What car to get after gt86 with 2-3x the budget

[krayzie]

Originally Posted by serialk11r

The Boxster is loud? LOL. Surely you kid. My MR2 Spyder (a very very loud car to begin with) has all the sound insulating cubby and soft top stowage parts gutted for a roll bar, so there is literally just the firewall between me and the engine, plus a few rather useless bits of cotton padding the PO taped on. Porsches have very minimal road (well, this is dependent on tire) and wind noise, at least when compared to cheap 25k cars. A surprising amount of engine noise makes it into the cabin, but that's the premium stereo system you're paying for right?

986 Boxster is loud to me as a stock vehicle.

You can rip out anything you like to any car that's not the point.

[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7nKt1NFsCA"]We Just Drove The Stripped-Out Volkswagen Diesel - YouTube[/ame]

[EAGLE5]

This asshole still own his fucked up car?

[serialk11r]

Originally Posted by krayzie

986 Boxster is loud to me as a stock vehicle.

You can rip out anything you like to any car that's not the point.

My comment was more saying that my standards for "loud" are completely off. Even a stock MR2 Spyder is louder than just about any other stock car.

I think the FR-S is basically a Lexus haha.

Still, could be worse. I saw this guy at Laguna Seca who daily drives an RX8 with no interior, no HVAC, no rear seats, no insulation, no airbag, fixed rear doors, and plastic windows that don't go down. Heat is provided in ample quantities in all seasons by the transmission and exhaust heat coming through the floor pan.

I guess that VW is next level compared to that though lol.

[Ultramaroon]

Originally Posted by serialk11r

I think the FR-S is basically a Lexus haha.

I have the same reference based on all of my previous cars.

[strat61caster]

Originally Posted by DarkSunrise

Yah that's why I said "another". Unless you're thinking they would base the next S2000 off that chassis, which I can't see happening.

Considering they put out two of 'em in the past 2 years, I think odds are decent Honda isn't going to completely abandon RWD.

Will it ever be something we can get our grubby mitts on is the more important question imo.

[krayzie]

Originally Posted by serialk11r

I think the FR-S is basically a Lexus haha.

The twins are probably screwed together much better than the average German car.

I'm rocking an old Lexus RX300 Sport Edition this winter and sometimes I can't even determine whether or not the engine started I have to check the tach, can't hear a thing until I hit redline and smooth AF still with 260,000km+

Golf GTI and Jetta GLI have been so quiet with the windows up after Mk2 that all I can hear are creaks and rattles from the interior, gotten too upscaled imo.

Honda still got some way to go until they get back to this level of sports car design.

[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUEU4EnPaEg"]Honda S2000 Type S 試車å*±å‘Š 15mins - YouTube[/ame]

[serialk11r]

Originally Posted by strat61caster

Considering they put out two of 'em in the past 2 years, I think odds are decent Honda isn't going to completely abandon RWD.

Will it ever be something we can get our grubby mitts on is the more important question imo.

I had to think for a while to figure out which was the other RWD platform you were talking about. S660 was the one I thought of haha.

Looking at the NSX frame, I wonder if they can recycle some of the cast parts to make a cheaper car, maybe swap some of the aluminum bits for steel to save money. It looks like there are a lot of extrusions that are fixed to the castings, so you could just swap in some shorter steel extrusions or something. Mild steel stampings instead of aluminum and carbon fiber would save money too. Of course, it would be okay if they figured out how to keep the aluminum for a reasonable price too

It would be cool if they shrank the wheelbase from 104" to around 97" ish, then shrank the track width to 60", and then swap out the V6 with an I4, and ditch the SH-AWD hybrid stuff at the front to save money. Basically a CR-Z with the correct wheels being driven, and preferably more horsepower (though like I have said, I am happy to spend money on a supercharger as long as they put the engine in the back). If the car has rear weight bias, you get pretty good grip without the AWD.

[Yardjass]

Originally Posted by strat61caster

I was wrong, Boxster came in at $41k. So a $9k difference ain't nothing to sneeze at, but a greedy Honda dealer and a Porsche dealer willing to discount, thousands weighed the two against each other.

That's quite a stretch. Only an idiot would buy a marked up car from a dealer instead of going elsewhere. That same idiot likely wouldn't negotiate a very good deal out of a Porsche dealer or they would have done the same at Honda.


That 9 grand is more like 12 now inflation adjusted and those two cars were not in the same price category. That's almost as bad as saying the Focus RS and C7 Corvette are price competitors just because some dealers were marking the Ford up above 50 grand with "gotta have it first" tax when it was newly released and a few stupid idiots were actually willing to pay it.

