Geeto67

jeep made a sports car? I know people have taken the AMC 258 I6 racing offroad, and in rallyes in everything from jeeps to ramblers. but that's not really a sports car. Still the I6 jeep engine is legendary in it's own right.

It's a car. Most modern American and German cars have more Japanese components in them than a Mitsubishi A6M Zero. Don't read so much into it. I have to say there is something I overwhelmingly like about this car and that it is a I6 sports car. Forget 2JZ and all that jazz for a moment, the roots of proper sports cars lies with the I6 engine. The japanese used straight 6 engines when they built the first 240zx and the first supra because that is what the British used. Jaguar's cross flow I6 gave Enzo Ferrari and his small displacement v12's fits, which was esp fitting since Enzo himself had cut his teeth racing I6 alfa romeos in the 1920's and 30's. All the great sports car makers, Aston Martin, Corvette, Jaguar, BMW, Alfa Romeo, datsun, toyota, Ford, Austin Healey, Mercedes, Triumph, MG, Maserati etc...., have roots with the inline-6. Today you can count the number of I6 sporting cars on one hand. There is the BMW z4 and turbo 2 and 3 series I6's, Mercedes AMG 53, and.......now the supra and that is pretty much it (although jaguar may be bringing it back as well). So for me I'm glad this thing exists - I just wish it wasn't $50k so more people will indoctrinate to the cult of the inline 6. In other news here is exactly how much toyota put into this supra: https://jalopnik.com/here-s-where-toyota-and-bmw-parted-ways-on-the-new-supr-1831780403

yeah well...America's voting habits are suspect these days. That being said Every new car, 90% of the used cars, and 100% of the motorcycles I have bought have been manuals so I voted with my wallet. Audi told me they don't want a repeat customer or my money. I'm fine with that - plenty of challengers, camaros, mustangs, VWs, subarus, bmws, etc...in the sea. sports car without a manual? come on toyota, be better.

it's the bmw B48 engine - the work horse of 320i's and Mini Cooper S's everywhere. Here's the thing: ok, it may be down on hp being an undersquare engine (or for the american car guys - a stroker motor) but it will still feel fast because of all dem torques. I suspect this combo is a tax dodge for other countries that rate and tax the car on performance (France) and engine displacement (almost all of Asia and England), which it why it isn't being brought here initially (even though the engine already has emissions cert for the us). Here in the US I imagine we will just call it the hairdresser/secretary special. they are claiming a 243lb weight savings, all off the nose - I wonder what it will do for handling? for a while I was wondering why the toybaru wasn't turbocharged yet...well this is probably why. 'yota be sandbagging the marketplace knowing their sports car was going to slake the turbo thurst and offer the toybaru fanboi's a legit "upgrade". Sneaky buggers.

that has to be Toyota trolling people. There is no way they would release a supra with less hp than a toybaru B86Rz.

you don't think it's a little suspicious that only after they go all in on autolol that they start bringing them to the US? It's almost as if Audi be like: [german accent] "these cars are too special for fat lazy americans and their mcdonalds hamburgers, ja? we better keep them here in Europe. Oh they are all auto now? well let them have the cars so they can drink 40oz cokes and drive the slow 88 kilometers per hour".

So let's get this straight - Audi is lol for going all automatic, but the moment someone else makes a joke about it suddenly they aren't LOL as you rush to defend them? Pick a lane, take your midol, and sit down.

and of those how many are a three pedal manual in the US? yeah, that's what I thought. In the past all we ever got was the RS4 and RS6 (and not the avant) and not every year, while everyone else got the RS2, RS6 avant, etc....

Nobody really needs to buy an audi ever again anyway. They don't even give us the good RS cars.

I am surprised that people are more angry about the styling than the fact that it doesn't have a toyota engine. The styling is a bit "anime" for my taste, but it's not entirely ugly. It has a modern RX8 feel to it with the F1 inspired nose. I am surprised that the styling is literally all toyota is contributing to the car though. the 3.0L bmw powerplant is certainly a capable engine, and one that I am sure is E85 and a tune away from 500 hp, and is the right configuration (I6), it still feels like a compromise that it's not a toyota developed engine. my prediction? they will sell maybe 1000 of them a year, at a discount after they languish on dealer lots. then some 2nd or 3rd owners will discover they make hellcat levels of power if you run E85 and screw the boost on to the moon, and then everyone is going to want a now discontinued one.

Does it have the wrong culture though? At the time it was on posters (just like lambos, ferraris, etc) and trapper keeper folders, it was in video games, and the kids who read car magazines and talked about super cars talked about the supra. Car magazines often included it in the comparisons of super cars and when they reviewed it they compared it to other super cars. So what more culture do you need? At the time the car didn't sell because people didn't value Japanese cars like they did American and Italian cars. The ZR-1 also had this problem: why spend Porsche 911 turbo money on something that looks like a corvette or a NA supra. But it doesn't mean those cars weren't every bit super cars. This idea that you are the wrong brand to build a super car is bullshit. It means ford cannot ever build a super car. Nor Chevrolet. Nor Nissan (sorry GTR). I don't accept that - ferrari's biggest racing rival in the 60's was ford. Or did you just mean the Japanese can never build a supercar?

