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The Opel Speedster is a British-built mid-engined, targa-topped, 2-seat sports car sold by the German automaker Opel, introduced in July 2000.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://archives.media.gm.com/intl/opel/en/news/pr_old/pressrelease_73.htm )〕 It was built in both RHD & LHD versions, at the Lotus Cars plant in Hethel, Norfolk, England. It was sold as the Vauxhall VX220 in the United Kingdom and the Daewoo Speedster in the Asian market. The car shared much in common with the Lotus Elise, although Opel claimed few parts were interchangeable. ==Design and development== Due to the changes in European crash safety regulations for the 2000 model year, Lotus needed to replace the original Elise, and they struck a deal with General Motors in order to have sufficient investment for a new car. As part of the deal, Lotus agreed to develop and produce the Opel Speedster and Vauxhall VX220 on the new Series 2 Elise chassis.〔 The first Speedster concept car was shown at the Geneva Motor Show in 1999.〔 Whilst the new Elise would use a 1.8-litre Toyota engine, similar to that found in the Toyota Celica, the Speedster was designed to use a 2.2-litre GM Ecotec engine from the Opel Astra. Neither engine had been used in the original Elise, which was fitted with a 1.8-litre Rover K-Series engine.〔 In order to accommodate the production of the new cars, Lotus expanded its Hethel factory to a capacity of 10,000 cars, with around 3,500 slots allocated to Speedster production. Production of the Speedster commenced in 2000.〔 The Speedster utilizes an aluminium chassis tub that weighs only .〔 The car also features bodywork made entirely of glass-reinforced plastic (GRP). The entire car weighs only , which made it lighter than the similarly-sized Toyota MR2.〔 At launch, the Speedster's all aluminium alloy 2.2 L Z22SE engine produced , making the Speedster considerably more powerful than the Elise was at launch.〔 As an answer to calls for a more powerful version of the Speedster, Opel introduced a new 2-litre turbocharged version of the Ecotec engine, which produced , but also weighed slightly more, at .〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Opel Speedster」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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