus others
Hangar 111 - Supplier for Quicksilver Exhaust

Other Exhaust Systems Considered - Owners comments

Get in touch if you have a system you wish to add to this list.

Manufacturer/Web Link	Available for..	Comments	Cost
Elise Parts	S1 Elise and Exige	Very loud, very well made and popular.	£387.69inc
Race Line	S1 and S2 Elise	One of the quieter systems on the market, well made and refined. Sounds good overall, quiet on cruising. Repackable version available.	Non Repackable £411.25inc Repackable £581.63inc
Chris Neil	S1 and S2 Elise	Very loud, excellent at high revs, a little unrefined on tick-over. Spits and pops. Tails don't aways line up on S1.	S1 £289inc S2 £351inc
Brooke Kensington	S1 and S2 Elise	One of the quieter of the bunch, but boomy at low load revs, racey at high revs, quiet on cruising.	S1 £323inc S2 £346inc
Larini	S1, S2, 111R	Awaiting your comments..	S1 £350 S2 £370 111R TBA
Motobuild	S1, S2	Owners comments not available, "track day system" available for S1 Elise, stainless "twin outlet" for S2.	S1 £346.50inc S2 £395.00
Janspeed SuperSports Stainless see PTP Ltd for offical sales	S1, S2, S2 111S	Fairly loud and raspy. Typical sports car sound. Well made popular official Lotus sports exhaust upgrade.	£351.32inc
Standard Janspeed (factory mildsteel)	S1, S2, S2 111s	Very quiet, as fitted by the factory. Heavy plus mild steel. No insurance complications, no track day noise problems.	£200 apprx
Quicksilver	S1, S2, S2 111S , 111R, Exige	Loud, well built, similar flow design to BK and Race Line.	£340 - £380inc

Costs include VAT where possible, those that do not specify are unknown, costs may vary between suppliers and do not include fitting.
Comments are an overall summary of owners comments and may in some cases be incorrect.
Costs are valid as of 19th January 2005 and are subject to change.

Last Updated : 20th January 2005

Craig D, 19th January 2005