You didn't read any part of this thread did you? You know how I know? Because the original question was "is the 1990's MK4 Supra Turbo considered a supercar by 1990's metrics?" Things we have already established: the previous gens were not super cars. The MK4 that is naturally aspirated was not a supercar. The new one based off a z4 chassis is not a super car. The 1990's supra TURBO cost almost or as much as a c4 zr1, 911 turbo, viper, nix, etc... And it delivered performance on par with all of those plus the Diablo and the F355. Yet people are reluctant to call it a super car. Some because it's just a base supra with a turbo so it isn't "special enough" (even though some years they made fewer supra turbos than diablos and F355s), some because they don't think of the Japanese as being capable of making super cars (even though the Japanese have been in motor racing since the 60's), And some because it didn't come from a luxury brand (even though a Toyota century is the largest status symbol in Japan). So what's your opinion on the original question?

wow, motor racism and motor elitism in one post. bravo. By this logic Honda NEVER built a supercar? the 1990's NSX was never a supercar in the 1990's because they also make small fuel efficient cars for bill and sarah to drive to their 9-5. oh, and they made the fucking insight which was a prius before prius was a prius. And I suppose Ford never built a supercar either, all those 60's GT40s and the ford GT doesn't count because ford made focuses and escorts, and falcons at the same time.

that's the old myth. A ferrarui must be good quality because it was expensive, but really a ferrari was expensive because the cost of engineering was expensive, and they hand built cars which was the most expensive way possible. Some stuff is really high quality, you won't find a lot of lambos with vinyl interiors, but some stuff is just average off the shelf parts too. the awd in the 1993 diablot VT was pillaged from their truck program. It sent 25% power to the front wheels. It was not a complicated system at all, mitsubishi, audi, subarus, etc all had system that worked better and were more advanced, but the VT system made an overpowered car more "managible" and thuse made the lambo guys look like geniuses for stuffing their truck tech in a car. here is a fun thing to think about. the company that had the best active suspension at the time? GM. too bad they didn't put it in a single production car. And that kind of illustrates something here: Chevy has the money to invest in far out tech, but they can't put it in a car because they know people won't pay $100K in 1990 for a corvette. Lambo and Ferrari don't have the same engineering money but if it works it goes into the car and the price is the price because lambos and ferrari's are supposed to be expensive. http://www.superchevy.com/features/0901gmhtp-1990-chevy-corvette-zr1-prototype/ lambo introduced AWD on the diablo VT in 1993. well you are right, a regular 3000GT with an expensive roof isn't a supercar because it isn't performing like one. It had to be on the VR4 which had the performance to run with the pack. Maybe not at the head of the pack, but it wasn't getting left on the porch either. It's about the total package of things, and some things have more weight than others (pun intended).

So the real question being asked here is how much does technology matter to the definition of supercar? Ostensibly a lot - a supercar is all about the bleeding edge of what the automotive industry can do reliably in a performance car. Ferrari and lambo both had spyder variants, as did the 993 911 turbo, but previous generations didn't. The C4 Zr-1 wasn't available as a convertible, neither was the lotus esprit. the viper was only one at this point and a top was a luxury. So.....how does a $20K roof option make it a supercar? exclusivity. here is a spyder that solves the security problem that all convertible supercars of that time suffered from, and it does it in the coolest, most high tech way possible. Maybe it doesn't add to the performance, but it certainly added to the wow factor. This is the car that made retractable roofs seem sexy and high tech again, and mercedes, and bmw, and others copied.

I think the VR4 retractable roof variant does qualify. It was the first retractable hardtop in the US market since 1959, it was a $20K additional cost over the top shelf 3000GT VR4 for a whopping $69,500 in 1995 dollars (making it more expensive than a viper, the supra turbo, and the ZR-1), and it was technically really advanced. The only place where I would say it's dodgy is performance - it was slower than the 911 turbo, supra turbo, zr-1, etc....pretty much the whole field. Not by much, but a noticeable amount. Prior to the sypder the VR4 had active aero and other stuff that is the stuff of supercars. Mitsu considered it an NSX competitor, but I don't know if honda felt that way. Oddly I lean away fromt he the 300zx twin turbo beong considered a supercar, but only because nissan was building a faster, AWD, tech advanced halo car in the GTR at the same time, they just weren't importing it to America. I wonder how much of this has to do with luxury marque bias? You almost have to make a case for the top of the line ferrari not to be considered a supercar some years (F355 anyone?), but chevrolet comes out with a 4 cam 32 valve v8 that makes 400hp and can run WFO for 24 hours straight at 175 mph in an era when the regular corvette struggled to break 300hp, and it's not a supercar. Lotus stuffs a twin turbo v-8 into an aging platform and no question it is a supercar, but mitsubishi builds a twin turbo v6, 4ws, awd, retractable roof tech tour de force and it's not a supercar because it's common (even when some years they only imported 84 units). Some of this bleeds into motor racism too. We expect the Italians to make supercars, it's like what they do. But the Japanese? they make shitbox econo cars that college students drive, how could they make a supercar? What do they know about supercars?

