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Old 03-15-2015, 04:28 PM   #337
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LOL the WRX is compromised? Okay chief. The problem with a track prepped BRZ is that you can have a track prepped STI for close to the same price.

I am amazed at how many people who have spend thousands and thousands of dollars on the FT86 to add superchargers, turbos, more performance suspension parts, etc have their cars for sale within a year of doing all these mods. Why is that?

And there are a bunch of them too.
The WRX is heavily compromised. I'm not sure you understand the meaning of that word used in this context. Let's think about this. It is a car that can haul a family, drive through snow and get good gas mileage all for under $25k. Every single one of those things could be sacrificed for a better sports car. Imagine a 2 seater RWD WRX without all the practical DD crap (4 doors, trunk space, etc) and wannabe luxury crap (moonroof, leather, sound deadening, etc). That would probably be 800#s lighter, louder and FAR more fun to drive. Sounds exactly like my BRZ with FI.

Also, track prepping a BRZ is really as simple as camber bolts, thicker oil and better brake pads/fluid for most of us. Maybe wheels, tires and oil coolers. You don't need to do anything else, it's very much like the STI in that way for $10,000 less.

People do crazy things to wrxs, stis, m3s, gtrs and sell them too. Look at the nasioc classifieds. There is a 530WHP fully built and track prepped sti for sale for 25k on the first page. There are always cars with crazy blood, sweat and money spent being sold for peanuts. This insanity occurs everywhere in the car modding community. Why do people do this? Because we all are brain washed consumers that need to consume more and more. Better and faster and shinier and etc. Hedonic adaptation.
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Old 03-15-2015, 05:42 PM   #338
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For the cost of brake pads and an oil cooler, I get a BRZ to the STI price? Wowza!
He said track prepped supercharged car. People are getting base 2015 STI's for $32K-33k. You ain't getting into a properly setup track supercharged BRZ for less than that even if you do most of the labor yourself. And even then you probably can't take an STI.
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Old 03-15-2015, 10:24 PM   #339
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The WRX is heavily compromised. I'm not sure you understand the meaning of that word used in this context. Let's think about this. It is a car that can haul a family, drive through snow and get good gas mileage all for under $25k. Every single one of those things could be sacrificed for a better sports car. Imagine a 2 seater RWD WRX without all the practical DD crap (4 doors, trunk space, etc) and wannabe luxury crap (moonroof, leather, sound deadening, etc). That would probably be 800#s lighter, louder and FAR more fun to drive. Sounds exactly like my BRZ with FI.

Also, track prepping a BRZ is really as simple as camber bolts, thicker oil and better brake pads/fluid for most of us. Maybe wheels, tires and oil coolers. You don't need to do anything else, it's very much like the STI in that way for $10,000 less.

People do crazy things to wrxs, stis, m3s, gtrs and sell them too. Look at the nasioc classifieds. There is a 530WHP fully built and track prepped sti for sale for 25k on the first page. There are always cars with crazy blood, sweat and money spent being sold for peanuts. This insanity occurs everywhere in the car modding community. Why do people do this? Because we all are brain washed consumers that need to consume more and more. Better and faster and shinier and etc. Hedonic adaptation.
So the GTR is compromised because it is AWD? What about the Evo? Porsche Carrera? Golf R? A car does not have to be RWD. In fact many people prefer the Fiesta ST which is FWD vs the twins for fun factor.

At any rate, all economy based sporty cars are going to have compromises. Of course the WRX does as it is going to be heavier and larger than say a Lotus Elise. But the twins are far from not being compromised either. Day one the power displacement was a compromise. And yes, you can spend a ton of money modifying the car to give it much better performance, but at that point you can get yourself in a much faster car that is stock. The upcoming Miata ND is going to be significantly lighter than the twins, does that make the FR-S/BRZ compromised too?

The twins are really fun cars, and I agree are inexpensive to track. But the premise that it is cheap and easy to add power is somewhat misleading. I followed Dezoris from day one and I felt he was one of the more honest people here when discussing modifications in terms of time, money, and pain points. I suspect this one of the reasons why you see so many modified twins being sold, some of them with very low miles and heavily modified less than a year.