[DarkSunrise]

Originally Posted by serialk11r

That's not exactly true, a lot of the supercars still have high revving engines. The brand new Audi R8 V10 still goes past 8000rpm, and the top of the line Porsche motors are going past 9000rpm.

There is nothing inherently wrong with NA and high revs, you can make the emissions work. The K20A and K24A2 were designed in the early 2000s, which is what, 2 whole emissions regulation updates ago? There's no reason to try and make the cold start and catalyst warranty requirements work on such an old engine design, and customers are demanding more torque, which is why almost everyone is going turbo.

If it's any glimmer of hope, the K24W7 actually still revs past 7000rpm despite that being completely unnecessary.

Either way, I'm okay with any of the current 4 cylinder Honda engines being in a RWD car. They all have pretty respectable power output and efficiency, have higher-than-average rev limiters, and seem to share much of the bottom end with their predecessors, which could be safely overrevved quite a bit. I am not a fan of turbos, but that won't be a problem; I'll turn down the boost for better response, then modify the turbine so it makes hp at the top end. The S660 really got my hopes up because it is very out of character for Honda to make such a thing, so I am hoping they take the RMR mantle from Toyota and make something epic.

Yeah I wouldn't mind a turbo engine either, but NA would be my first choice for its simplicity and response. In any even the bigger hurdle is probably corporate Honda choking on the sales numbers they saw for the ND Miata, 370z, Twins, and especially their own S2000.

Originally Posted by strat61caster

Considering they put out two of 'em in the past 2 years, I think odds are decent Honda isn't going to completely abandon RWD.

Will it ever be something we can get our grubby mitts on is the more important question imo.

Agree, it wouldn't surprise me if an S2000 replacement never even reached the US. Just don't seem to have a market here for lightweight RWD sports cars sadly.

[Re_Invention]

Originally Posted by DarkSunrise

Yeah I wouldn't mind a turbo engine either, but NA would be my first choice for its simplicity and response. In any even the bigger hurdle is probably corporate Honda choking on the sales numbers they saw for the ND Miata, 370z, Twins, and especially their own S2000.

Agree, it wouldn't surprise me if an S2000 replacement never even reached the US. Just don't seem to have a market here for lightweight RWD sports cars sadly.

Some more fuel for the fire

http://blog.caranddriver.com/more-de...s2000-revival/

TLDR -

Two stage electric boosting system; electronically driven supercharger, conventional turbocharger. Longitudinally mounted 2 liter inline 4 making 320+ horsepower with an 8 speed DCT transaxle with a sticker north of $50,000.

sure

I agree - minimal market space for an affordable roadster and virtually no market for a shift it yourself non-numbers car without the latest and greatest. And in today's day and age it doesn't make sense to develop anything bespoke outside of halo cars. The Fiata, Twins, Supra, et al are proving the best financial case forward is shared development.

It's a grass is greener argument though in lieu of sportsters, roadsters and generally fun flickable lightweight sports cars we have no ending supply of 500+ horsepower minivans, SUV's, trucks and Enterprise rentals. Not that I'm complaining!

[serialk11r]

Originally Posted by DarkSunrise

Yeah I wouldn't mind a turbo engine either, but NA would be my first choice for its simplicity and response. In any even the bigger hurdle is probably corporate Honda choking on the sales numbers they saw for the ND Miata, 370z, Twins, and especially their own S2000.

Agree, it wouldn't surprise me if an S2000 replacement never even reached the US. Just don't seem to have a market here for lightweight RWD sports cars sadly.

Maybe the numbers would work if they tried to compete with Porsche, who is managing to sell 20k sports cars a year, which is around the same as the Miata and twins combined. Porsche also happens to have extremely fat profit margins on their cars.

What I have noticed in the Bay Area at least is that the people who do buy an FRS or BRZ have a tendency to pour thousands in upgrades into their cars. Only now that some of the high mileage cars are getting closer to the 10k mark rather than the 20k mark is it becoming an "accessible" and "cheap" sports car for the enthusiast lacking money. Another thing I noticed is that there are way way more Limited BRZs than Premium.

The way I see it, 25k must not be a good price point for a sports car these days. You either have enough money to stretch the budget to 30-40k, or you can't afford a new car in the first place.