Didn't Aerosmith put this in their living on the edge video in the early 90's?

Is the 1990's NSX a supercar by 1990's standards? is the Nissan R34 GT-R? If those qualify, the why not the toyota supra turbo?

this is a lot of triggered CB butthurt spilling over into CR To be very clear on my position: The MK4 Supra Turbo is a supercar. The naturally aspirated version I don't think qualifies thought it is still a sports car. It's performance and price puts it in league with the Corvette ZR-1, 911 turbo, Lotus Esprit v8, Dodge viper, Acura NSX, and while not in league with price it was close to the diablo and F355 berlinetta in performance (and the Supra Turbo was often compared to those cars when reviewed). At the time that was the top tier of performance cars and all of those were considered supercars in their time. Hypercars of that era like the F40, F50, Jaguar xj220, vector w8, and Mclaren f1 were just starting to pull away from what a supercar was traditionally considered. I realize none of these cars might qualify as supercars now compared to the modern field, even the diablo, but the moniker is earned in the era when the car was new. To that end the car must be a halo car, the pinnacle of performance for the brand at the time, must be competitively fast within the field of other halo cars, expensive beyond normal sports car prices, and rare. I think what makes people resistant to think it is a supercar is that it comes from a non-luxury brand. Even Honda sold the NSX under the acura brand, but being a toyota it doesn't feel "special". I wonder if people would have paid more attention if it was a lexus. Nobody seems to have a problem calling the lexus LFA a supercar and to me and others that feels like the spiritual successor to the supra, but some don't agree. Also for the time, the car was a hard sell on dealer's lots due to lack of marketing and a lot of people ended up with discounted ones or cheap used ones until the advent of youtube and vids of 1000hp monsters roll racing on open highways started to bump prices back up. I don't think either of these arguments diminishes it's supercar status. Pop culture included it in video games like Need or speed and Test Drive 4, Posters of it were sold next to the ones of diablos, vipers, ferraris, 911 turbos, and Zr-1s. Journalists of the time compared it to "other cars" that are naturally considered supercars like the viper and diablo. It was the halo car for toyota at the time and it hung with the supercar pack in performance and technology. The 1990's are the era when the US first started to see japan dip their toe in the supercar for a world market pool. The Acura NSX and Toyota Supra Turbo

I think everyone is pissed that it isn't a supercar like the old MK4 Turbos were....... :gabe:

This year marks the 25th anniversary of the Hot Rod Power Tour. After Dad's health problems in 2018 I realized I may not get another chance to do the father and son stuff I wanted to do with him, so we booked the rooms and registered for the Tour. Going to be driving the Family 1990 C4 ZR-1 for the long haul (hopefully) down from NY. I am kind of (read: verry) excited for this adventure. Who else is going? Who has done this before? Who has some advice for the trip?

Just booked all my hotel rooms and registered for Power Tour. No backing out now. Spoke to dad about it last week and we agreed we are going to be doing the trip in the family C4 Zr-1 (that we bought new in 1990). Figure it will be a nice addition to that car's "story". Can't Wait!!!!

Ouch. For a bike list...does anybody drag race bikes around here? haven't seen to many serious ones

everytime I see this thread pop up, this commercial pops into my head:

With the exception of spending that is of a classified nature essential to national security (which is pretty broad), the government publishes it's spending as part of the public record. It does require a bit of research beyond just typing "federal budget" into google and you'll have to pull Authorizations, Appropriations bills, and budget resolutions separately and read them - but the info is out there and available for the public to read if they wanted to. It was part of my old job to look at the government spending around agency enforcement to see what had been allocated for the CFPB or the OCC. Lean years and the agencies tended to be more aggressive with their reviews, fat years and they were more cooperative and progressive. I will agree that most people, including myself rarely take the time to read the whole thing in detail, but it still follows basic accounting principles. If there is a budget shortfall the government agencies that have the shortfall may have to furlough or layoff employees, but it isn't like a small business - those furloughs and layoffs cost money too. Not funding the government or having a shutdown doesn't make the government smaller - it just stops the essential services that need to be done from being done, while continuing to rack up costs. Here is a good example: as former military you get a pension. If you are eligible to collect that pension (that you earned) that means there is a government employee processing your payment. If that office and employee is affected by the shutdown, then there isn't anybody to process that payment. The gov't still owes you the money you earned, but how are you going to collect? You can't sue the federal government for collections in this case, and the process didn't go away or the government get any smaller, it just ceased to do it's job. the costs still racked up for that agency (power bill, salaries, etc), and you are still owed your money, but the only one who ends up screwed are the beneficiaries of the work that didn't get done - which are little people like you and me. Government shutdowns don't save money or make government smaller - that happens through acts of congress and budget allocations and bills - it just screws the american taxpayer who relies in part on the gov't.