I love fun RWD cars. I would love to add an S2K, Miata, twin to my garage again at some point, but I view these types of cars as toys that will simply get driven much less than say a WRX because they are very impractical where I live, and especially since I have a family.
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Old 03-16-2015, 09:55 AM   #340
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I love fun RWD cars. I would love to add an S2K, Miata, twin to my garage again at some point, but I view these types of cars as toys that will simply get driven much less than say a WRX because they are very impractical where I live, and especially since I have a family.
I agree with this 100%. I too sold my BRZ for a 15 WRX. While I do miss my BRZ, I have no regrets getting the WRX. Its quick, handles corners very well and is much more practical then the BRZ ever was.
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Old 03-16-2015, 11:18 AM   #341
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I'd love to be @DSOmegaX, but I think I might be joining @thill and @TONYpepperon1 when the 2016's come out.

I don't suppose any of you have any thoughts on the CVT compared to the auto in the BRZ?
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Old 03-16-2015, 11:19 AM   #342
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I'd love to be @DSOmegaX, but I think I might be joining @thill and @TONYpepperon1 when the 2016's come out.

I don't suppose any of you have any thoughts on the CVT compared to the auto in the BRZ?
Ive never driven an auto brz but the CVT is terrible. Its like a goat with two heads. Unnatural.
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Old 03-16-2015, 11:20 AM   #343
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I haven't driven the WRX CVT, but I've driven their XV CVT. It's pretty smooth and not as odd as older ones. It almost feels like it has ratios.
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Old 03-16-2015, 02:21 PM   #344
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So the GTR is compromised because it is AWD? What about the Evo? Porsche Carrera? Golf R? A car does not have to be RWD. In fact many people prefer the Fiesta ST which is FWD vs the twins for fun factor.

Gtr and Porsche? Not so much, they are purpose built machines and expensive. Evo and golf r? Absolutely because both are built to a low price point and thus based on fwd econoboxes and there is only so much you can do with fwd. Why didn't they just go rwd? The chassis isn't setup for it. Awd and torque vectoring is an awesome tool for chassis setup which can make up for a lot. Im not saying any of these cars are bad but i think a dedicated sports car chassis makes for a superior sports car rather than building on top of an econobox. This should be a duh statement. People prefer a fiesta over a twin eh? Ok, it's not a bad car either but unless you think it's a superior sports car, I don't know what you're trying to say. Some people hate beer and like licking buttholes. People can be weird.

At any rate, all economy based sporty cars are going to have compromises. Of course the WRX does as it is going to be heavier and larger than say a Lotus Elise. But the twins are far from not being compromised either. Day one the power displacement was a compromise. And yes, you can spend a ton of money modifying the car to give it much better performance, but at that point you can get yourself in a much faster car that is stock. The upcoming Miata ND is going to be significantly lighter than the twins, does that make the FR-S/BRZ compromised too?

A ton of money modifing the car to make a twin scary fast? Get outta here. Just because you can't chip it to 300whp doesn't mean the twins aren't extremely easy to mod. I still don't think you know the meaning of "compromised" in the context of this discussion, let me modify my use. Of course the brz makes compromises...it's small, low ground clearance, not torquey, under-tired, no luxury, harsh ride, etc. how many of these matter? ONLY YOU CAN DECIDE. That's why they make so many kinds of car. In my opinion, the wrx does family car better than the brz but it definately does not do sports car better than the brz. Do you think the wrx does everything better?

The twins are really fun cars, and I agree are inexpensive to track. But the premise that it is cheap and easy to add power is somewhat misleading. I followed Dezoris from day one and I felt he was one of the more honest people here when discussing modifications in terms of time, money, and pain points. I suspect this one of the reasons why you see so many modified twins being sold, some of them with very low miles and heavily modified less than a year.

The reason you see so many modified twins being sold is that's where you are looking. It's just your own bias. People heavily mod cars and sell them all the time. Look at the c7 stingray boards. Tons of cars for sale. People can be very stupid when it comes to cars and money.

Dez was a relatively early adopter, you are going to have an expensive painful time blazing a path and being first. Nowadays, the path to 300hp is pretty cheap and easy. You can even do it on stock injectors! You do realize that track prepping a wrx will be quite an expensive endeavor to do right? It's a great street car but there is a reason the sti exists. I'm not sure why a FI brz has to be track ready to compare to a wrx which is far from it anyway.


I love fun RWD cars. I would love to add an S2K, Miata, twin to my garage again at some point, but I view these types of cars as toys that will simply get driven much less than say a WRX because they are very impractical where I live, and especially since I have a family.