Maybe if Honda tries to make a "budget Porsche", slotting it in where the S2000 was (not exactly a cheap sports car, but less money than a Corvette or Porsche), giving it a relatively premium feel and higher grade components, that would be a good seller. A 35k car would have more of that luxury cachet and performance, while still being in range of the people who buy twins, Miatas, WRXs, etc. Give it a slightly spiced up run of the mill 4 cylinder engine to save money, but give it some faux leather, nice looking buttons, bits of aluminum here and there for weight savings, etc. I can tolerate if they make it a soft top to help sales, I'll just throw the latches away and bolt a hard top on. I personally would have wanted a nicer interior for the twins, and a lot of enthusiasts I met felt like the car was too slow, so if you improve those two areas the demand might be better.

[DarkSunrise]

Originally Posted by Re_Invention

Some more fuel for the fire

http://blog.caranddriver.com/more-de...s2000-revival/

TLDR -

Two stage electric boosting system; electronically driven supercharger, conventional turbocharger. Longitudinally mounted 2 liter inline 4 making 320+ horsepower with an 8 speed DCT transaxle with a sticker north of $50,000.

sure

Haha yeah exactly. That's what I was hoping Honda would avoid -- another heavy, overly expensive/complex, dual-clutch only, numb $50k+ sports car. It's the same direction they went with the new NSX, and the same direction the industry seems to be headed.

Oh well, like you said at least my next SUV/minivan will be 500 hp so I can beat that Volvo soccer mom to the next red light while letting forward crash detection save my ass so I can text on my phablet about how annoying the start-stop system is.

Originally Posted by serialk11r

Maybe if Honda tries to make a "budget Porsche", slotting it in where the S2000 was (not exactly a cheap sports car, but less money than a Corvette or Porsche), giving it a relatively premium feel and higher grade components, that would be a good seller. A 35k car would have more of that luxury cachet and performance, while still being in range of the people who buy twins, Miatas, WRXs, etc. Give it a slightly spiced up run of the mill 4 cylinder engine to save money, but give it some faux leather, nice looking buttons, bits of aluminum here and there for weight savings, etc. I can tolerate if they make it a soft top to help sales, I'll just throw the latches away and bolt a hard top on. I personally would have wanted a nicer interior for the twins, and a lot of enthusiasts I met felt like the car was too slow, so if you improve those two areas the demand might be better.

I kind of feel like that's the market Nissan chased with the 370z. $35k RWD car with more power and better interior than the S2000. It didn't work out all that great though. I think once you're willing to sacrifice weight to move up-market and add performance, suddenly you're uncomfortably close to competing with the Mustang GT and Camaro SS. The advantages those cars have with the volumes they move and the amount of parts/platform-sharing they do, it'd be hard for any Japanese car manufacturer to compete.

[Re_Invention]

Originally Posted by DarkSunrise

Haha yeah exactly. That's what I was hoping Honda would avoid -- another heavy, overly expensive/complex, dual-clutch only, numb $50k+ sports car. It's the same direction they went with the new NSX, and the same direction the industry seems to be headed.

Oh well, like you said at least my next SUV/minivan will be 500 hp so I can beat that Volvo soccer mom to the next red light while letting forward crash detection save my ass so I can text on my phablet about how annoying the start-stop system is.

I kind of feel like that's the market Nissan chased with the 370z. $35k RWD car with more power and better interior than the S2000. It didn't work out all that great though. I think once you're willing to sacrifice weight to move up-market and add performance, suddenly you're uncomfortably close to competing with the Mustang GT and Camaro SS. The advantages those cars have with the volumes they move and the amount of parts/platform-sharing they do, it'd be hard for any Japanese car manufacturer to compete.

The blistering quick, comfortable, safe, text while it drives and orders you a Starbucks do it all machine of the future - today!



Bingo regarding the 370z taking the entry sports coupe position. Porsche has recently gone on record saying (which can change tomorrow) they won't consider anything below the Boxster, $60k+ OTD, at the moment. And that makes sense given the size of production, consumer demands and profit margins. They are so immensely profitable because they get away with charging so much for their products. It isn't that their plastic or metal is 100% more expensive than Toyota's. Why sacrifice margin at current production volume for a gamble risk to recapture end of year profits with greater volume and investment of infrastructure. Suggesting that is living with blinders on because they will reserve that for Macan lifestyle vehicles! hahah!

No one needs to appeal to a market that isn't profitable, a few griping enthusiasts on forums (which frankly always turn out to be a marginal group of buyers anyway) across the world aren't the average consumer. They [we] are the 1%!

[EAGLE5]

FT86 is perfect car.