Yeah me too. I had a 1997 wrx, 2002 wrx, 2004 sti and 2008 sti before I decided to go with a brz and forester. I know all about the goodness of the wrx/sti, they just can't compete with two more focused cars which is where I am in life right now. This should be a duh statement.
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Old 03-16-2015, 08:41 PM   #345
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Evo and golf r? Absolutely because both are built to a low price point and thus based on fwd econoboxes and there is only so much you can do with fwd. Why didn't they just go rwd? The chassis isn't setup for it. Awd and torque vectoring is an awesome tool for chassis setup which can make up for a lot. Im not saying any of these cars are bad but i think a dedicated sports car chassis makes for a superior sports car rather than building on top of an econobox.
But neither of those AWD cars are tuned anywhere close to their handling limit, and they generally don't exhibit FWD tendencies, and they handle quite well, both objectively and subjectively. Ironically some of the earlier reviews of the twins compared its steering to the Evo.
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Old 03-16-2015, 08:59 PM   #346
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Returning to the seat *issue*. I just drove my BRZ 1000 miles in 1 day (FL to NJ).. and 1000 miles a week ago (NJ to FL). Wasn't planning to, but the truck broke down the day before the trip (Daytona Bike Week).

And.. I was comfortable the whole way. No way would I survive the trip if I was in the stock WRX seat. I'm sure some folks find it comfy enough, but not me.. BRZ seats FTW!

Oh and I had fun and it was very easy to get around traffic creators (the a-holes squatting in left lane at speed limit.. or lower).

AND... I averaged 33mpg on the trip.
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Old 03-16-2015, 10:22 PM   #347
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I come from a long line of WRX and STi. I had the opportunity to drive my friends stock FRS for a week because I am on the fence about buying a BRZ or E90 (yes, i want the 4 door) M3. My 2012 WRX has more practical usable power on a daily basis. The AWD is practical; I get about 21-23 mpg on an average of city driving. It is a lot easier to fit more people in the WRX because it has more room and has four doors. I hate pulling my seat forward all the time to let others in. Now, however, I do like the steering wheel of the FRS better. The seat is more comfortable. You feel like you sit low even though it has the same clearance as a WRX. The seating position is spot on. The torque doe, i mean lack of it is a nuisance unless I'm in a lower gear. But if you ever own a few Honda, revving the crap out of it is an enjoyment so that doesn't bother me so much. If your single, I think the Twin is an awesome car for a young, inexperience driver. Just remember about the cost of ownership between the two. Insurance on a WRX will cost more then a BRZ in general, variables play a factor of course, could be vice versa. I'm 30 so my insurance is first cheap, $80 for full coverage and all the side trimmings for my WRX, USAA.
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Old 04-13-2015, 01:23 PM   #348
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Reviving a dead thread.

After much debate, I traded in my BRZ for a '15 STi. The desire for more space, a quieter cabin, and more torque/hp won out in the end. The STi is absolutely excellent. Grip levels are high, handling is sharp, engine is smooth, and the AWD system is absolutely confidence inspiring. On top of that, my kid fits in the back with room to spare.

But, owning an STi (and driving it on the same canyon roads that I'd driven the BRZ on many many times) has also made me realize just how great the BRZ is. The 86 is so communicative, and making it do what you want is effortless. It's an absolute blast to drive (especially once you do something about that torque dip), and IMHO a hell of a deal.

I'm pretty much just repeating what some people above have already said, but "BRZ v. WRX" is ultimately going to depend on what you're looking for. Both are excellent cars, just different. You can't really go wrong with either, unless you're trying to fit your family of 4 into your BRZ for an extended road trip. Then you're going to have a bad time.
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Old 04-13-2015, 04:39 PM   #349
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LOL. Just took a family of four on a road trip. Yes, it sucked, but I got a track day out of it.
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Old 04-13-2015, 05:52 PM   #350
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Reviving a dead thread.

After much debate, I traded in my BRZ for a '15 STi. The desire for more space, a quieter cabin, and more torque/hp won out in the end. The STi is absolutely excellent. Grip levels are high, handling is sharp, engine is smooth, and the AWD system is absolutely confidence inspiring. On top of that, my kid fits in the back with room to spare.

But, owning an STi (and driving it on the same canyon roads that I'd driven the BRZ on many many times) has also made me realize just how great the BRZ is. The 86 is so communicative, and making it do what you want is effortless. It's an absolute blast to drive (especially once you do something about that torque dip), and IMHO a hell of a deal.

I'm pretty much just repeating what some people above have already said, but "BRZ v. WRX" is ultimately going to depend on what you're looking for. Both are excellent cars, just different. You can't really go wrong with either, unless you're trying to fit your family of 4 into your BRZ for an extended road trip. Then you're going to have a bad time.
Am I the only one who doesn't think the BRZ is THAT bad in terms of inside noise? Maybe I'm used to econoboxes but then again, I did own an IS300 at one point.

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